BICOM

The Palestinian Supreme Court in Ramallah yesterday ruled that the Palestinian municipal elections, which were scheduled to take place in October, must be postponed.

The court sited “procedural problems in Gaza,” where Hamas is the ruling power. Hamas-controlled courts in the Gaza Strip have disqualified a number of candidates’ lists backed by the Fatah faction of Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas.

The court also ruled that “elections can’t take place in one place and not the other”. Although lists of candidates had been submitted in some East Jerusalem neighbourhoods such as Beit Hanina, Abu Dis and Kafr Aqab, it is highly unlikely that Israel would have consented to an election in territory it administers.

The court said that the municipal vote would be postponed until at least December 21 and that the issue would be considered again on September 21. It remains unclear whether the court is likely to change its mind in the interim period.

Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhr rejected the court’s ruling, calling it a “political decision”. He added: “We reject the decision to cancel the election and call on everyone to reject it.”

However, Fatah spokesman Osama al-Qawasmi said they “hold Hamas fully responsible for foiling the election, starting with the unjustified petitions it filed” against Fatah-affiliated electoral lists in Gaza.

Ever since Hamas violently seized the Gaza Strip from the PA in 2007, relations between Fatah and Hamas have been bitter. There have been several attempts at reconciliation between the two factions since then, but none have come to fruition. The joint participation in the municipal elections had been viewed as a possible sign of rapprochement.

A municipal vote had also been regarded as a potential precursor for the first elections for the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) in ten years. Hamas won a majority in the 2006 PLC vote, but the Fatah-controlled PA, headed by Abbas, has not convened the forum since then.