Middle East Eye spoke to Antony Loewenstein, an independent journalist, film-maker and author of The Palestine Laboratory, about the Israeli election results.
“There's not really any major or even significant difference between Netanyahu and the so-called opposition on any of the key issues, Iran, Lebanon, Gaza, the West Bank, and in some ways, although at this point it's obviously unclear who won and Netanyahu seems to be slightly ahead with his block, but obviously that could change in the coming days or weeks,” Loewenstein told MEE.
“But really what that says, I think is something much bigger. Which is that a sizeable proportion, if not the majority of Israeli Jewish voters do not want to engage with Arabs, do not want Arabs in government, do not believe in any self-determination for Arabs, and not want any real change between the West Bank and Gaza, and in fact a sizeable proportion if not a majority, want to get rid of all Arabs from Palestine and as many Arabs from Israel itself.”
“Which really I think speaks to the fact that the issue in Israel as many people like me have been saying for years, is not just about Netanyahu. Obviously, it's very significant that the Arab parties have won hugely, and that's probably because many Palestinians voted in Israel, and also probably more left-wing Israelis, including some Israeli Jewish friends of mine who wanted to support the Arab Parties.
“And in a sane country, those voters and those parties would have representation in a government, or at least in a sizable opposition. But at this current point it's very hard to see if that will happen because both major parties, the opposition and Netanyahu, have refused doing so. So really it just shows that Jewish supremacy is the law of the land,” Loewenstein concluded.