High Court begins hearings on ban of Arab parties and candidates from Oct. 27 election

By Ariela Karmel

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1 October 2026, 11:17 am

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Ariela Karmel is a political correspondent at The Times of Israel. She previously reported for Calcalist and Haaretz. She holds an MA in Middle Eastern and African History from Tel Aviv University and a BA in Political Science from the University of British Columbia.

A hearing at the Supreme Court in Jerusalem on the Central Elections Committee’s decision to disqualify Arab parties and candidates from running in the upcoming elections, October 1, 2026. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

The High Court of Justice begins hearings on the disqualification of Arab parties and candidates from the October 27 election, as protesters gather outside the Supreme Court.

An expanded panel of nine justices is set to consider the Central Elections Committee’s decisions last week to disqualify Balad chairman Sami Abou Shahadeh and Hadash MK Ofer Cassif, as well as Mansour Abbas’s Ra’am party and the Joint List — a bloc made up of Balad, Hadash and Ta’al. The court is beginning with Abou Shahadeh’s case, followed by Cassif, the Joint List and Ra’am later today.

Outside the court, protesters demonstrate against the disqualifications while Cassif tells the crowd ahead of the hearings that they will “bring justice, peace and a prosperous future for all our children — Palestinians and Israelis, Jews and Arabs.”

“We will defeat fascism, and it will be thrown into the dustbin of history,” he adds.

National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, whose far-right Otzma Yehudit party petitioned to disqualify Abou Shahadeh, arrives at the court wearing a lawyer’s robe alongside party No. 2 Tally Gotliv, also a lawyer, to represent the party in the proceedings.

“Sami Abu Shehadeh cannot be a member of Knesset. A supporter of terrorism belongs in prison, not in the Knesset,” Ben Gvir says, arguing that the Balad leader “supported” the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack.

Most of the rulings are expected to be overturned with the exception of the ban on Abou Shahadeh, whose disqualification was supported by Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara over an article he published a day after October 7 that she said expressed support for armed struggle against Israel. CEC chairman and Supreme Court Justice Noam Sohlberg, as well as parties across the Zionist opposition, also supported barring him.

Abou Shahadeh denies supporting violence or terrorism and argues that the article does not provide grounds for disqualifying him.