Palestinian leader Abbas lays ground for succession

The Islamist movement Hamas will no longer be involved in any future transition after Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas stated Wednesday who would take over in the interim when the position falls vacant.

Even though his tenure as the leader of the Palestinian Authority ended in 2009, Abbas, 89, remains in power and has rejected calls to name a vice president or successor.

In the event of a power vacuum, the Palestinian Authority is assumed by the speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC), according to current Palestinian law.

However, after more than ten years of hostilities between Hamas, which overthrew the Palestinian Authority in the Gaza Strip in 2007, and his secular party, Fatah, Abbas formally disbanded the PLC in 2018, which was where Hamas held a majority.

In a decree, Abbas stated that Rawhi Fattuh, the head of the Palestinian National Council, would serve as his temporary substitute in the event that the post became available.

“If the position of the president of the national authority becomes vacant in the absence of the legislative council, the Palestinian National Council president shall assume the duties… temporarily,” it said.
The decree added that following the transition period, elections must be held within 90 days. This deadline can be extended in the event of a “force majeure”, it said.

The Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), which has more than 700 members from both the Palestinian territories and other countries, has the PNC as its parliament.

Hamas is not represented on the council because it is not a part of the PLO. The PNC deputies are appointed rather than elected.

The “delicate stage in the history of the homeland and the Palestinian cause” is mentioned in the directive as Israel and Hamas are engaged in combat in Gaza following the latter’s historic offensive on southern Israel in October of last year.

The differences between Fatah and Hamas are also still present.

The directive was issued on the same day that Israel and Hezbollah, a militant organisation in Lebanon that supports Hamas, reached an agreement that resulted in a ceasefire in Lebanon.

With its inability to pay its public servants and the threats of Israeli far-right ministers calling for the annexation of all or part of the occupied West Bank—an aim that Benjamin Netanyahu’s government is making less and less secret—the Palestinian Authority looks weaker than ever.