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Hamas challenges Fatah rule in Palestinian election

Posted on: Wednesday, 25 January 2006, 15:41 CST

By Wafa Amr and Mohammed Assadi

RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - Islamic militant group Hamas made a strong showing in a Palestinian parliamentary election on Wednesday, just a few percentage points behind the ruling Fatah movement, first projections showed.

The strength of support for Hamas in the first Palestinian parliamentary election in a decade raised the prospect that it could win government posts for the first time and deal a further blow to hopes for peacemaking with Israel.

Exit polls from three institutions all put Fatah ahead, but by margins of only between three and seven percentage points.

The highest projection for Fatah was 47 percent in a poll by Bir Zeit University that gave Hamas 44 percent, also the highest estimate for the militant group. The other polls gave results of 46 to 40 percent and 42 to 35 percent.

Pollster Khalil Shikaki said Hamas appeared to have won all the seats in Gaza City, the group's powerbase.

Both sides claimed victory and fired guns in the air to celebrate in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Hamas said it believed it had won over 50 percent of the vote.

"Hamas is making huge progress," said spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri, telling supporters "your efforts did not go in vain."

Hamas, whose charter calls for the destruction of Israel, was expected to capitalize on Fatah's image for corruption and mismanagement. It has largely respected a truce for a year.

Palestinians voted at polling stations across the West Bank and Gaza Strip, emerging with index fingers daubed in blue ink to prevent fraud.

"This election might bring change," said voter Khalil Tato in the West Bank city of Hebron. "... a reduction of unemployment, an end to corruption and better and stronger negotiations with the Israelis."

Militants under orders to avoid trouble on election day after weeks of armed chaos left their weapons outside.

Turnout was estimated at more than 73 percent.

PEACEMAKING DOUBTS

Israel has said future peacemaking would be in doubt if Hamas, responsible for many suicide bombings during a five-year-old uprising, took a role in government. Washington, which lists Hamas as a terrorist group, has also voiced concern.

But Abbas, elected a year ago after the death of former Palestinian President Yasser Arafat, said the Palestinian Authority was ready to resume long-stalled talks with Israel even if Hamas joined his government.

"We are approaching a new period and we hope that the international community will help us return to the negotiating table," said Abbas, hailing the peaceful voting.

Israel and the United States rule out any contacts with Hamas unless it renounces violence, disarms and drops its charter provisions calling for eliminating the Jewish state.

"Hamas is a terrorist organization. Under current circumstances I don't see any change in that," said White House spokesman Scott McClellan after first projections emerged.

Even if Hamas does not win outright, it is expected to do well enough to be offered cabinet seats in a power-sharing deal.

"The test of democracy is not this election, the test is in the day after when you have to start enacting policy," said Israeli spokesman Raanan Gissin.

Abbas hopes once Hamas enters parliament it might be prepared to relinquish its weapons.

Despite signals this week it might be open to indirect talks with Israel, Hamas reiterated on Wednesday it would not change its charter or give up its weapons.

LITTLE TROUBLE

Only a few incidents marred the election, in which 1.4 million people in Gaza, the occupied West Bank and Arab East Jerusalem were eligible to vote for a 132-member parliament.

A festive mood prevailed at polling places in East Jerusalem, where Israel allowed limited voting under U.S. pressure and as long as Hamas did not campaign there.

Israel captured East Jerusalem in the 1967 Middle East war and annexed it in a move not recognized internationally. Palestinians say it must be their future capital.

Voters chose from 11 party lists across the Palestinian areas and more than 400 candidates running locally in the first parliamentary elections since 1996. About 900 foreign observers, led by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, were present.

Israeli troops pulled back from West Bank population centers to avoid accusations of interfering in the polls.

Interim Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, in his first policy speech since assuming the powers of Ariel Sharon who suffered a stroke on January 4, said he hoped the Palestinians would elect a government ready to follow a U.S.-sponsored "road map." He is widely favored to win Israel's March 28 election.

(Additional reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi in Gaza, Allyn Fisher-Ilan, Jeffrey Heller, Megan Goldin and Tali Caspi in Jerusalem and Haitham al-Tamimi in Hebron)

Source: REUTERS

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