Palestinian President delays parliamentary poll, blaming Israel
Palestinian President, Mahmoud Abbas has postponed planned parliamentary elections next month amid a dispute over voting in Israeli-annexed East Jerusalem and splits in his Fatah party.
Abbas, 85, blamed Israel for uncertainty about whether it would allow the legislative election to proceed in Jerusalem as well as in the occupied West Bank and Gaza on Friday.
The decision came three months after he announced the first national elections in 15 years in what was widely seen as a response to criticism of the democratic legitimacy of Palestinian institutions, including his own presidency.
The outcome of an election could see gains for Hamas, which controls Gaza.
Abbas’s chief domestic rival, Hamas had fought a well-organised campaign to defeat a similarly divided Fatah in 2006.
The dispute over Jerusalem was the principal reason cited by Abbas in a speech early on Friday following a meeting of Palestinian political factions.
“Facing this difficult situation, we decided to postpone the date of holding legislative elections until the participation of Jerusalem and its people is guaranteed,” Abbas said in the speech on Palestinian TV.
In previous elections, Israel allowed a few thousand Palestinians to vote in Israeli-controlled post offices in East Jerusalem. But this time, the Israelis said they do not have a government to approve the Palestinian request.
The delay of the parliamentary elections set for May drew intense domestic criticism, with Abbas and his allies weakened by challengers from within his own divided Fatah party.
It was not immediately clear whether a presidential vote scheduled for July would go ahead.
The Palestinian Central Elections Commission said it was suspending the election process following Abbas’ decision. The election campaign was supposed to begin on Friday.
Protesters in Gaza and the West Bank called for the elections to proceed as scheduled – for many it would be their first election.
Abbas had hinted at the delay for weeks by claiming that Israel had not agreed to permit East Jerusalem Palestinians to vote in the city.
A spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said earlier this week that there had been no formal Israeli announcement on whether it would allow Palestinian voting in Jerusalem – as it did during the last elections in 2006 – and Israeli officials said on Thursday that there had been no change.
Aljazeera
