RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) – Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s request for elections put his political future in jeopardy, forcing him to negotiate conflicting demands to engage with a more friendly American government, to repair the split with his rival Hamas militants and keep you undisciplined The Fatah movement disintegrates.
The presidential decree issued last month, calling for what would be the first Palestinian elections in 15 years, resulted from negotiations launched with Hamas last year with the aim of strengthening the ranks in the face of unprecedented crises.
The Trump administration cut off all aid and proposed a plan for the Middle East that overwhelmingly favored Israel and would have allowed it to annex parts of the occupied West Bank. A US-mediated normalization agreement between Israel and the United Arab Emirates last summer put the annexation on hold, but left Palestinians increasingly isolated in the region.
Thus, Abbas initiated talks with Hamas, the Islamic militant group that seized Gaza from its forces in 2007. These discussions culminated in the presidential decree calling for legislative elections on May 22 and presidential elections on July 31.
It is not at all clear that the elections will actually take place. This will require an agreement between Abbas’ secular Fatah movement and Hamas, which has been deeply divided for more than a decade, despite multiple attempts at reconciliation. The two sides plan to meet in Cairo this week.
The outcome of the negotiations will largely depend on Abbas, 85. He spent decades looking without violence for a Palestinian state in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem, territories taken over by Israel in the 1967 war. Instead, he came to rule an increasingly autocratic and unpopular Palestinian Authority, confined to parts of the occupied West Bank. .
Reconciling with Hamas and holding elections could strengthen its legitimacy and respond to longstanding Western demands for responsibility. But even a limited victory for Hamas, which is considered a terrorist group by Israel and Western countries, could result in international isolation and the loss of vital aid – as it did after Hamas won the last parliamentary elections in 2006.
At a briefing with Palestinian journalists, EU representative Sven Kühn von Burgsdorff welcomed the call for elections, but declined repeated requests to explain how the EU would respond to a Hamas victory.
“Do you put the cart before the horse?” he said. “Why don’t we start with the horse.”
President Joe Biden restored aid to the Palestinians and promised to take a more impartial approach, but the Middle East conflict is likely to be in the background with regard to more pressing crises such as the coronavirus pandemic, and the United States is unlikely to be involved which includes Hamas. Even an independent government backed by Hamas can pose problems for Western donors.
The elections may also precipitate the dissolution of Abbas’ Fatah party. He has not prepared a successor and may face a leadership challenge from Marwan Barghouti, a popular Fatah leader who is serving five life sentences in an Israeli prison for his role in the 2000 intifada, or uprising.
“For Barghouti, running for president is the only way out of prison, or at least that’s what he thinks,” said Ali Jarbawi, professor of political science at Birzeit University in the West Bank.
Abbas may also have to face Mohammed Dahlan, a Fatah rival who was sentenced in absentia on corruption charges by a Palestinian court after being expelled by Abbas. Dahlan has a support base in his homeland, Gaza, and powerful allies in the United Arab Emirates, where he lives in exile.
“So far, all we talk about is having a list (from Fatah), but it is not unlikely that there will be two or even three,” said Jehad Harb, a Palestinian political analyst. “Or Barghouti can wait for the presidential election.”
Hamas would face its own election challenges, where voters can blame him for the economic devastation in Gaza, which has suffered three wars with Israel and an Israeli-Egyptian blockade since the militant group took power.
A circulating idea is to put together a joint list of Fatah and Hamas, but that would largely resolve the outcome of the parliamentary election before any vote is taken, raising questions about its legitimacy.
Yara Hawari, a senior analyst at Al-Shabaka, an international Palestinian think tank, says that either way, if the elections go ahead, there will be an “engineered result” that will allow Fatah and Hamas to maintain the status quo.
Both Palestinian authorities repressed dissent through torture and arbitrary arrests in the areas under its control, and Israel routinely detains Palestinian activists and suppresses protests and boycott movements.
“It has already been manipulated,” said Hawari. “If you have a society that is completely suffocated politically, it is routinely punished for political opposition – it is already defrauded.”
The unresolved issues between Fatah and Hamas could also be used as pretexts to cancel or postpone the elections.
The two sides have yet to reach agreement on a court to resolve electoral disputes and a mechanism to secure polling stations in Gaza, where Palestinian security forces have not been present since Hamas came to power. The Palestinian Authority also demanded that Israel allow Palestinians in annexed East Jerusalem to participate in the elections.
Khalil Shikaki, the director of the Palestinian Center for Policy Research and Research, said Abbas could cancel or postpone the elections and blame Israel or Hamas.
“However, if Israel does not give him that pretext and Hamas does not give him that pretext, then his hand will be forced and he will have to go to the elections,” he said.
Abbas, whose presidential term expired in 2009, is already facing a crisis of legitimacy, and Western donors can rethink their support if the elections are canceled. Abbas may also face a backlash from the Palestinian public.
“The process has its own dynamics and, although Abbas controls it, I think his calculation will have to adjust to the options that will remain if he decides to cancel the elections unilaterally,” said Shikaki. “There will be significant disagreements within Fatah about this.”