In '92, Hadash attacked the government and voted for it. Could that work today?

The article compares Hadash and Mada's support for Rabin's government in 1992 with the possibility of an Arab safety net for a government that would replace Netanyahu. The author, Dr. Mayson Arshid Shahada, examines the debate between Yosef Jabarin (the Joint List) and Mansour Abbas (Ra'am) over the nature of support, and points to the exclusion by the change camp as the central difference from the past.

The article, by Dr. Mayson Arshid Shahada, compares Hadash and Mada's support for Rabin's government in 1992 with the contemporary possibility of an Arab safety net for an alternative government to Netanyahu. The author describes Tawfiq Ziad's historic speech in the Knesset on July 13, 1992, where he attacked the government's basic principles but declared support out of "hope." She notes that Hadash and Mada completed a blocking bloc of 61 seats, but Rabin formed a coalition with Meretz and Shas. The dependency only arose after Shas's departure in 1993, and the Arab parties enabled the approval of the Oslo Accords. The author examines the current debate between Yosef Jabarin, who promised a safety net, and Mansour Abbas, who criticizes the proposal as "illusions" and demands full coalition partnership. The central difference, she argues, is not on the Arab side but on the Israeli side: while in 1992 the Labor Party was not ashamed of Arab support and provided written commitments, today the exclusion comes from within the change camp itself – Golan, Lieberman, Bennett, and Eisenkot reject partnership with the Arab parties or set restrictive conditions. The author calls on both sides to present clear conditions and avoid merely choosing the lesser evil.