Arab party next leader of Israel’s left-wing camp?
With the Jewish left-wing parties crumbling, the Arab Joint List seeks to lead the camp and appeal also to Jewish voters.
In the late evening hours of April 13, minutes before the expiration of the midnight deadline for Blue and White party leader Benny Gantz to form a new government, President Reuven Rivlin’s office announced that he had granted Gantz’s request, endorsed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, for a 48-hour extension.
However, even if Gantz and Netanyahu form their power-sharing government by midnight on April 15, Gantz’s decision to join forces with Netanyahu and the nerve-wracking negotiations Netanyahu put him through in recent weeks have dealt the Israeli left a crushing blow. Gantz’s move, which resulted in the dismantling of his original Blue and White party, has left voters of the center-left disappointed and frustrated, some angry that their votes were “stolen” and handed to the Netanyahu bloc, and all realizing that the hope Gantz offered when he formed his center-left alternative to Netanyahu is dead.
