Around 1.5 million people are registered to vote in this municipal election in the West Bank, occupied by Israel
Palestinians from the West Bank and a central area of Gaza will go to the polls this Saturday (25) to elect mayors and councilors in the first elections since the start of the war, characterized by discouragement and a reduced political outlook.
Around 1.5 million people are registered to vote in this municipal election in the West Bankoccupied by Israel, as well as 70,000 people in the Deir al Balah area of Gaza, according to the Ramallah-based Central Election Commission.
Polling stations in the West Bank will remain open from 7am to 9pm local time (from 1am to 3pm in Brasília), while in Deir al Balah the polls will close at 5pm (11am in Brasília) so that the count can be carried out in daylight due to the lack of electricity in this war-ravaged territory, the electoral commission informed AFP. Controlled by Hamas since 2007, Gaza will hold its first vote since the 2006 legislative elections, won by the Islamist movement.
A Most electoral lists are aligned with the Fatah partynationalist, secular and led by President Mahmoud Abbas, or running as an independent. There are no lists linked to the Islamist movement Hamas, Fatah’s archrival that controls almost half of the Gaza Strip and whose October 7, 2023 attack on Israel triggered the war. In most cities, Fatah-supported candidacies will face independent lists led by candidates from factions such as the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (Marxist-Leninist).
