๐ต๐ธ Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas on Saturday postponed the November 28 legislative elections, which would have been the first national vote in two decades, to September 11, 2027, when a presidential election will also be held, according to the official Wafa news agency.
๐ธThe executive committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization, which Abbas heads, said Israeli actions had made a vote in Gaza impossible. Israel has confined about 2 million Palestinians to an about 35% part of the enclave, carries out daily strikes and has barred election officials and international observers, the Financial Times reported.
๐ธIn the West Bank and East Jerusalem, the committee cited a surge in settler attacks, Israeli military movement restrictions and Israel's withholding of billions of dollars in PA revenues.
๐ธIt said conditions expected when the elections were announced months ago "had changed fundamentally" and now "undermine guarantees for the safety of voters, candidates and electoral workers."
๐ธIn an October 8 letter to France seen by Reuters, PA Vice President Hussein al-Sheikh laid out those conditions: an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, the deployment of international forces and Palestinian police, curbs on Israeli annexation and settler violence, and the release of nearly $7 billion in Palestinian funds withheld by Israel. None had materialized.
๐ธHamas called the postponement "a step in the right direction," saying political and security conditions were not suitable for a free election, and said the delay "must lead to a serious, fruitful and comprehensive national dialogue." Late last month, Hamas and Islamic Jihad agreed to back "a unified national list" with Dahlan's bloc to challenge Abbas's Fatah, Islamic Jihad deputy leader Mohammed al-Hindi told the AP. He said Islamic Jihad, which has historically boycotted PA elections, "will not directly run any candidates" but would support the agreed list. The alliance marks a striking turn, since Hamas drove Dahlan out of Gaza in 2007.
๐ธAbbas's Fatah rival Mohammed Dahlan called it a "catastrophic" decision and a "violation of democracy [and] the rights of our Palestinian people," the FT reported. His reformist Fatah faction called the delay an "attack on democracy" that threatens younger Palestinians who have been deprived of the right to choose their representatives. "The absence of elections deepens the crisis of legitimacy and weakens the Palestinian domestic front," the faction said, adding that the leadership "is enshrining fiscal, political and administrative corruption, and pushes institutions away from the national track." It called for broad dialogue among factions to build a "popular front" capable of exerting pressure.
๐ธEgypt has invited Palestinian faction leaders, including Dahlan and Hamas political bureau chief Khalil al-Hayya, to Cairo next week for a new round of reconciliation talks, sources told The National. Faction sources said the delay was meant to address Palestinian divisions before a vote.
Abbas, 90, last won an election in 2005 and has ruled by decree since his term expired in 2009. He had pledged to hold elections this year as part of reforms demanded by the international community, as the PA sought a role in postwar Gaza. But an August poll by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research found 79% of Palestinians wanted him to resign.
Palestinians last voted for a legislature in 2006, when Hamas defeated Fatah. Israel and Western governments responded with sanctions on the Hamas-led government, and the US armed and trained Fatah forces, led in Gaza by Dahlan, to provoke a civil war and oust Hamas, according to documents reported by Vanity Fair. The fighting ended with Hamas taking control of Gaza in 2007.