Hamas puts up strong show in Palestine poll: Fatah’s monopoly on power dented
RAMALLAH, Jan 25: Hamas made a strong showing in a Palestinian parliamentary election on Wednesday, denting the ruling Fatah movement’s near-monopoly on power, first projections showed. Polling officials said Hamas looked set to get over 30 per cent with more than 40 per cent for Fatah.
The strength of support for Hamas in the first Palestinian parliamentary election in a decade raised the prospect that it could win government posts for the first time and deal a further blow to hopes for peacemaking with Israel.
The group vowed not to disarm or negotiate with the Jewish state if it enters the Palestinian parliament after the election. Its chief candidate Ismail Haniya said there was no contradiction between guns and democracy as he voted in a Gaza refugee camp.
“The Americans and the Europeans say to Hamas: either you have weapons or you enter the legislative council. We say (we will have) weapons and the legislative council, there is no contradiction between the two,” he said.
The ruling Fatah faction claimed to have fended off an unprecedented challenge to its power from Hamas in the election.
“We think that Fatah has comfortably won the elections,” Mohammed Shtayyeh, one of the leaders of the Fatah campaign team who is also a cabinet minister, told AFP.
“We are sure that Fatah has won the elections with a percentage (of seats in parliament) which would allow us to form the next government,” he added.
Fatah said its own figures gave it 46 per cent of the vote to about 32 per cent for Hamas. But Hamas said it doubted the figures were correct and wanted to wait for the count.
Hamas was expected to capitalize on Fatah’s image for corruption and mismanagement.
Amid tight security, Palestinians voted at polling stations across the West Bank and Gaza Strip, emerging with index fingers daubed in blue ink to prevent fraud.
Militants under orders to avoid trouble on election day after weeks of armed chaos left their weapons outside.
Turnout was heavy, with nearly 60 per cent by late afternoon.
ABBAS READY FOR TALKS: But Mahmoud Abbas said the Palestinian Authority was ready to resume long-stalled talks with Israel even if Hamas joined his government.
“We are always prepared (to negotiate),” he told reporters, saying the Israelis had “no right to choose their partners”.
Even if Hamas does not win outright, it is expected to do well enough to be offered cabinet seats in a power-sharing deal.
Mr Abbas hopes once Hamas enters parliament it might be prepared to relinquish its weapons.
LITTLE TROUBLE: Only a few incidents marred the election, in which 1.4 million people in Gaza, the occupied West Bank and the eastern sector of occupied Al Quds were eligible to vote for a 132-member parliament.
Israeli police stopped small groups of Jewish ultra-nationalists marching towards two Palestinian polling stations in Al Quds and made several arrests.
Twelve people were injured when Fatah and Hamas supporters scuffled near Al Khalil, West Bank. In southern Gaza, police fired in the air to control an unruly crowd of voters.
A festive mood prevailed at polling places in Occupied Al Quds, where Israel allowed limited voting under US pressure and on condition Hamas candidates not campaign there.
Israeli police said they had detained two Hamas activists.
Voters chose from 11 party lists across the Palestinian areas and more than 400 candidates running locally in the first parliamentary elections since 1996. About 900 foreign observers, led by former US president Jimmy Carter, were present.
QUARTET MEETING: The Mideast Quartet — grouping the European Union, Russia, the United Nations and the United States — will meet in London on Monday to evaluate the outcome of the Palestinian election, the US State Department said on Wednesday.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will take part in the meeting, which will be held on the sidelines of a Jan 31 donors conference on Afghanistan in the British capital, spokesman Sean McCormack said.—Agencies
Exit polls
AN exit poll by West Bank’s Bir Zeit university forecast that Fatah had won 63 seats in the 132-seat parliament against 58 for Hamas.
Another forecast by the Ramallah-based Palestinian Centre for Policy and Survey Research said that Fatah had won 42 percent of votes against 35 percent for Hamas, but failed to give a breakdown of seats.—AFP
RAMALLAH, Jan 25: Hamas made a strong showing in a Palestinian parliamentary election on Wednesday, denting the ruling Fatah movement’s near-monopoly on power, first projections showed. Polling officials said Hamas looked set to get over 30 per cent with more than 40 per cent for Fatah.
