Joint List backs Matan Kahana for Knesset speaker in bid to unseat Ohana

The Arab-led Joint List will vote for Matan Kahana, a lawmaker from the Yashar party, to become the next speaker of the Knesset, Israel's parliament, one of its senior members said on Tuesday. Haaretz reported that Ahmad Tibi, who heads one of the factions within the Joint List, announced the party's support, a move the paper said could hand Gadi Eisenkot's political bloc enough votes to remove the current speaker, Amir Ohana of Likud, and take over the Knesset leadership before any new government is in place.

The announcement came on the day the 26th Knesset was due to be sworn in. At a party faction meeting held before the afternoon ceremony, Joint List lawmaker Yousef Jabareen said his party would work to keep Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his allies out of power, The Times of Israel reported. Ynet carried a short alert quoting Jabareen as saying the party would send the Netanyahu government home and would be a safety net for its public.

Why the speaker's chair matters

The Knesset speaker presides over the chamber, controls its agenda and runs its sessions. Ohana, a member of Netanyahu's Likud party, has held the post. According to Haaretz, a successful vote for Kahana would give the Eisenkot-led bloc control of parliament's leadership while coalition talks are still under way, rather than leaving that position in Likud's hands during the transition.

The push to replace Ohana was already in motion. A Times of Israel liveblog entry the same day reported that Yashar had submitted the signatures of more than 61 members of Knesset demanding a vote on replacing the speaker. A figure of 61 represents a majority in the chamber. The reports do not say whether Joint List lawmakers were among those signatories, or how many of the signatures would depend on them.

Who spoke for the Joint List

Two Joint List figures appear in the reports. Ahmad Tibi, described by Haaretz as the leader of a faction within the party, is the one Haaretz cites on the decision to back Kahana. Yousef Jabareen is the lawmaker quoted by The Times of Israel and Ynet on the broader aim of ending Netanyahu's government. The Joint List is an alliance of Arab-led parties, which is why Haaretz refers to Tibi heading a faction inside it.

Jabareen told the faction meeting that Arab voters, whose participation in the recent election he described as high, had given the party a mandate to help bring down what he called the government of Netanyahu, Ben Gvir and Smotrich. He was referring to the prime minister and his far-right coalition partners. According to The Times of Israel, he accused that government of having made life miserable for Arab citizens over recent years and described it as "malicious."

What "safety net" means here

In Israeli politics, a "safety net" usually refers to a party that supports a government from outside the coalition, voting with it on key motions without taking cabinet posts. Jabareen used the phrase, but in the account published by The Times of Israel he applied it mainly to Arab citizens themselves: the party, he said, would protect them against rising crime, home demolitions, unequal allocation of state resources, racism, police violence and limits on free expression.

The Ynet alert renders his words more briefly, as the party being a safety net for "our public." Neither report quotes Jabareen saying the Joint List would serve as a parliamentary safety net for a specific alternative government, and readers should not take that from his remarks as reported.

What the reports do not say

• None of the reports gives a date for the vote on replacing Ohana, or a full count of the votes Kahana expects to receive.
• No response from Ohana, Likud, Kahana, Yashar or Eisenkot to the Joint List's announcement has been reported.
• The reports do not say whether the Joint List's support extends beyond the speaker vote to backing a future government led by Eisenkot's bloc, or on what terms.
• It is not clear from the material whether all factions within the Joint List have agreed to the position Tibi announced.