LONDON: The reported electoral alliance between Hamas, Islamic Jihad and exiled former Fatah strongman Mohammed Dahlan represents one of the most unlikely developments yet seen in Palestinian politics.<\/p>\n
But as Palestinians prepare to go to the polls on Nov. 28, in the first national elections in 20 years, that extraordinary partnership could weaken President Mahmoud Abbas\u2019s grip and, perhaps, even set the stage for a reboot of Palestinian hopes for self-determination.<\/p>\n
Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority, confirmed Nov. 28 as the date for elections to the Palestinian Legislative Council during his recorded address to the UN General Assembly on Sept. 24.<\/p>\n
Not everyone is convinced the election will happen.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t believe that there will be an election,\u201d said Kobi Michael, a senior researcher at Israel\u2019s Institute for National Security Studies and the Misgav Institute.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe that Abu Mazen will, at the right moment, find the right excuse why he must postpone the election.\u201d<\/p>\n
That has certainly happened before, most recently in 2021.<\/p>\n
But if the election does go ahead, a strong electoral bloc featuring Dahlan and Hamas would likely be pushing at an open door.<\/p>\n An August poll carried out by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research found that only 21 percent of Palestinians believed \u201cFatah under Abbas\u201d was the party most deserving of leading the Palestinian people, while satisfaction with the president himself stood at only 26 percent in Gaza and 16 percent in the West Bank.<\/p>\n News of the \u201cunlikely electoral coalition,\u201d formed in a bid to end the 21-year presidential run of the 90-year-old Abbas, emerged this week in a rare interview with Mohammed Al-Hindi, deputy secretary-general of Islamic Jihad.<\/p>\n In an interview with The Associated Press in Istanbul on Monday, Al-Hindi said the alliance brought together \u201csix or seven factions,\u201d including Hamas, Islamic Jihad \u201cand the Reformist Movement represented by Mohammad Dahlan \u2026 to support a unified national list.\u201d<\/p>\n Islamic Jihad would not field any candidates, he added, because it did not consider the elections to be \u201cbeneficial to the national interest or the Palestinian people.\u201d<\/p>\n But, he said, \u201cit will support a national list \u2026 in order not to leave the stage for \u2026 other lists.\u201d<\/p>\n There is no love lost between Dahlan and Abbas.<\/p>\n Appointed head of the Preventive Security Force in Gaza by Yasser Arafat following the Oslo Accords in 1994, Dahlan left the enclave after Hamas seized power there in 2007 but remained an influential Fatah leader until he and Abbas fell out spectacularly in 2011.<\/p>\n At the time, Dahlan was seen as a potential successor to Abbas. Amid accusations by Dahlan of corruption, and by Abbas of plotting to overthrow the Fatah leadership, Dahlan was expelled from the party and went into self-imposed exile in the UAE.<\/p>\n If Abbas considered Dahlan a political threat in 2011, 15 years later that threat has returned with a vengeance.<\/p>\n But it is Dahlan\u2019s history with Hamas, and the close relationships he has cultivated in exile with the US, Israel and the UAE \u2014 America\u2019s leading Gulf partner in the Abraham Accords \u2014 that make their new partnership such a remarkable exercise in realpolitik.<\/p>\n As head of the PSF in Gaza from 1994 to 2002, Dahlan became one of the Palestinian Authority\u2019s most powerful security chiefs. He oversaw crackdowns on Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad and developed close working relationships with Israeli and US security and intelligence agencies in efforts to prevent militant attacks and uphold the Oslo security arrangements.<\/p>\n Today, Dahlan continues to play a key role in regional politics.<\/p>\n According to some reports, it was thanks to behind-the-scenes mediation by Dahlan that on July 30 President Donald Trump was able to announce \u201ca historic agreement for the complete disarmament of Hamas and all other armed groups in Gaza.\u201d<\/p>\n Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu surprised Washington by rejecting Trump\u2019s Gaza peace plan on Aug. 9 and implementation of the proposed disarmament agreement has since stalled.<\/p>\n But that it existed at all was thanks to Dahlan, according to Palestinian journalist Mohammed Daraghmeh, who last month told Le Monde that he had \u201cmediated between Jared Kushner and Hamas.\u201d<\/p>\n Dahlan, he added, \u201cis emerging as the main Palestinian leader. Mahmoud Abbas remains invisible in his office while Mohammed Dahlan gets results.\u201d<\/p>\n For Michael, a strategic alliance at this stage makes sense for both Dahlan and Hamas.<\/p>\n \u201cDahlan intends to replace Fatah and to begin paving his way back to the Palestinian territories, and I believe that he does it in order to be elected later as president,\u201d Michael told Arab News.<\/p>\n \u201cHe is trying to build his political power by using his historical relations with Hamas, despite the crises they had when he was head of Preventive Security in the Gaza Strip.\u201d<\/p>\n Although there might still be bad blood between them, \u201cHamas understands the political circumstances and they want to keep their relevance as a political power.\u201d<\/p>\n Also, Dahlan, who was born in the Khan Younis refugee camp in Gaza, \u201cgrew up with them. He knows them and they know him, and they prefer him to the other people from Fatah.<\/p>\n \u201cThey know that they cannot participate in elections explicitly as Hamas, because they reject Mahmoud Abbas\u2019 terms, and they do not intend to say that they accept the Oslo Agreement or recognize the right of the State of Israel to exist, and they want to keep their ideology.<\/p>\n \u201cSo, by cooperating with Dahlan and establishing the new national party, they will be able to be relevant players in the political arena.\u201d<\/p>\n There is a \u201cGame of Thrones\u201d element to the relationship.<\/p>\n \u201cI have no doubt that when Hamas feels strong enough politically, they will not hesitate to get rid of Dahlan,\u201d Michael said.<\/p>\n As for Dahlan, \u201che is a very smart guy, and he believes that he will be able to control Hamas and build his political power in a way that will enable him even to destroy them later on.\u201d<\/p>\n Since moving to the UAE, Dahlan has become a close adviser to UAE ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed and, Michael said, is believed to have been the conduit through which warnings ahead of the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attack reportedly reached the ear of Sheikh Mohammed and, through him, Netanyahu.<\/p>\n In an interview on Egyptian television last fortnight, Sufian Abu Zaida, a former minister in the Palestinian Authority, revealed more details about how he had conveyed a warning about Oct. 7 to Israeli and UAE authorities almost a month before the attack took place.<\/p>\n The Israeli newspaper Haartez reported that Sheikh Mohammed subsequently passed on the warning by telephone to Netanyahu, whose alleged failure to act on the information has caused a scandal ahead of Israel\u2019s own election, scheduled for Oct. 27.<\/p>\n An official UAE source disputed the claim that Sheikh Mohammed personally warned Netanyahu, telling the UAE\u2019s National that security matters are handled through the relevant agencies, rather than at the level of national leaders.<\/p>\n Abu Zaida had been part of ongoing prisoner-exchange negotiations between Israel and Hamas when, about a month before the attack, Yahya Sinwar, then Hamas\u2019 leader in Gaza, urged him to pass on a message that an \u201cearthquake\u201d was coming.<\/p>\n Dahlan\u2019s name has not emerged in connection with this. But Michael believes it was Dahlan who personally passed on the message to Sheikh Mohammed \u2014 and that he may have done so with Hamas\u2019 blessing.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think that Emirati intelligence has such good resources in the Gaza Strip,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cThey rely on Dahlan, and he still has people there. He still has connections with Hamas, and he knew Sinwar personally \u2014 they grew up together in Khan Younis.\u201d<\/p>\n The theory is that Hamas was preparing the attack, the preparations for which became increasingly obvious in the weeks before it happened, as a negotiating tactic.<\/p>\n \u201cThey wanted to continue pressuring Israel and to get more working licenses, more energy, more water and more economic improvements, and to make progress with regard to prisoner exchanges,\u201d Michael said.<\/p>\n \u201cI think if Israel had responded positively to this message, the attack would have been postponed.\u201d<\/p>\n It is, Michael said, because of, rather than despite, Dahlan\u2019s connections \u2014 with Israel, the UAE and the US \u2014 that Hamas sees value in an electoral partnership with him now.<\/p>\n Certainly, the Hamas-Dahlan alliance will do nothing to dampen Palestinians\u2019 enthusiasm to take part in a national election for the first time in 20 years.<\/p>\n Under the terms of the Palestinian Authority Basic Law, the president can serve a maximum of two consecutive four-year terms, and elections for the Palestinian Legislative Council must also be held every four years. There have, however, been no elections for either the PLC or the presidency for nearly 20 years.<\/p>\n The 2006 election was only the second to the PLC. The first had been held a decade earlier, but subsequent elections were delayed by constant disputes between Fatah and Hamas, conflict and Israeli restrictions.<\/p>\n When Palestinians finally went to the polls for a second time, in 2006, the election was won by Hamas, which took 74 of the 132 seats in the legislature, leaving Fatah with only 45.<\/p>\n Hamas\u2019 Ismail Haniyeh served as prime minister of the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority from March 2006 to March 2007, and then as head of a short-lived Fatah-Hamas national unity government.<\/p>\n The power-sharing arrangement between the two parties quickly broke down, and in a short but bloody civil war in June 2007 Hamas took control of Gaza, leaving Fatah in charge of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.<\/p>\n Abbas subsequently dismissed Haniyeh and dissolved the unity government.<\/p>\n The PLC has been effectively paralyzed since 2007, and Abbas\u2019 four-year term expired in 2009.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n![\"\"\/](\"https:\/\/assets.maestronewsroom.com\/media\/30f6532d-717b-4366-9158-9c455299fcd9\/1790782851592-fcb4681e3d6153dd.jpg\")
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