Under Israeli Fire, Palestinians Vote in Local Polls

President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah party has fared well in Palestinian local elections but Hamas has also scored significant gains.

Of the 104 local councils up for grabs in the occupied West Bank on Thursday, Fatah won control of 61 compared with 28 for Hamas and 15 for other factions.

According to Jamal al-Shobaki, head of the Higher Commission for Local Elections, the results were in line with opinion polls that gave Hamas about 30% support - pointing to big gains when it takes part in January parliamentary elections.

Thousands voted in the election, seen as a test of Hamas's political clout ahead of the legislative poll. Hamas boycotted the only previous parliamentary ballot in 1996 to protest against government policy toward Israel.

Thursday's ballot, the third phase of local elections for more than 1000 council seats in the West Bank, was also the first Palestinian vote since Israel completed its withdrawal from the Gaza Strip on 12 September after 38 years of occupation.

Al-Shobaki put turnout at 81%. Final official results were due to be announced in a few days.

Israeli view

The prospect of a key role for Hamas in Palestinian politics has raised eyebrows in Israel and abroad due to the group's refusal to disarm under a US-backed "road map" peace plan.

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said Israel would not facilitate Palestinian voting in the parliamentary ballot in the West Bank, where the army has a network of roadblocks, if Hamas ran in the election without first disarming.

His deputy, Vice Premier Shimon Peres, said on Thursday: "There cannot be a situation where one party utilises the ballot and another the bullet. No free democratic election can be conducted in this manner."

Samir Hleleh, the Palestinian cabinet secretary, said there was some concern that Western donor nations may withhold funds to any local councils where Hamas holds sway.

"It will be difficult for Hamas-controlled municipalities to receive international donor money. This would place a heavier burden on the government to provide aid," Hleleh said.

Hamas has accused the Palestinian Election Committee of distorting the results of a round of municipal voting to make it appear that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah party - which came out ahead - swept the poll.

Committee head Jamal Shobaki, who released the results, told a news conference on Saturday that Fatah won in 51 of 104 municipalities, and Hamas in 13. The remainder were taken by other factions or coalitions.

Thursday's vote was the third of four rounds of municipal elections, and was not necessarily a predictor of parliamentary elections in January because local issues and candidates' clan membership figured heavily.

The election committee intentionally avoided announcing that Fatah, led by Abbas, ran unopposed in some areas to make it appear its candidates had trounced Hamas, said Sami Abu Zuhri, a Hamas spokesman in Gaza. He said, however, that Hamas would not officially challenge the results.

"The announcement by the local election committee was biased," Abu Zuhri said. "It was a manoeuvre on the part of the election committee to present the numbers in an indirect way to favour one faction, and we will tell our people the truth."

Fatah - under fire for running a corruption-ridden government - was not expected to make a strong showing in the municipal voting. Hamas, by contrast, has been taking credit for Israel's recent withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and was expected to do well.

Rally explosions

But the group's position suffered after explosions at a rally last week which killed 21 people and wounded dozens of others. Hamas blamed Israel for the blasts, suspecting guided missiles from spy planes, and fired barrages of rockets at an Israeli town that borders Gaza.

Israel responded with air strikes at Hamas targets and arrest raids, rounding up 35 Hamas members who were either candidates in the municipal elections or active in the voting. Of those arrested, 17 won the election, Shobaki said.

Hamas said the Israeli arrest campaign hurt the group's chances in the municipal vote.

The official Palestinian announcement reported a relative successful showing by the Fatah movement in the third round of local council elections in the West Bank, held last week. But this success is cast in doubt. According to official data, Fatah won 53 percent of seats in the local councils, and Hamas only 26 percent. Yet if you take a closer look at the numbers of voters for the two movements, it becomes clear that Hamas actually carried more votes.

In any event, Hamas clearly is the ascendant power among the Palestinian public. The movement is deeply rooted in public life. "Our enemies are trying to stick us with an image of Al Qaida-type terrorist fanatics, but the truth is that we are a legitimate national resistance movement," said Hamas spokesmen last weekend.

The Israel Defense Forces, which in the past two weeks has been targeting terrorists in the West Bank and Gaza Strip for assassination, struck mainly at members of Islamic Jihad and Fatah's Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade. Not Hamas activists. Conversely, the vast majority of the approximately 400 activists arrested in the past few weeks in the West Bank have links to Hamas. Many of the detainees are considered political activists and are not linked to terrorist activity, including Hassan Yusef of Ramallah and Mohammed Ghazal of Nablus. Both men belong to the moderate wing of Hamas, and Ghazal recently announced that Hamas might consider modifying its charter, which denies Israel's right to exist. (Although Ghazal denied making the statement, Reuters responded that it had a recording of his statement in its possession.)

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As far as can be discerned from the response of the Palestinian street to the targeted assassinations and arrests, they have, as one might expect, increased the bitterness toward Israel. What's more, the assassination victims included a child (in Balata) and at least two other young people who had nothing to do with terror attacks. No less important is the fact that the arrests evidently adversely affected the status of the Palestinian Authority chairman, Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen).

After all, everyone knows that Abu Mazen and his colleagues in the Fatah leadership are afraid of Hamas success in the elections for the Palestinian Legislative Council (the parliament), which are to be held in late January. Against this background, people have begun to talk in the West Bank street about how the arrests are part of a scheme hatched by Abu Mazen and Ariel Sharon, with the aim of striking at Hamas and weakening it in the period leading up to the election. Such talk harms the chairman and his partners in the government.

Another outcome of the arrests that is possibly even more significant is that the Hamas movement could move increasingly toward clandestine underground activity. This is at odds with the Palestinian Authority's plan for dealing with it. Abu Mazen is trying to encourage Hamas to end terrorist activities and become a political party. He has had limited success, such as the cease-fire agreement in which Hamas was a partner, and its willingness to take part in elections to the city councils and to parliament. In the opinion of the Palestinian leadership, this is an important stage on the path of Hamas toward acceptance of the Oslo Accords and joining in the diplomatic process, which would mean recognition of the State of Israel.

Mass arrests such as those of last weekend, and the targeted assassinations, of course, make Hamas move backward, and strengthen its extremist wing. Since it is a movement that has won the admiration and respect of the masses, Israel's struggle against it must not take on a solely military character. An exclusively military campaign would not help. On the contrary, it would weaken Fatah and Abu Mazen and would fortify his opponents.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/631820.html