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PLC deputy speaker: Cancelling Gaza elections only serves occupation

October 4, 2016 at 11:32 am

Chief of Court Board Hisham al-Hantu (C) reads the Palestinian Supreme Court’s decision that municipal elections can be held, but only in the West Bank and not in Gaza Strip on October 3, 2016 in Ramallah, West Bank. [Issam Rimawi – Anadolu Agency]

The Palestinian Authority’s Supreme Court’s decision to cancel elections in the Gaza Strip is “dangerous” and only serves the occupation, the Palestinian Legislative Council said yesterday.

In a statement, the First Deputy Speaker of the PLC Ahmad Bahar said: “This is a partisan decision issued by a politicised court. It is dangerous as it reinforces internal division and distances the people of the same nation from each other.”

Bahar said that the “decision is political and has no legal, ethical or national legality,” noting that carrying out the local elections in the occupied West Bank without the Gaza Strip “goes against the national interests and destroys the internal national agreement.”

“The decision is an evasion of national duties, as well as an attempt to avoid an expected loss for Fatah in case the elections were conducted.”

He called for the Palestinian people, factions, NGOs and national individuals to reject this decision because it “damages the internal Palestinian fabric and harms all national agreement efforts”.

Yesterday morning, the PA Supreme Court in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah decided to carry out local elections only in the West Bank and to cancel them in Gaza.

The court referred the decision to what it called the “illegality” of the courts of appeal in the Gaza Strip, which disqualified a number of Fatah candidates who committed either criminal, illegal or unethical acts.