Palestinian municipal vote no indicator of public opinion

Elections for municipal councils throughout the West Bank and in one Gaza Strip city, Deir Al-Balah, will be held on Saturday. These will be the fifth local elections since the creation of the Central Elections Commission following the establishment of the Palestinian Authority in 1993.
Before the creation of a Palestinian government, municipal elections provided a rare platform to gauge public opinion. Elected mayors and councils often carried the political aspirations of Palestinians for freedom and self-determination. However, since then, municipal elections have had less of a political role and more of a service-oriented role.
The Palestinian leadership, under President Mahmoud Abbas, has tried its best to avoid competitive elections in major cities, even though these elections will not include Hamas supporters due to the conditions of participation. They worry that competing lists will be seen as a referendum against an unpopular Abbas, even though such opposition might largely come from supporters of his own Fatah movement.
In Gaza, the only town holding municipal elections is Deir Al-Balah, where four largely family-based lists are participating. Some nominees are close to but are not members of any known political faction. Certainly, no Hamas participants will be involved.
The upcoming municipal elections will therefore fail to indicate the direction of public opinion. Major cities like Nablus and Ramallah will not witness any competition because there is only one unopposed list in these (and other) localities. This can be attributed to the desire to avoid unnecessary competition at a time of political uncertainty. It also reflects the leadership in Ramallah’s desire to avoid an election process that would reveal its own weakness and unpopularity. In some locations, potential opposing list leaders have complained that carrot-and-stick efforts were employed to dissuade many from participating, leaving only one unopposed list in some key locations.
Official statistics from the Central Election Commission show that 42 municipalities have a single unopposed list of candidates. So, we already know that the next mayor of Nablus will be a woman, Anan Al-Attir, a former deputy governor of the Nablus district. Businessman Yacoub Sa’adeh will be the mayor of Ramallah.
Slightly over 1 million Palestinians are eligible to vote in an electoral system based on an open list form of proportional representation. The public will be asked to select one electoral list and up to five candidates from that list. Women must make up at least 32 percent of all lists’ nominees. Some 367 electoral lists were submitted, comprising 4,475 candidates and 284 village councils. Ninety municipal councils will hold elections on Saturday, while the rest will not due to the absence of any other list.
For the most part, candidates are either family or tribal representatives or belong to the ruling Fatah movement. 

The Palestinian leadership has tried its best to avoid competitive elections in major cities.

Daoud Kuttab

All candidates must sign a document stating they will adhere to the international agreements the Palestinian government has signed. This condition eliminated Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Left-wing factions in the Palestine Liberation Organization felt that this condition — imposed by the international community — violates Palestinian sovereignty and independence. Consequently, they also decided not to participate.
About one-third of all elected councilors will be women. Eight women have been nominated to head an electoral list. Some cities and townships will also have special consideration for Palestinian Christians. According to a 2017 presidential decree, towns with a traditional Palestinian Christian majority must have a majority of Christians in their municipal council. In Bethlehem and Ramallah, where four lists are running, the ratio is officially set at eight Christians to seven Muslims. In Beit Sahour and Beit Jala, the council membership ratio is 10 Christians to three Muslims on any council, irrespective of population size.
While the municipal elections are taking place in their regular four-year cycle, 2026 is also expected to witness several other elections that will have an important political impact.
As part of a comprehensive reform plan presented by Abbas to the UN General Assembly last September, the Palestinian National Council will be revitalized in the fall of 2026. This does not necessarily mean that all members of the PLO’s parliament in exile will be formally elected. The commitment made by Abbas states that elections for 350 delegates (much reduced from the previous 500-plus) will take place where possible.
A third of the Palestinian National Council’s delegates are supposed to be those elected to the Palestinian Legislative Council. The 132-person latter has been dissolved since 2018 by a decision of the Palestinian High Court. No decision or election date has yet been announced for the Palestinian Legislative Council elections. Abbas had declared that Palestinian legislative elections would take place one year after a ceasefire in Gaza came into effect. However, they might be postponed due to the unstable situation in the Strip and the West Bank, as well as the issue of East Jerusalemites participating via absentee voting at six post offices, as agreed in the Oslo Accords.
While the upcoming municipal elections will not provide any clear direction for the Palestinian public, an important event taking place next month might. The Eighth Fatah Congress is due to convene on May 14. Although the PLO’s main faction is supposed to hold its congress every four years, the seventh congress took place in 2016. It remains to be seen whether the upcoming congress will strengthen the position of Abbas and its vice president, Hussein Al-Sheikh, or if the popular imprisoned Fatah leader Marwan Barghouti and his supporters will emerge as a strong faction within the ruling movement.

• Daoud Kuttab is an award-winning Palestinian journalist and former Ferris Professor of Journalism at Princeton University. He is the author of “State of Palestine Now: Practical and Logical Arguments for the Best Way to Bring Peace to the Middle East.”
X: @daoudkuttab