Leader of the Arab Ra'am party MK Mansour Abbas is inclined to refrain from recommending any candidate to receive the mandate to form the next government when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's time runs out at midnight Tuesday, Israel Hayom has learned.
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However, officials in Ra'am said that a decision to recommend one candidate or another might be made after a round of telephone consultations.
However, members of the Joint Arab List, from which Ra'am split prior to the March 23 Knesset election, were worried that Ra'am has closed a deal with the Likud to recommend Yamina leader Naftali Bennett and prevent the mandate from being handed to Yesh Atid leader Yair Lapid.
A high-ranking official in the Joint Arab List told Israel Hayom that "there is no chance we will recommend Bennett. Most of the Joint List MKs want to recommend Yair Lapid, but the decision will be made, again, at the last minute. If Lapid doesn't have enough recommendations to receive the mandate – we will abstain."
Members of the Joint Arab List are angry at Abbas. The Hadash party put out a message saying that "What is most important is to fight fascism and Jewish supremacy, not give into them."
The Hadash message condemned statements by Abbas that the party said were "designed to be accepted by the radical settler fascist Right … to accept it [Ra'am] as a partner in a government to rescue Netanyahu."
"Hadash rejects MK Abbas' stance that denies the right of the Palestinian people to oppose the occupation and the settlements, and condemns it as 'violence and terrorism.' We oppose any attacks on civilians, and support the right of the Palestinian people to fight the greatest terrorism, which is the occupation."
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