Islamic Jihad will not take part in Palestinian elections

Palestine’s Islamic Jihad said on Wednesday that it would never take part in parliamentary and presidential elections, Al-Ayyam has reported.

Speaking to the newspaper, a member of the movement’s political bureau, Nafeth Azzam, explained that the stance of Islamic Jihad regarding elections had not changed since the Oslo Agreement, which established the Palestinian Legislative Council and Palestinian Authority.

According to Azzam, the elections will not end the crises affecting the Palestinians. “They will,” he insisted, “deepen the tragedy and division.”

He added that his movement’s stance regarding elections to the Palestinian National Council is different because the PNC represents the wider Palestinian community and it is not an outcome of Oslo.

Azzam ended his interview by calling for concentrated efforts to reach internal agreements on the national programme “for which the Palestinians have sacrificed so much.”

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