Palestinian elections: in Egypt, Hamas and Fatah start talks
The President of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, in Ramallah on May 19, 2020. AP - Alaa Badarneh
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Rivals of Islamist Hamas and secular Fatah have started key talks in Cairo ahead of elections scheduled for this year in Palestine, Egyptian state television reported on Monday (February 8th).
The objective is to remove the obstacles to the holding of the legislative and presidential elections.
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2021 must be an important year in the Palestinian territories.
For the first time in 15 years, elections are scheduled:
the legislative in May, and the presidential election at the end of July
.
These meetings are at the heart of discussions in Cairo on Monday.
14 Palestinian factions, including rivals Hamas and Fatah, have started talks in the Egyptian capital, "
with the participation of all factions under the auspices of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi,
" state television reported .
Hamas confirmed this via a statement: “
The delegation of the cadres of the Islamic resistance movement Hamas has arrived in Cairo to participate in the sessions of the national dialogue which begin on Monday.
"
The Arab League also met in Cairo
These discussions aim to remove obstacles to the holding of the 2021 elections. The legal and security system to be adopted for each election, and the fate of voters in East Jerusalem - a sector occupied and annexed by Israel - are among the questions thorny to deal with.
The vice-chairman of Hamas's political bureau, Saleh Al-Arouri, heads the delegation sent to Cairo.
And according to press reports, a Fatah delegation, led by Jibril Rajoub, had already arrived in the city the day before.
In parallel with these discussions, an extraordinary meeting of the foreign ministers of the League of Arab States is to be held this Monday, also in Cairo, with the subject of the Palestinian question.
In the last
Palestinian legislative elections in 2006
, Hamas won.
A victory unrecognized by Fatah and which had led to bloody clashes between the two factions, then to the birth of two separate political systems: the Palestinian Authority of Mahmoud Abbas (Fatah), which sits in the West Bank occupied by Israel (2 , 8 million Palestinians), and therefore the Gaza enclave (2 million inhabitants), ruled by Hamas and under Israeli blockade.
(
with AFP
)
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