Israel elections: East Jerusalemites remain disillusioned and disenfranchised

"So who do you think will win tomorrow's elections?" I ask Abu Emad, my local grocer, just outside Jerusalem's Damascus Gate. "Netanyahu," he answers, with certainty. "For sure, it will be Netanyahu."

He may be right, but not because he will be casting a vote for Bibi.

East Jerusalemites are permanent residents of the city, not citizens, and therefore cannot vote in Israel's parliamentary elections. Israel allows them to vote in municipal elections, a "right" many Palestinians here choose not to exercise.

Right now, according to Israeli polls, Zionist Union, the newly formed centre-left party headed by Yitzhak Herzog and Tzipi Livni, will most likely win the majority of seats in Israel's Knesset.

Likud trails in second and the Joint Arab List is expected to come in a respectable third with a possible 13 to 15 seats of the 120 up for grabs.

But what does this mean for the Palestinian residents of Jerusalem's eastern sector? Since the Joint Arab list - Balad, Taal and the Islamic movement with the mixed Arab-Jewish list Hadash - has no chance of winning the majority vote and therefore forming the government, probably not much.

The 'others'

For us, it doesn't make any difference. They are all Zionists. - Abu Emad, East Jerusalem grocer

Palestinians in Jerusalem are used to the fact that any and all Israeli governments - from the so-called left to the current right - view them, the permanent Arab residents of the city, with the same suspicious eye.

They are "the other" in a city Israel claims is the "united capital of Israel".

They are occupied, unwanted, underdeveloped and at the receiving end of a slew of racist laws aimed at exclusion.

One look across the line separating east from west will prove this to be true. West Jerusalem has all the trappings of a modern European city - high-rise buildings, well-paved roads, glitzy stores and spacious malls, trams that link the city's suburbs (in this case, mostly the Jewish suburbs) and at present, posters of candidates plastered throughout the streets, urging citizens to vote for them, to create a "better Israel".

The east side is void of any posters, mainly, as previously mentioned, because its residents cannot vote. Besides, Palestinians know a "better Israel" is code for fewer Palestinians - or none in a perfect Israeli world.

Only a small number of Palestinian Jerusalemites who traded in their East Jerusalem ID cards (ie permanent residency status) for Israeli citizenship are eligible to vote.

They are not many, and to most Jerusalemites, they are turncoats, selling out their status as Palestinian residents of the holy city for the more secure identity of Israeli citizens. In the eyes of Jerusalemites, therefore, they don't count.

Disenfranchised

It's a well-known fact that whoever wins tomorrow's elections in Israel does not have the development of East Jerusalem and its residents at the top of their priority list.

Quite the contrary, candidates are competing over who can be tougher on the Palestinians. Netanyahu has already vowed not to make any concessions, or withdraw from any more land, and most importantly, never to divide Jerusalem.

If he wins, he has reassured his constituents that he will continue to clamp down on the Palestinians with an iron fist. The Zionist Union is playing up Israel's security and the "fight against terror" and repairing its relationship with the US. Peace with the Palestinians is not on the agenda of either front-runner.

And so, the exorbitant taxes on East Jerusalemites will continue, the home demolitions and the imprisonments will continue and Jerusalemites will also continue to fight for their right to live in their own city.

Abu Emad waves his hand in the air, dismissing the entire subject: "To us, it makes no difference. They are all Zionists."