Arab Knesset leader: Don't call me 'a demographic problem'

In an interview with Al-Monitor, Joint List Chair Ayman Odeh argues that calling for the preservation of a Jewish majority in Israel excludes Arabs from public discourse.
Ayman Odeh, head of the Joint Arab List, poses before the filming of a television campaign ad in Tel Aviv, March 8, 2015. A political sideshow for much of the past six decades, Israel's Arab minority is hoping to gain much-needed muscle after next week's parliamentary election, with four Arab parties uniting under one banner for the first time. Surveys show the Joint Arab List could even finish third in the vote and become a factor in the coalition-building that dominates Israeli politics, where no party ha
Ayman Odeh, head of the Joint Arab List, poses before the filming of a television campaign ad in Tel Aviv, March 8, 2015. - REUTERS/Baz Ratner
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Shlomi Eldar
@shlomieldar
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Ever since he was elected chairman of the Joint List, which is made up mainly of Arab parties, in January, Knesset member Ayman Odeh has set himself a goal to fight the delegitimization of the Arab population in Israel and attacks related to their citizenship by various right-wing sectors.

Since the March 17 general election and the Joint List’s electoral success — which garnered 13 Knesset seats and became the third-largest party in the parliament — Odeh has discovered that the challenges facing him are not confined only to coping with Israel’s right-wing groups that regard Arab Israelis as a menace. He also faces entire sectors in the Israeli left that share, according to him, the same offensive discourse.

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