All Content

Palestinians' time of choice

Eóin Murray Gaza City 24 January 2006


A year on and the groaning burden of the Israeli occupation remains in place – a constant feature of the political and geographical landscape. The impact of Israel’s occupation on the election for the 132-member Palestinian Legislative Council on 25 January 2006 remains unclear but certain key factors have to be taken into consideration. The pressures of occupation and poverty are undiminished, but the Palestine election is an opportunity for activists to promote a vision of change, finds Eóin Murray. 

Photostory: Palestinian Elections Campaign

24 January 2006


Sixteen constituencies in the West Bank and Gaza Strip will choose 132 members of the Palestinian parliament, known as the Palestinian Legislative Council or PLC, which will sit for four years - though it has been 10 years since the last parliamentary election. Only Palestinians resident in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem can vote. Palestinians with Israeli citizenship are not eligible to vote, nor are the estimated 6 million Palestinians and their descendants who live as refugees in other countries. The vast majority of the 100,000 eligible voters living in East Jerusalem are not allowed to vote in their own city. Dozens of individuals and parties will contest the election. However the two biggest groups will be Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah movement and the Islamic movement Hamas. 

Gunmen kill Fatah activist

24 January 2006


In the pre-dawn hours of Tuesday, 24 January 2006, unidentified gunmen opened fire at Ahmad Yousef Abdel Jabbar Hassuna, 36, of Nablus, and killed him. PCHR’s preliminary investigation indicates that, on Monday evening (23 January 2006), a group of gunmen carrying automatic rifles came to the victim’s house in Rafedeya neighborhood. They asked him to remove from his house’s wall a picture of PLC candidate Ghassan El-Shak’a; but he refused to comply with their demand. The gunmen left. At approximately 02:00 on Tuesday, ten unidentified gunmen came to the house and attempted to remove the picture. Their voices woke up Hassouna, who came out of his house carrying a pistol. The gunmen immediately opened fire at him, hitting him with a bullet in the head. 

Palestinian Elections: Third day voting of the security forces

23 January 2006


On Monday evening, 23 January 2006, early voting of Palestinian security forces for the Palestinian legislative commenced have been completed. Voting of security forces started on Saturday morning, 21 January 2006, and has continued for 3 days, in accordance to amendments to article 73 of the Elections Law No. 9 of 2005, which allow security forces to vote on the three days that precede the official date of election. According to the Central Election Commission, by 15:00, 53227 security personnel (90%) had voted. The number of security personnel who have the right to vote in polling centers throughout the West Bank and the Gaza Strip is 58705, including 36091 in the Gaza Strip. 

Palestinian refugees will hold mock PLO elections in Brussels and Paris

24 January 2006


Symbolic elections to the Palestinian National Council (PNC), the PLO’s exile parliament, will be held by Palestinian communities in Paris and Brussels on 25 January parallel to the Palestinian Authority’s second round of elections to the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) in the Israeli occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip (OPT). The symbolic elections aim to raise public awareness of the exclusion of over half of the Palestinian people from the internationally-sponsored process of Palestinian political decision making applied under the terms of the Madrid-Oslo agreements between Israel and the PLO. 

Annan urges Palestinians to vote in upcoming elections

20 January 2006


Looking to next week’s Palestinian legislative elections, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan today urged all those eligible to participate and voiced hope that this milestone will set the stage for peace and Statehood. “You deserve a free, fair and peaceful election,” Mr. Annan said in a message to the Palestinian people released in New York. “Your electoral commission is doing outstanding work under difficult circumstances.” He stressed that action at the ballot box will help set the course for the future, encouraged all to vote on 25 January and pledged that the UN “will remain steadfastly committed to helping you to achieve a state of your own.” 

International observers arrive for Palestinian elections

21 January 2006


Election observers from 22 countries have arrived to observe election preparations and voting as part of a multinational delegation organized by the National Democratic Institute in partnership with The Carter Center. The observers will attend orientation briefings over the next two days and will be deployed on election day, Wednesday Jan. 25, to locations in Jerusalem, the West Bank, and Gaza. The 80-member delegation is being led by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, former Swedish Prime Minister Carl Bildt, former Albanian President Rexhep Meidani, and former Spanish Foreign Minister and current member of the Spanish Parliament Ana Palacio. 

Illusion of democracy: The Palestinian Elections

Saree Makdisi 23 January 2006


With about 80 percent of eligible voters registered, and more than 700 candidates running in a hotly contested campaign, the stage is set for what is being packaged as an impressive exercise in democracy when Palestinians in the occupied territories. But writes EI contributor Saree Makdisi, the talk of elections is part of an attempt to impose a sense of normalcy on a highly abnormal situation: not just the endless occupation, but the unresolved future of the Palestinian people, two-thirds of whom are excluded from the electoral process because they do not live in the occupied territories but rather in refugee camps or in the diaspora, or as second-class citizens of the state of Israel. 

Palestinian legislative elections: A vote for law and order

Maureen Clare Murphy 23 January 2006


Palestinians in the occupied territories are gripped to see who will enjoy the majority of the seats in the council — the ruling party Fateh or the Islamist opposition movement Hamas. Fateh has lost a great deal of support after ten years of failed negotiations with Israel, a drastic deterioration of the severe humanitarian situation endured by West Bank and Gaza Palestinians, and widespread corruption in the Palestinian Authority (PA) and failure to uphold the rule of law that has spilled out into the streets with sharpened lawlessness and vigilantism. 

Palestinian Elections: Second day voting of the security forces

22 January 2006


On Sunday, 22 January 2006, early voting of Palestinian security forces for the Palestinian Legislative Council continued for the second consecutive day. Voting of security forces started on Saturday morning, 21 January 2006, and will end on Monday evening, 23 January 2006, in accordance to the amendments to article 73 of the Elections Law No. 9 of 2005, which allow security forces to vote on three days preceding the official date of election. According to the Central Election Commission (CEC), 49.6% of security personnel in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip voted on the first day. By 15:00 on the second day of voting, 75.9% of security personnel had voted.