Palestinian leader’s loyalists win local elections, including some seats in Gaza

Hamas, which ousted the PA from Gaza in 2007, did not formally nominate candidates in Gaza and boycotted the race.

By Reuters and Algemeiner

Loyalists of President Mahmoud Abbas won most races in Palestinian municipal elections, election officials said on Sunday, in a vote that for the first time in nearly two decades included a city in the Gaza Strip run by rival Hamas.

Saturday’s ballot marked the first elections of any kind in Gaza since 2006 and the first Palestinian polls since the Gaza war began more than two years ago with Hamas’ cross‑border attack on southern Israel.

Abbas’ Palestinian Authority (PA) said the inclusion of the Gaza city Deir al‑Balah, which suffered less damage than other areas of the coastal territory during the war, was intended to show that Gaza was an inseparable part of a future Palestinian state.

The elections, in which voter turnout was low, had been held “at a highly sensitive moment amid complex challenges and exceptional circumstances,” Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa said as results were announced on Sunday.

But they represented “an important first step in a broader national process aimed at strengthening democratic life … and ultimately achieving the unity of the homeland,” he said.

POSSIBLE INDICATOR OF HAMAS SUPPORT

Hamas, which ousted the PA from Gaza in 2007, did not formally nominate candidates in Gaza and boycotted the race.

But some candidates on one of the Deir al-Balah lists were widely seen by residents and analysts as aligned with Hamas, making the vote a potential indicator of support for the Islamist terror group.

Preliminary results showed that the list, known as Deir al‑Balah Brings Us Together, won only two of the 15 seats contested in Gaza.

The Nahdat Deir al‑Balah list, backed by Abbas’ Fatah party and the PA, secured six seats.

The remaining seats were won by two other Gaza-based groups, Future of Deir al‑Balah and Peace and Building, not affiliated with either faction.

Abbas loyalists swept the election in Judea and Samaria, running unchallenged in many seats.

Fatah spokesperson Abdul Fattah Dawla noted that turnout was close to that for the last municipal elections in Judea and Samaria, in 2022, praising voters for participating despite ongoing violence by Israel.

“By electing figures linked to Fatah, voters appear to be seeking unrestricted international support for municipal governance and a gradual political shift that could extend beyond the local level,” said Palestinian political analyst Reham Ouda.

The recent war has left much of Gaza reduced to rubble, with many residents displaced and focused on survival. Israel has continued conducting strikes amid dozens of ceasefire violations by various terror groups still operating in the Strip.

In Gaza, voter turnout reached just 23 percent, while in Judea and Samaria it was 56 percent, according to Chairman of the Central Elections Commission Rami al‑Hamdallah.

Al‑Hamdallah said some of the ballot boxes and voting equipment did not make it into the enclave because of Israeli security restrictions, though those challenges were overcome.

Hamas’ Gaza spokesperson, Hazem Qassem, downplayed the significance of the election results, saying that they had no impact on wider national issues.

electionsGazaMahmoud AbbasPA