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Fatah internal elections in Gaza expose Abbas-Dahlan conflict

September 15, 2015 at 2:49 pm

The internal elections held by the national Palestinian liberation movement Fatah in Gaza to choose members of regional leadership councils have revealed the ongoing conflict between Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (the current leader of Fatah) and dismissed Fatah leader Mohammed Dahlan.

At the beginning of last week, four young Palestinian men were injured during a clash between supporters of President Abbas and supporters of the dismissed leader Dahlan during the elections in the Khan Younis area in southern Gaza.

The tension between the supporters of the two sides required the intervention of Gaza’s Hamas-governed police force to break up the clashes, which were also repeated in a Gaza university.

The elections resulted in the victory of 15 members who will form the leadership council of Khan Younis. This is part of what Fatah leader Yahya Rabah is describing as “the legitimacy trend”.

Rabah told Anadolu news agency that: “Despite all of Dahlan’s attempts of sabotage and abuse, Fatah was successful in conducting its elections in a democratic manner.”

He added, “Dahlan, who is no longer a member of Fatah and who is no longer involved in the movement’s decisions, wants to impose his ideas by causing chaos in the regional conference. However, we are moving forward with the movement’s elections and support the Fatah legitimacy represented by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.”

Rabah stressed that his movement will continue to hold elections in Gaza leading up to the seventh General Conference (during which the leaders of the movement will be elected).

Fatah held its sixth conference in August 2008 in Bethlehem, in the south of the West Bank. During the conference, the movement decided that it would have a regular conference every six years, based on the political and organisational situation on the ground.

The seventh conference was supposed to be held in August 2014, but the conditions in the Palestinian political arena and Israel’s latest war on Gaza caused it to be postponed, according to a statement issued by Fatah.

The preparatory committee has put in place a number of regulations that members must abide by in order to participate in the seventh conference. Information from inside Fatah reveals that the committee has agreed that the number of participants will not exceed 1,000 individuals, all of whom represent the movement inside and outside Palestine.

Rabah confirmed that his movement would go ahead with arranging the conference and will not allow any voices or parties to sabotage what he called “the internal democratic wedding”. He added, “Last Saturday, those representing the Fatah legitimacy won the elections and those supporting chaos and interference were not successful in affecting the movement.”

He also said that Fatah made the decision to face head-on any plans that aim to damage the movement’s structure, noting that Fatah in Gaza will continue its elections in every municipality and will move forward with its democratic path.

According to Rabah, Fatah is expected to resume the election of municipal leaders in Gaza during the next few weeks in preparation for the General Conference.

In accordance with Fatah’s internal regulations, members of the municipal leadership are considered members of the Fatah General Conference, which will then elect the members of Fatah’s Central Committee and Revolutionary Council.

A Fatah leader close to Dahlan, who preferred to remain anonymous, told Anadolu that President Abbas does not have legitimacy within the movement in Gaza.

He added that President Abbas threatened dozens of movement leaders with cutting their salaries if they declared their loyalty to Dahlan.

“He has cut off the salaries of military employees in the past after accusing them of being loyal to and working for Dahlan. He then reinstated their salaries, but this drove many to fear such measures,” said the leader.

According to the source, President Abbas seeks to hinder and prevent the victory of those close to Dahlan in the municipal elections and their representation in the General Conference.

Hani Habib, a political writer for Al-Ayyam newspaper, told Anadolu that the conflict between the two men will continue because it represents what he described as a conflict of “two generations” and “two trends”.

He added, “We are talking about a generation represented by President Abbas, leader of Fatah, and a generation led by the dismissed Fatah official Mohammed Dahlan. It is clear that President Abbas will not allow for the strengthening of Dahlan’s trend within Fatah and he wants the seventh conference to be held to elect leaders that represent his trend and policies.”

“President Abbas is working on completely eliminating Dahlan’s trend by means of a number of political and financial decisions that would give him absolute control over Fatah,” says Habib.

Dahlan, on the other hand, wants to strengthen his control and influence within the movement against Abbas and to challenge him for his influence, according to Mukhaimer Abu Saada, politics professor at Gaza’s Al-Azhar University.

Abu Saada also told Anadolu that the disputes between the two men will grow in the next few days, especially with the internal action taking place in the Fatah arena ahead of the conference.

“There are great contrasts within Fatah, and we cannot deny the growing influence of Dahlan in Gaza. It is clear that this trend is trying to strengthen its presence, and this is not what President Abbas wants and he will fight it,” Saada added.

Abu Saada ruled out the possibility of President Abbas succeeding in excluding Dahlan’s trend, noting that “the man’s influence is growing due to his Arab and international support, as well as the support he is gathering from within the movement.”

Mohammed Dahlan was dismissed in June 2011, after the formation of an internal committee of the movement’s leadership. Numerous accusations were made against him, including financial corruption, and the corruption committee took Dahlan’s case to the Corruption Court in Ramallah, but the court dismissed the charges against him.

Dahlan still has influence within Fatah in Gaza, but the extent of his influence is still unknown.

Abdel Sattar Qassem, a political science professor at Birzeit University in Ramallah, believes that the dispute between the two men will reached a point of what he called “breaking bones”.

Last July, President Abbas dismissed Yasser Abd Rabbo from his position in the PLO Executive Committee and replaced him with Saeb Erekat, who has been the chief negotiator with Israel over the past two decades.

Dahlan issued a statement in which he accuses Abbas of staging a “coup”, and claiming that: “Our national cause is facing a critical historic moment which requires everyone to immediately issue a challenge. President Mahmoud Abbas has begun to implement the ‘palace revolt’ in order to rid himself of the shackles of the national institutions and eliminate the last remaining rules and mechanisms of Palestinian action; this is a clear attempt to destroy any leadership framework able to hold him accountable or deter him.”

Dahlan currently lives in the UAE and those close to him say he has support from Egypt and Gulf states. He recently presented large amounts of money to help the people of Gaza, especially the victims of Israel’s most recent war. His wife, Jalila Dahlan, who heads an organisation that works on providing humanitarian aid to Palestinians, has launched relief projects in the Gaza Strip, which has been under an Israeli blockade since 2007.

Translated from Anadolu Agency, 15 September 2015.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.