Israel tight-lipped on Palestinian elections
Official Israel is mindful not to make public statements on the upcoming Palestinian elections, yet some reports suggest it is working behind the scenes to encourage their postponement or cancellation.
Israelis are focused on political plots and maneuvers ahead of President Reuven Rivlin tasking a candidate to form a new government. But in parallel, Jerusalem is preoccupied with developments on the Palestinian front ahead of the May 22 Palestinian parliamentarian elections.
Polls in recent weeks have gone back and forth between Hamas and Fatah. A March 23 poll by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research had noted a small shift away from Hamas and in favor of Fatah. But that was before Palestinian prisoner and leader Marwan Barghouti announced that his own list would be running in the elections.
For Israel, this is negative news on two levels.
The first is Barghouti himself. The former Fatah senior has been imprisoned in Israel for more than 20 years and is surely not Jerusalem’s prime choice as its future Palestinian interlocutor. He is considered more hawkish and combative against Israel compared with Abbas. That being said, over the years Barghouti had contacts with several senior left-wing Israeli politicians who visited him in jail. Some of them now estimate that between a stronger Hamas and a weaker Abbas, Barghouti could be a constructive compromise.
