A recent poll by Statnet, a research and polling institute specializing in the Arab sector, asked what party Arabs would vote for if the Joint List split into its four constituent parties: Hadash, Ra’am, Balad and Ta’al. The results, which were released last week, had one particularly curious finding. They showed that 25.% of respondents would vote for a Jewish party rather than one of the Arab parties that make up the Joint List.

While the finding is, undoubtedly intriguing, it should come as no surprise to anyone who follows Arab society in Israel, especially the developments of the last few months, since the rotation government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Benny Gantz was formed — one that turned out to be all Netanyahu in everything but name.

The poll’s question was completely theoretical. It is fairly safe to assume that the Joint List will not break up into its constituent parties, if only because of the high electoral threshold of 3.25%. Talks are now taking place in the home of Mohammad Barakeh, chairman of the steering committee, to ensure that the parties run together again.

Nevertheless, it is hard to ignore the fact that a quarter of the respondents answered that they would vote for a Jewish party after the Joint Party won a 15-seat record in the March 2020 election. However, in April 2019, when the parties ran as two separate lists (Hadash-Ta’al and Ra’am-Balad), 28.4% of Arab voters cast their ballots for Jewish parties, particularly Meretz (8.7%) and the Blue and White Party (8.1%). In the September 2019 election, 20% of Arab voters cast their ballots for Jewish parties. It should be emphasized that Arab voters do not like supporting parties that cannot pass the electoral threshold.