Palestine competes with Fatah, Hamas to discuss elections

Technical, legal and security issues need to be resolved first, observers say, to ensure that the first Palestinian votes in 15 years are not marred by a rift between the old enemies.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas last month announced dates for the first elections since 2006, setting a legislative vote for May 22 and a primary election on July 31.

They come in a year when former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a staunch supporter of the conflict, is also facing new elections, months after the White House left his close friend to the US Donald Trump.

As Palestinians cut ties with the Trump administration, accusing it of pro-Israel bias, they hope for renewed diplomacy under Joe Biden, who supports a two-state solution and has promise to support them back.

In the last Palestinian parliamentary vote, Hamas won an unexpected landslide, an unrecognized victory for Fatah Abbas, which eventually led to bloody conflict and a destructive split in Palestinian rule.

Fatah has since taken control of the Palestinian Authority on the West Bank, and Hamas has been in power in Gaza since 2007, the year Israel and Egypt began blocking the West Bank. Mediterranean plate.

The division has left the Palestinian Territories under two separate political systems and without an executive parliament.

By calling elections, experts say, Abbas is trying to restore faith in Palestinian rule amid hopes that Biden may revive talks with Israel aimed at the Palestinian state. to create.

However, before any vote, a series of nuts and bolts issues must be addressed, Khalil Shikaki, director of the Palestine Center for Policy Research and Survey in Ramallah, told AFP.

If there are electoral disputes, “which judges – the one in Gaza or the one in the West Bank – are going to judge?” he asked.

He noted that PA judges do not recognize Hamas courts, while Islamists may want their judges to rule on Gaza voting disputes.

“Who’s going to police the process?” he asked, warning of a possible disruption if Fatah wants to send PA forces to Gaza.

“It is imperative that they agree to these terms. If they do not agree, there are unlikely to be elections.”

Even if the Fatah delegation led by Jibril Rajoub and the Hamas team with Saleh al-Arouri make progress in Cairo, major challenges will still outweigh the vote.

At the top of the list is East Jerusalem, the largest Palestinian city annexed by Israel after the 1967 Six-Day War in a movement unknown to most of the international community.

Abbas has previously said he would not agree to elections unless Palestinians in East Jerusalem can vote.

But such a promise is unlikely from the Israeli government, which has described the entire city as an “undivided capital”.

The PA has called on the European Union to send an election observer mission to, in particular, monitor the vote in East Jerusalem.

Regional powers are concerned at the same time that an impact by Hamas, which has links to the Muslim Brotherhood, could inspire other Islamic political groups, said Ofer Zalzberg of the Kelman Institute for Conflict Change.

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, in hosting the talks, is trying to show Biden’s administration that, despite its domestic human rights record, it remains a force for regional stability, Zalzberg said.

But Egypt is also concerned that Hamas’ performance in the vote “could affect the status of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and throughout the region,” he said.

These concerns apply to Jordan and Israel, which have fought three wars with Hamas since 2008 and are concerned that the Palestinian elections could be “the first step for Hamas to take over the West Bank, “Zalzberg said.

To avoid that result, regional players may push for “a formula in which Hamas will only be a young partner in a power-sharing settlement,” he said, insisting that Hamas and Fatah could seek to create a joint list of candidates to foster unity.

Jamal al-Fadi, a political scientist at Gaza’s Al-Azhar University, said that greater unity between Hamas and Fatah requires both groups to agree to a “code of honor” to allow everyone to campaign to cheap and “promises to honor the outcome, whatever it is. “.

“The agencies need to make this statement clearly and concisely to prevent the 2006 situation from happening again,” he told AFP.