MembersGive Muslims a Chance

Earlier this week, another crisis took place in the coalition, threatening to further destabilize its already brittle standing. On Sunday (July 11), senior member of the Islamic Ra’am faction, Waleed Taha, announced via Twitter that he had informed the coalition that the party’s MKs would boycott Knesset committee discussions and not vote on bills in the plenum for the time being. This decision came against the background of Ra’am’s increasing frustration with the coalition since joining it to ensure that a government would be formed just a month ago.

More specifically, the source of Ra’am’s frustrations stems from the fact that incessant violent crime in Arab society and the legalization of Bedouin unrecognized villages in the Negev, two of the central issues concerning the Islamist party as well as the main drivers of its willingness to join the coalition, have received very little attention thus far. In addition, the party’s members feel cheated, following the leaked information that senior members in the coalition are secretly negotiating with the Joint Arab List, which currently...