What's a Palestinian vote worth?
Media speculation has focused on whether or not the forthcoming Israeli elections will help or hinder the quest for peace and a resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Personally, I don’t expect Tuesday’s ballot to have any profound effects on the status quo of the conflict. However, missing from this equation, as so often is the case, is what the elections mean for Israel’s Arab minority, which constitutes a full fifth of the country’s population.
At first sight, their situation appears to be the very definition of a no-win situation.
“I have yet to make a decision regarding which would be the best of two evils – a Zionist Camp government or a Netanyahu government,” says Mimas Abdelhai, a young university student from al-Tirah, which lies in what is known as the “Arab triangle”. “The more racist the Israeli government gets, the more the international arena understands Palestinian suffering.”
Israeli-Palestinian coalition of political parties seek big win in elections
This reflects the widely held conviction among Palestinian-Israelis that, when it comes to Israel’s Arab citizens, the main difference between the Israeli centre(-left) and the right is one of honesty. This broad-based anti-Arabism manifested itself in the recent witch hunt against Balad Knesset member Hanin Zoabi.
Source: www.aljazeera.com