Ramallah: A Palestinian court on Thursday suspended municipal elections set for October 8 following disputes between the rival Fatah and Hamas movements over candidate lists, jeopardising the first vote since 2006 to involve both parties.
The decision was made by the high court in Ramallah in the West Bank, where Fatah is in power. It was not immediately clear if the decision was definitive or whether the elections could be rescheduled.
Hamas, which runs the Gaza Strip, boycotted the last Palestinian municipal elections in 2012, but was due to participate this year.
A Hamas spokesman said the movement rejected the court’s decision.
“This is a political decision,” Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said.
“We reject the decision to cancel the election and call on everyone to reject it.”
Fatah and Hamas have not contested an election since the 2006 parliamentary polls, which Hamas won — sparking a conflict that led to near civil war in Gaza the following year.
This year’s vote was planned with 81-year-old President Mahmoud Abbas under heavy political pressure as opinion polls suggested that most Palestinians would like him to step down.
There has been no Palestinian presidential election since 2005 and Abbas has remained in office despite the expiry of his term.
The head of the high court, Hesham Al Hatoo, issued Thursday’s ruling in response to a challenge by a lawyer, Nael Al Houh.
Al Houh said his appeal was based on the fact that the elections were not being held in occupied Jerusalem and over concerns related to the election in the Gaza Strip.
The Palestinians want east Jerusalem, occupied by Israel in 1967 and later annexed, as the capital of their future state.
In the Gaza Strip, a court run by Hamas cancelled lists of Fatah candidates in a number of municipalities for “violating the election law”, according to a judicial source and a spokesman for Fatah.
The judicial source said five lists in the Khan Yunis area were cancelled for “violating the law and not meeting the necessary conditions”.
Despite repeated reconciliation attempts, Hamas and Fatah have failed to bridge their differences and form a unified administration for the Palestinian territories.
