Israel's top court signals it will ban Palestinian candidate Abu Shehadeh from election

Israel's Supreme Court has signalled that it will uphold a decision to bar Palestinian politician Sami Abu Shehadeh from this month's parliamentary elections, in a move that reflects how Israel's judiciary legitimises the political exclusion of Palestinian citizens of Israel while allowing extremist Israeli politicians to stand.

During a hearing in occupied Jerusalem, a nine-judge panel urged Abu Shehadeh, the leader of the Balad party and the third candidate on the Joint List, to withdraw his candidacy rather than face a formal ruling disqualifying him from the election.

Chief Justice Yitzhak Amit said the judges had discussed the case and that a majority appeared to support upholding the Central Elections Committee's decision to disqualify Abu Shehadeh.

"There is a consensus among the judges that the things written by candidate Sami Abu Shehadeh are painful, offensive and repugnant," Amit said, referring to an opinion article published in The New Arab's Arabic language edition Al-Araby Al-Jadeed on 8 October 2023, a day after the Hamas-led attacks on Israel.

He added that although the judges held differing views, the likely outcome was to uphold the disqualification.

The court consequently recommended that Abu Shehadeh reconsider whether to remain a candidate, potentially avoiding the need for a written judgment explaining the decision.

No final ruling had been issued at the time of the announcement.

The Joint List condemned Thursday's proceedings as a political trial, saying the court was yielding to pressure from Israel's far right and sections of the Zionist opposition.

The Palestinian-led electoral alliance pledged to respond by mobilising voters ahead of the 27 October election, saying attempts to exclude its candidates would not silence Palestinian political representation.

"The essence of what happened is the prevention of an Arab political leader from contesting the elections and an infringement of our people's right to choose their representatives," the alliance said in a statement.

It accused the court of giving judicial cover to a campaign of political persecution led by the far right and supported by sections of the Zionist opposition.

The alliance maintained that there were no legal grounds to disqualify Abu Shehadeh and that the court's position had contradicted the standards it had established in previous electoral disqualification cases.

It noted that the proceedings was part of a wider crackdown on Palestinian citizens of Israel, including doctors, nurses, teachers, drivers and students who have faced consequences for expressing their political views.

The Joint List also noted that Israeli authorities were targeting those who oppose the war on Gaza, occupation of the West Bank, the continued killing and starvation of civilians, while politicians advocating violence and the forced displacement of Palestinians continue to hold positions of power.

"Our legitimacy comes from our people, the justice of our cause and our struggle, and it cannot be taken away by a political or judicial decision," the alliance said.

It pledged to confront attempts at political exclusion through collective action and greater participation in the 27 October election.

Adalah warns of discriminatory treatment of Palestinian candidates

The Haifa-based Palestinian rights organisation Adalah, which is representing Abu Shehadeh, warned ahead of Thursday's hearing that the disqualification proceedings were discriminatory and contradicted established legal standards.

In a statement on Wednesday, the organisation said Israel's Central Elections Committee had voted to disqualify every Arab electoral list while allowing far-right Jewish-Israeli parties to contest the election, despite evidence of incitement to violence against Palestinians.

Adalah argued that approving the decisions would establish separate legal standards for Palestinian and Jewish-Israeli candidates seeking to exercise their electoral rights.

The organisation pointed to evidence presented against National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir's Otzma Yehudit party and the Religious Zionist Party, including statements by party leaders and representatives encouraging violence against Palestinians, the killing and starvation of civilians in Gaza, and attacks on Israeli Supreme Court judges.

Despite this evidence, the Central Elections Committee and Israeli Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara concluded that there were insufficient legal grounds to disqualify either party.

Adalah noted that the attorney general had acknowledged that Ben-Gvir's statements and actions brought his party "dangerously close to the forbidden zone", but had nevertheless found that they did not meet the legal threshold for disqualification.

By contrast, Abu Shehadeh faces exclusion primarily over a single opinion article in Al-Araby Al-Jadeed. Adalah noted that the article had contained no explicit call for violence or armed struggle and that its only call for action was for a political process.

It also argued that the Central Elections Committee had disregarded Abu Shehadeh's parliamentary record and extensive evidence of his longstanding opposition to violence and the killing of civilians

Abu Shehadeh warned of wider campaign to silence Palestinians

In an exclusive interview with The New Arab on Wednesday, Abu Shehadeh warned that attempts to disqualify him and the Arab electoral slates were part of a wider campaign to suppress Palestinian political representation in Israel.

He said that the campaign against him had extended beyond Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's governing coalition to sections of the Zionist opposition, including Yair Golan's Democrats party.

"The Zionist consensus stretching from Yair Golan to Itamar Ben-Gvir against me, demanding my exclusion as a representative of Balad and the Arab minority, is extremely revealing," he told The New Arab.

"These different Zionist factions are trying to impose a single narrative that allows no dissent."

Abu Shehadeh said the campaign was intended to silence those who challenge Israeli policies towards Palestinians in Gaza, the occupied West Bank, East Jerusalem and Israel itself.

He rejected allegations that he had endorsed violence or armed struggle, insisting that Balad's political programme was based on democratic participation, equality and international law.

"Neither Balad nor I have ever advocated violence or armed struggle; our programme is entirely political and democratic," he said.

He also warned that the Supreme Court faced a test of its independence amid growing pressure from Israel's far right.

"If the court functions as a genuinely independent legal institution and adheres strictly to jurisprudence, there are no legal grounds to disqualify me, Dr Ofer Cassif or the Arab slates," he said.

Asked what he would do if the court upheld his disqualification, Abu Shehadeh said he would continue working to secure the Joint List's success in the election.

"If the disqualification stands, I will do everything I can to ensure the Joint List's success," he told The New Arab.