Before the election in Israel: What does left mean in Israel?

A café in the heart of the liberal metropolis of Tel Aviv. The journalist and activist Noam Sheizaf sits at one of the tables and wants the left-liberal party, of which he has recently become a member, to move further to the left. He lists why he joined the Democrats: “Women’s rights, religious freedom, a focus on environmental protection.”

So far, so normal for a leftist in a left-liberal party. Then he says: “As far as the Palestinians are concerned, I am of course on the far left within the party.”

In Israel today, whether you are left or right is defined less by questions of distribution, even though rents and living costs are very high, but above all by: What is your attitude to national security and to the Palestinians?

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Today, only a few people in the country would even describe themselves as left-wing: in a survey by the Israel Democracy Institute (IDI) from 2025, just under 13 percent of Jewish respondents were. Almost 60 percent, however, describe themselves as right-wing. The numbers are even clearer among younger people: in another IDI survey, three out of four 18- to 24-year-olds called themselves right-wing.

Noam Sheizaf, in his early 50s, is a convinced leftist. As a journalist, he co-founded +972 Magazine, internationally known for his critical reporting on Israel's actions in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Some accuse the media of engaging in anti-Israel activism. Sheizaf recently made a documentary about the divided city of Hebron in the West Bank. The situation of the Palestinians is close to his heart; his position is clear: the issue of the occupation must be moved up the agenda – including in the Democratic Party.

At that time he was still part of the Meretz party. The Democrats emerged in 2024 from the merger of Meretz and the Avoda workers' party. Avoda dominated Israel's politics at one point, until the 1970s and again briefly in the 1990s. But recently both parties had lost so much popularity that a merger seemed necessary.

Even before October 7, 2023, some were calling Yair Golan a traitor. For example, because he publicly opposed the judicial reform of the current right-wing government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Security is the most important issue for many. And that often means: support for military solutions. “Our national security is directly linked to the peace process and a negotiated solution with the Palestinians,” says Sheizaf. “In the Israeli consciousness there is a separation between national security and peace,” he says.

His party needs to sharpen things up, he emphasizes. “The right-wing parties are campaigning with a very clear agenda, a very radical ideology,” says Sheizaf. The parties to the center and to the left, on the other hand, find it difficult to conduct an ideological election campaign - “a tactical mistake,” he emphasizes. “Elections,” he says, “are a competition of ideas.”

Someone who has a lot of ideas is in tenth place on the list. About 60 kilometers north of Tel Aviv, Soumaya Bashir sits on her sofa in the village of Jatt. Jatt is inhabited entirely by Arab Israelis and borders the barrier that separates Israel from the West Bank. In the twilight outside the living room window, the mosques glow green on the horizon.

She emphasized that she got her place on the list through the primaries within the Democratic Party. And this despite who she is, or perhaps because of it: Arab, Palestinian, Israeli, Muslim, feminist. It is unusual for an Arab candidate to be on the list of a Zionist party - and even more so if she wears the hijab.

Bashir speaks quickly, switching back and forth between Arabic, English, Hebrew. Her husband makes coffee and heats the coals for the shisha. She tells how she grew up in a religious family, really wanted to play the guitar, and eventually studied music therapy. How she got married, had three daughters, divorced and put her violent ex-husband behind bars.

How she met her second husband, who was living in London at the time and moved back to Israel for her. How she co-founded the organization “We Have No Other Country,” which advocates for partnership between Jewish and Arab Israelis. She was involved in “Women Fight for Peace” and took to the streets against violent crime in Arab society. And finally, they go one step further in their commitment.

Soumaya Bashir is not a completely new face in politics. In the 2000s, she joined the Arab, secular Ta'al party led by Ahmad Tibi. He supported her – until she wanted to stand for election. And, as she tells it, an older gentleman pushed her aside and had to withdraw her candidacy. “Arab masculinity” has suddenly reared its head, she told the Ha’aretz newspaper about the incident. Then she turned her back on Ta'al.

Ta'al is in the opposition out of conviction, like almost all other Arab parties. In 2021, the Muslim conservative Ra'am party made a splash when it joined the so-called "Government of Change" - a first for an Arab party. The coalition lasted less than two years. Since then, all Arab parties have been in opposition again.

For some of the Jewish parties, there are politicians in the Knesset whose native language is Arabic. But with only one exception, they are all members of Israel's Druze community. And because they mostly serve in the military and are considered loyal to Israel, they are not necessarily representative of many Muslim and Christian citizens.

The fact that Bashir joined the Democrats also has to do with her belief: isolation from the rest of Israeli society is damaging to the Arab community, she says. One of Bashir's ideas, on the other hand, was that Israeli citizenship for the more than two million Palestinians came with not only rights, but also responsibilities.

Like their Jewish fellow citizens, they should serve their country - not in the military, but in the so-called "National Service", the Israeli civilian service. The opposition from the Arab community, she says, is immense. Nevertheless, she holds on to it.

There is also criticism of party leader Yair Golan from the Arab and far left community: Golan, who served the Israeli military for almost 40 years and rose to one of the highest ranks, is himself a man of the system, of war, of occupation.

In order to really make a difference, you have to work from within the system, says Bashir. Arab parties have sat in the Knesset for decades, but the situation of Palestinians in Israel - higher crime rates, discrimination, fewer opportunities for good jobs - has not changed.

"The Arab parties talk primarily about the occupation. There are important problems to be solved in our own community," she says. For example, the wave of violence. The Democrats are campaigning on the topic - in Arabic and with a picture of Soumaya Bashir in her white hijab. “End organized crime,” it says.

Jatt, Bashir's hometown, and its surrounding area are also repeatedly the scene of violence. Around September, when a burned-out car was found on a dirt road near Jatt. The charred corpses of three young men from a nearby Arab town lay inside.

Maybe that's what it means to be left-wing today in an Israel that has moved so far to the right: to be pragmatic, to address concrete problems. Focus less on the big picture, where you can often achieve little.

According to surveys, the Democrats could win between eight and ten seats in the elections. So they have to form a coalition. In all likelihood, the parties in the anti-Netanyahu camp that are willing to govern would be available. And with the exception of the Ra'am party, they all tend to be located in the center and center-right.

Journalist and activist Noam Sheizaf says: “Everyone knows that compromises have to be made in order to form a government.” But he sticks to it: “That doesn’t mean having to argue from a weak position.”

We have to rely on peace, says Sheizaf. For peace you have to work together, says Bashir. And these are traditionally left-wing positions.