El pleno parlamentario de constitución de la nueva legislatura en Berlín tenía que ser una celebración para Elif Eralp. La candidata de Die Linke (La Izquierda) para gobernar la capital de Alemania veía este jueves cómo su amiga y compañera Hendrikje Klein era elegida presidenta de la Cámara. Pero las caras de Eralp y del resto de los diputados de la formación poscomunista mostraban poca alegría. El semanario Der Spiegelpublicó pocas horas antes un documento interno del partido en el que la posible futura alcaldesa de Berlín reconocía temer por su vida y la de su familia. El origen de su miedo son grupos radicales palestinos afines a Die Linke.
Berlin’s Left Party lead candidate for governing mayor, Elif Eralp, privately expressed fear of Hamas-linked figures tied to her party’s orbit in internal notes accidentally returned to Der Spiegel, raising sharp questions about her ability to lead the capital’s security structure.
The notes, part of an authorized interview draft sent back with visible internal comments this week, show Eralp writing that she and her husband have “fear of these people.” She asked her team to strike a question and her own answer about the activist Ibrahim Ibrahim, explaining: “I cannot put myself and my family in danger for Der Spiegel. What do we do now? Can we cancel the whole interview?” She added that she “should never have agreed to this interview.”
Eralp cited past advice from Berlin’s State Criminal Police Office (LKA) not to name specific individuals, noting that earlier guidance concerned organized crime and “now it’s about people with contacts to Hamas.”
He has been described as praising Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar as a “martyr hero” and has roles in the United Palestinian National Committee, which Berlin’s domestic intelligence service has classified as extremist for supporting Hamas. Parts of the Left Party’s Neukölln base and some politicians have maintained contacts with this milieu; Ibrahim later traveled to Turkey for a gathering involving Hamas-linked figures.
The Left Party emerged as the strongest force with 25.7 percent of the vote in the latest Berlin election. Eralp has sought a coalition with the Social Democrats (SPD) and Greens. Her office has said she faces daily threats and insults, and security authorities advised against naming specific individuals in certain contexts.
Opposition parties seized on the disclosure. Kristin Brinker, chair of the AfD’s Berlin parliamentary group and the party’s lead candidate, said: “That Elif Eralp, albeit involuntarily, admits her fear of the criminal clans throws a glaring light on the state of internal security in our city. If even a top politician no longer feels safe, what are ordinary Berliners supposed to say, who in an emergency have no personal protection standing by?”
She added that the notes from Erlap illuminate the party’s condition, linking it to clan connections beyond known cases involving a Bundestag member and “rampant antisemitism.” Brinker concluded that the Left is “far from any governing capability.”
Brinker urged the Greens and SPD to end talks immediately with the Left to form a ruling government in Berlin.
“This party and this woman must under no circumstances be entrusted with our city,” warned Brinker.
At a press appearance Thursday, Eralp declined to address the Spiegel notes directly, calling them private and internal. She stated she would not be intimidated and pledged to ensure both social and individual security for all Berliners, declaring she would act “with all means against organized crime, against terror, against everything,” including those who glorify violence.
In an interview with German newspaper Junge Freiheit, deputy chairman of the AfD parliamentary group, Sebastian Münzenmaier, said: “The revolution is devouring its children. For years, the left has defamed criticism of clan crime, mass migration, and Islamic glorification of terror as racist. Now, she is suddenly afraid of the ghosts she summoned.”
CDU Berlin leader Stefan Evers asked: “How is Elif Eralp supposed to ensure the security of millions of people as governing mayor if she herself is afraid of the Islamist environment of her party?”
He said the revelations heighten concern about a Left-led government and urged “the reasonable ones among the Greens and SPD” to “finally pull the emergency brake,” warning that fear of Islamists must not influence political decisions.
Referring to clans and organized crime, outgoing Governing Mayor Kai Wegner (CDU) stated that a government “must never make its actions dependent on these structures — certainly it must not fear them.”
SPD figures also responded critically. Neukölln district mayor Martin Hikel said the episode shows “how strongly these terror-glorifying, antisemitic forces are anchored in the Left and want to come to power with the help of the Left.” SPD lead candidate Steffen Krach described the situation as shocking and stated there must be no Hamas sympathizers free to move in the city.
TEL AVIV, Israel: Israel's two Arab parties are in a position to have a say in who the country's next prime minister and government will be — but not if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has anything to do with it, after he alleged serious criminal activities took place during voting in the Arab areas of the nation.
The two parties were projected to win a combined 19 Knesset seats, according to preliminary results. With both Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud-led right-wing bloc and the opposition leader Gadi Eisenkot’s centrist bloc falling short of the 61 seats needed for a parliamentary majority.
On Wednesday, Prime Minister Netanyahu wrote on X that Israel’s election had been "stolen by Arab parties that support terrorism and the elimination of the Jewish state," alleging serious criminal offenses, including bribery, threats, violence, forgery and the use of prohibited software to mobilize voters.
"The Likud party is transferring to the police, the Shin Bet, and the Central Elections Committee hundreds of testimonies and pieces of evidence regarding election theft in many Arab polling stations," he wrote.
He cited allegations of thousands of envelopes containing cash and Ra’am ballot slips, threats and violence against polling station staff, multiple votes cast behind the voting curtain, voting under multiple identities, discrepancies between the number of ballot envelopes and the number of voters, the use of prohibited voter-mobilization software and other offenses.
"We demand from the police and the Shin Bet a thorough investigation into the election theft by the Arab parties and the full prosecution of the criminals. We demand from the Central Elections Committee an immediate response to investigate these criminal offenses that have severely damaged the integrity of the elections in Israel and the election results," he added.
In a letter addressed to Yesh Atid lawmaker Vladimir Beliak, Acting Central Elections Committee Director-General Dean Livne wrote that the elections "were conducted lawfully" and that, "to the best of my knowledge, there is no basis for allegations of systematic violations of election integrity," the Times of Israel reported. He also acknowledged that the request for an investigation concerned classified information whose veracity had not yet been determined.
The political make-up of the Arab parties includes the Joint List, which brings together three parties: Hadash, a predominantly Arab-Jewish left-wing party rooted in Israel’s communist movement, and the Arab nationalist parties Ta’al and Balad. With over 90% of ballots counted, the alliance was projected to win 12 seats.
The other Arab party, the United Arab List (Ra’am), led by Mansour Abbas and affiliated with the Southern Branch of the Islamic Movement in Israel, was projected to win seven seats.
Arab citizens make up approximately 21% of Israel’s population. Turnout in this election reached a near record high between 75% to 80%.
"They are a political force to be reckoned with," Dahlia Scheindlin, a former policy fellow at the Mitvim Institute and a senior analyst at Haaretz, told Fox News Digital.
Scheindlin said that Netanyahu framed his campaign around the claim that the opposition is prepared to form a government dependent on Arab parties’ support, which he argues would lead to the establishment of a Palestinian state that would become a terror state and ultimately bring about Israel’s destruction.
"This is the most consistent message, and he never stopped saying it, including on election day," she said.
Scheindlin said that the issue had become politically sensitive, prompting leading Zionist opposition parties to pledge not to cooperate with the Arab parties.
"They have sworn they would not build a coalition that depends on Arab votes, either from within the coalition or from outside it. If they receive any help, they will have to break that promise," she added.
It is not inconceivable, though highly unlikely, that Netanyahu could reach out to one of the Arab parties to explore the possibility of cooperation, Scheindlin said.
Dr. Arik Rudnitzky, a researcher in the Israel Democracy Institute’s Arab Society in Israel Program, said that Arab parties had historically remained in the opposition and had not joined governing coalitions.
During the governments of Yitzhak Rabin and, later, Shimon Peres in the 1990s, Arab parties provided a parliamentary safety net from outside the coalition. This enabled the government to remain in office and complete its term even after it effectively became a minority government amid opposition to the Oslo Accords, as the Haredi Shas party left the government.
"Historically, Arab parties were always in the opposition for many reasons. It was quite uncommon to believe Arab parties could [support] the government. It’s a novelty of recent years, plus the fact that their political strength in terms of the number of seats was not as significant as it is today," Rudnitzky said.
Demographic changes alone do not explain the Arab parties’ growing political strength, Rudnitzky said; shifting voting patterns have also played a role.
"In the past, Arab voters supported both Arab and Jewish parties. In the 1980s and 1990s, approximately half voted for Jewish parties," he continued.
Rudnitzky said historical developments, the impact of the Oslo Accords and the entry of new Arab representatives into the Knesset contributed to a gradual shift away from Jewish parties, with more Arab voters turning to Arab parties.
"Today, we can say that between 85% and 90% of Arab voters support Arab parties. This is the main reason for their increased political strength," he added.
Any support Arab parties might provide to a prospective coalition would come in exchange for political concessions, Rudnitzky said. Their demands would likely include a government decision and a plan to combat crime in Arab communities, as well as a new socioeconomic development plan for the Arab sector involving budget allocations.
Ultimately, he said, such arrangements would involve allocating public goods and resources in exchange for political support. "There is no free lunch in politics. Every collaboration, either within a coalition or from the outside, has its political price."
Scheindlin noted that while the Joint List would not be invited to join a governing coalition — and its members would not want to do so anyway — Mansour Abbas and his United Arab List have pursued a different, more controversial approach. The party has accepted Israel as a Jewish state and seeks to improve the lives of Arab citizens within that framework, she said.
"They are expecting equality as citizens. They accepted Israel’s identity and are willing to work within that framework to improve the lives of their citizens. They are the only ones who have a chance of being invited into a coalition, as they were in 2021," she said.
In September, the Central Elections Committee (CEC) voted to disqualify the Joint List and the United Arab list from competing in the Oct. 27 elections. On Oct. 2, Israel’s Supreme Court overturned the CEC’s decisions against both parties.
Section 7A of the Basic Law: The Knesset bars candidates who deny Israel’s existence as a Jewish and democratic state, incite to racism, or support the armed struggle of an enemy state or terrorist organization against Israel from participating in Knesset elections.
Martin Sherman, founder and executive director of the Israel Institute for Strategic Studies, told Fox News Digital that Arab parties in Israel are essentially illegal and should be barred from participating in elections.
"They have different social agendas, perhaps, but on the political level, they all oppose Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people. One can only hope that politicians in Israel will realize that and that political ambitions and animosity toward Netanyahu will not prevail," he said.
One former Israeli diplomat noted the irony and said it was a good teaching moment for those who don't understand the country. "Arab Israelis voted in huge numbers and, according to the exit polls, won more Knesset seats than ever before. That is the answer to the ridiculously ignorant accusation that Israel is a supposed ‘apartheid’ state," Shahar Azani, veteran israeli diplomat and former spokesperson of Israel’s consulate in New York, told Fox News Digital.
He added, "Arab citizens are shaping the government and taking part in the Jewish state's democratic celebration, and we welcome it. But with great power comes great responsibility: they must now take the next step and reject the extremist positions some voiced as soon as the results came in, that would alienate them from Israel's Jewish majority."
The Arab parties have long been kept on the political sidelines. But stunning turnout by their supporters makes the Arab minority an Israeli political reality that cannot be ignored.
Facing demands that Britain apologize and pay reparations, palace officials say Charles will reiterate previous comments that slavery was an "atrocity that forever stains our history," while stopping short of an apology.
Votes are still being counted, but it appears that neither Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing coalition nor the opposition alliance headed by Gadi Eisenkot will have a majority.
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