With just 15 days till Israel's next election, former Joint Arab List MK and current Balad party chairman Jamal Zahalka joined host Jacob Bardugo for another installment of Israel Hayom's new political podcast.
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"The polls show the Likud receiving two Knesset seats. People are lying to the polls out of anger. People told me they're voting for Abu Yair [Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu], and that is out of protest. Let's meet up after the elections, and I will show you that half a Knesset seat will vote for Likud," he told Bardugo.
Asked whether Arab Israeli lawmakers would recommend Yesh Atid party leader Yair Lapid for prime minister, Zahalka said, "No, we haven't decided any such thing. We don't see him as a serious candidate for the premiership. If there will be a serious nominee, we'll discuss it. Right now, we in Balad are against it."
As for New Hope leader Gideon Sa'ar, Zahalka said, "From a political perspective, he's a very radical person, more radical than Netanyahu. He is for a Greater Israel, and an alliance cannot be made with him."
Asked whether the Joint Arab List may wind up without a candidate to recommend for the role of prime minister and as a result recommend no one, Zahalka said, "That could very well be," noting there was a 95% chance that would be the case.
As for the mass protests in the northern town of Umm al-Fahm over the Israel Police's treatment of crime within the community, Friday, Zahalha said, "There have always been protests against violence. A year ago, there were really big protests in Majd al-Krum, and then the government came out with promises, but the Arab public has had enough of talk. They aren't reading the map. The government helped crime organizations in the Arab sector by taking out their competitors in the Jewish sector."
According to Zahalka, "The ones who sell drugs in Jewish communities are Arab crime organizations. They opened up the market to them. Why are they doing that? It's very simple: It's part of their usual discrimination policy."
The Balad chairman said, "The time has come for there also to be demonstrations and calls to rein in crime organizations in Jewish communities. This is not just the Arabs' problem. What happens when, for example, a Jewish person is murdered by these crime organizations? The government catches the murderers within a number of days."
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