Israeli voters started today to vote in municipal electionswhich were originally scheduled for late October, but were postponed twice because of the war that broke out on October 7 with Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

In the midst of war ca 7.2 million voters are called to the polls in Israelin East Jerusalem, in the Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank and in a part of the annexed Golan.

Nearly 150,000 Israelis have been forced to flee their homes in towns and kibbutzim located near the Gaza Strip, but also in the northern part of the country on the border with Lebanon, theater of regular exchanges of fire between the Israeli army and the Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah.

Two candidates from the evacuated areas were killed in the October 7 Hamas attack that killed at least 1,160 people in southern Israel, mostly civilians.

In retaliation Israel pledged to destroy Hamas and has launched an attack on the Gaza Strip which has so far claimed the lives of 29,782 people, mostly civilians.

Palestinians in East Jerusalem, the sector of the city occupied by Israel in 1967, cannot vote in parliamentary elections, but have the right to vote in municipal elections. They represent about 40% of Jerusalem’s residents, but usually do not vote in municipal elections.

Arab candidate in Tel Aviv

For the first time since 1967, a candidate from Israel’s Arab minority, Walid Abu Tageh, announced that he would run for mayor of Jerusalem, but ultimately did not submit his candidacy.

In Tel Aviv councilor Amir Badran is the first Israeli Arab to run for mayor of the city. After the October 7 attack, this lawyer organized overnight vigils in the streets of the mixed Arab-Jewish neighborhood of Jaffa, asking residents to say “no to violence, no to racism.”

But the chances of him being elected are small. His opponents are the outgoing mayor of Tel Aviv Ron Huldai and the former minister of economy Orna Barbiei.

Israeli soldiers, including those deployed to the Gaza Strip, began voting last week, with the military saying 925 polling stations had been set up.

THE second round of municipal elections was scheduled for March 12but was rushed to 10 due to the start of Ramadan, the holy month for Muslims that begins on the evening of March 10 or March 11.

The abstention rate in the 2018 municipal elections, the most recent, was just over 40%.