Yousef Taysir Jabareen (born February 23, 1972) is an Israeli Arab lawyer, academic, and politician. A member of the Arab-Jewish, left-wing Hadash party, he served in the Knesset from 2015 to 2021. In May 2026, he succeeded Ayman Odeh as Hadash chairman, and in September became the leading candidate of the reconstituted Joint List for Israel’s October 2026 election.
Jabareen was born and raised in Umm al-Fahm. He earned a bachelor’s degree in law from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 1995, a master’s from American University’s Washington College of Law in 1997, and a doctorate from Georgetown University Law Center in 2003. His doctoral research compared the civil-rights struggles of African Americans and Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel. From 1997 to 2000, he was legal director of the Association for Civil Rights in Israel’s northern branch. He later taught at American University, the University of Maryland, the University of Haifa, Tel Aviv University, and Tel-Hai Academic College. He headed the Dirasat Arab Center for Law and Policy in Nazareth.
A longtime Hadash member, Jabareen was placed tenth on the newly formed Joint List in 2015 and entered the Knesset when the alliance won 13 seats. His legislative work emphasized legal equality, Arab education, minority rights, and Jewish-Arab cooperation. He also supported ending Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and establishing a Palestinian state alongside Israel.
His first Knesset term included disputes over Israel’s constitutional identity and the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. In March 2018, the Knesset Ethics Committee refused to approve a U.S. lecture tour financed by Jewish Voice for Peace, which supported BDS and appeared on an Israeli government blacklist. Jabareen argued that the decision infringed his political freedom and petitioned the Supreme Court with Adalah; the court upheld the restriction in June 2021. After the Knesset passed the Nation-State Law in July 2018, Jabareen argued that it entrenched unequal citizenship. The law reserves national self-determination in Israel for the Jewish people, designates Hebrew the state language, gives Arabic “special status,” and does not contain an equality guarantee.
When the Joint List divided for the April 2019 election, Jabareen won reelection from sixth place on the Hadash-Ta’al slate. He returned from tenth place on the reunited Joint List in September 2019 and again in March 2020, when the alliance reached a record 15 seats. During the 23rd Knesset, he chaired the Special Committee for the Rights of the Child and helped advance regulations governing supervision of early-childhood daycare centers.
Jabareen lost his seat in the March 2021 election after the Joint List fell to six seats. He returned to frontline politics in May 2026, winning 82 percent of Hadash’s leadership vote. Calling for the “broadest and strongest Joint List possible,” he pledged to oppose another Netanyahu-led government and campaign for equality, democracy, and peace with Jewish democratic partners. Hadash, Ta’al, and Balad subsequently reunited, without Ra’am, and submitted a joint slate on September 8, 2026, headed by Jabareen, followed by Ahmad Tibi and Sami Abou Shahadeh. Jabareen is married and has four children.
Sources: “Member of Knesset Yousef Jabarin,” Knesset.
“Civil Rights for Arab-Palestinians in Israel: A Chat with MK Jabareen,” Communist Party of Israel, (January 11, 2016).
Ben Lynfield, “Israeli Arab MKs Fear Future Should US Drop Support for Two-State Solution,” Jerusalem Post, (February 16, 2017).
Yousef Jabareen, “Israel Just Dropped the Pretense of Equality for Palestinian Citizens,” Los Angeles Times, (July 20, 2018).
“Israeli Supreme Court OKs Ban on Knesset Member’s Trip to U.S. Funded by Jewish Voice for Peace,” Adalah (June 24, 2021).
Ariela Karmel, “Former MK Yousef Jabareen Elected Leader of Arab-Majority Party Hadash,” Times of Israel, (May 16, 2026).
Stav Levaton, Ariela Karmel, Emanuel Fabian, “Israel’s Election Takes Shape as 38 Parties Submit Slates, in Battle Between Pro- and Anti-Netanyahu Blocs,” Times of Israel, (September 9, 2026).
Amir Deeb, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.