Hajj Yayha was born in
Tayibe, and studied civil engineering at the
Technion – Israel Institute of Technology. He is married with four children and lives in Tayibe. Hajj Yayha joined the
Islamic Movement in 1981. He served as mayor of
Tayibe for six months in 1998 and again from 2005 until 2007. In 2007 Interior Minister
Roni Bar-On removed Hajj Yayha from office and replaced him with an appointed committee. Hajj Yayha filed a petition against the decision, but it was dismissed. Prior to the
2015 Knesset elections he was elected to second place on the United Arab List (UAL), the political wing of the Southern Branch of the Islamic Movement. With the party becoming part of the
Joint List, an alliance with
Hadash,
Balad and
Ta'al, Hajj Yahya was placed sixth on the overall Joint List list. He was elected to the Knesset as the alliance won 13 seats. For the
April 2019 elections, the UAL ran a joint list with Balad, with Hajj Yahya as the second UAL candidate and third on the joint list. He was re-elected to the Knesset as the alliance won four seats. ==References==