Jewish ex-police official joins Arab-Israeli party ahead of election

TEL AVIV – Mansour Abbas, the head of the moderate Islamist party Raam, announced on Monday that former Israeli police official Yoav Segalovitz will run on Raam’s list in the upcoming elections. This makes Segalovitz the first Jewish Israeli to stand for an explicitly Arab party. Raam’s platform for the Oct 27 election is centered around anti-crime measures, and Abbas chose Segalovitz for his proven track record in combating crime.

Segalovitz, who previously served as a member of the Knesset with centrist Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid party, had been a deputy minister of national security under Lapid and right-winger Naftali Bennett. In 2021, Abbas signed an unprecedented accord joining Lapid’s coalition government, which helped secure billions of dollars for Israel’s Arab minority. However, the agreement was met with criticism from some Arab Israelis and Jewish voters who saw it as a betrayal.

Segalovitz acknowledged the troubled history between Arabs and Jews in Israel, but expressed optimism about the possibility of political cooperation. He stated that while there are significant differences, it is still possible to create trust, recognize those differences, and commit to joint action. Abbas, in turn, emphasized the importance of seeing the other and stated that Raam is not afraid of change, actively pushing for it.

The latest polls suggest Raam could win five or six seats out of the 120-member Knesset. In response, the right-wing Likud party, led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, accused Abbas of refusing to recognize Hamas and Hezbollah as terrorist organizations and pushing for the creation of a Palestinian state.