The Center-Left has been having a field day recently over Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's "discovery" of the Arab Israeli electorate. Their excitement was, of course, immediately channeled into hateful statements and social media posts – look at Netanyahu, using Arab Israelis to further his political agenda.
Follow Israel Hayom on Facebook and Twitter
Truth be told, the dialogue and political integration with the Arabs sector is the good news we have been waiting for.
In Judea and Samaria, it happened a long time ago. Those who live here know that the Arabs are part of us. We're not going anywhere and they have no specific plans to disappear, either. Anyone who talks to Palestinians on the ground knows that the Palestinian Authority is irrelevant and that both sides still suffer from its inception.
For the most part, the average Palestinian in the West Bank actually hoped that Israel's plan to extend sovereignty to parts of Judea and Samaria and the Jordan Valley would be implemented and that they would be given the option to extract themselves from the PA's clutches.
Peace with the Emirates and Islamic states around the world dwarfs the PA in comparison with Israel. This is not new but the Left has failed to understand that. First, the Left didn't like it when settlers and Palestinian became friends without promising to evict their homes; the Left blistered at the peace deals with Dubai and Morocco because they excluded the Palestinian issue, and now the Left is a heartbeat away from railing against Arab Israelis who acknowledge Netanyahu as Israel's leader.
For the Left to survive the next elections, it would have to understand that peace cannot be the result of actions by leaders who exploit grief-stricken civilians on both sides of the conflict – only from deals the likes of which Netanyahu has struck, negotiated from a position of power.
Netanyahu has pulled the last rug from under the Left's feet and it has been rendered hollow. For years, the Right has been trying to explain that it has nothing against peace – that it supports peace and wants it, and that its religious partners pray for it daily – but until now, no one has been able to prove it. Add to that some unfortunate statements, including by Netanyahu himself, and the Right has never been able to shake off the burden of proof.
Anyone who listened to Netanyahu's UN speech in 2018 remembers that he said that the one good thing that has come out of the Iranian threat is that we discovered Islamic states that wanted to be our allies. The Palestinian leadership does not see Israel as an ally – it feels closer to the Iranians.
The Left is threatened by Netanyahu, but this is just the beginning. At the moment, the Palestinian leadership depends on the Israeli left, but Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is not getting any younger and whoever follows him in Ramallah may seek to align themselves with the UAE rather than with the militant forces in Hebron, which won't the Palestinians get on with their lives. But if that happens, what will the Left do?
Subscribe to Israel Hayom's daily newsletter and never miss our top stories!
