http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A51690-2005Jan5.html
Hamas Won Power In West Bank Vote Local Elections May Prove to Be Harbinger By John Ward Anderson and Molly Moore Washington Post Foreign Service Thursday, January 6, 2005; Page A15 OBEIDIYEH, West Bank -- In this nondescript town of 10,000 people four miles southeast of Jerusalem, a slate of candidates called the Reform Bloc campaigned hard against corruption in the governing Palestinian Authority in last month's municipal elections, the first for Palestinians in nearly three decades. When the final votes were tallied, the Reform Bloc swept seven of the town council's 11 seats, including that of the mayor. Today, the government in Obeidiyeh is in the hands of the Islamic Resistance Movement, the radical Islamic organization known as Hamas that is labeled a terrorist group by the U.S. and Israeli governments. The Reform Bloc candidates were all associated with Hamas, local officials and residents say, but adopted a more nondescript name for their slate because they feared attack or arrest by Israeli security forces. The voters of Obeidiyeh, however, knew and embraced their true identities. In the same manner, in 26 communities across the West Bank, candidates associated with Hamas but campaigning under different banners won about 35 percent of 306 individual races. When negotiations are finished on the formation of coalitions, they could end up controlling or sharing control of governments in at least nine and as many as 13 municipal governments. "It was a very big percentage. . . . No one expected Hamas to take that percentage," said Ghazi Hamad, the editor of Hamas's weekly newspaper, Ara Salah. Hamas had never participated in an election in the Palestinian territories before last month's local balloting. The outcome, according to political analysts, politicians and voters, is a harbinger of the kind of campaigns that can be expected among a people who feel disenfranchised by their leaders, frustrated by years of corruption and worn down by conflict with Israel. "People wanted change," said Ali Jerbawi, a political scientist at Birzeit University near Ramallah, the main city in the West Bank. "They were tired of 10 years of negotiations [with Israel] that went nowhere. . . . Hamas was the political opposition, and people identified with the opposition, if not with the Hamas ideology itself." The local races, which drew 81 percent of registered voters, may also offer insights about the outcome of the election this Sunday to pick a new president of the Palestinian Authority to succeed Yasser Arafat, who died two months ago. Hamas, which opposed the 1993 Oslo peace accords that created the Palestinian Authority, is not fielding a presidential candidate and has officially called on its members to boycott the election. But some Hamas leaders said in recent interviews that Hamas was doing little to discourage members from voting and was quietly encouraging members to vote against the front-runner, former prime minister Mahmoud Abbas, the candidate of Arafat's Fatah movement, to narrow the margin of his expected victory. Among those responding to a recent public opinion poll, Abbas held a commanding 43 percentage-point lead over his closest rival, Mustafa Barghouti, a human rights activist. "Everyone has his own freedom," said Sami Abu Zohri, the Hamas spokesman in the Gaza Strip. "We won't force Palestinians to boycott, but we're not supporting any particular candidate." The local election results were a particularly strong blow to Fatah, which used its power as the largest party in the Palestinian Authority to schedule the elections in several phases, political analysts and politicians said. The towns where elections were held in December were picked because they were places where Fatah was expected to win easily, giving the party momentum going into subsequent rounds, some Fatah leaders privately conceded. "We expected Fatah to get 10 seats" on Obeidiyeh's 11-person council, said Shukri Radaideh, 45, a top Fatah leader in the region and head of the party in Obeidiyeh. The main problem, he said, was that 19 candidates associated with Fatah were on the ticket, which split the movement's vote, giving it just three seats, while all seven Hamas candidates and the lone independent were victorious. "Fatah defeated itself" and was also hurt by its close association with the Palestinian Authority, he said. "Fatah was seen as the party in power, and because of mistakes, including corruption, the local Fatah paid the price." Said Jerbawi, the political scientist: "These towns and villages were selected because Fatah thought they would get all the seats. . . . They were safe havens." "The election results in the West Bank assured there is no way to run from Hamas," said Abu Zohri, the Hamas spokesman. "The results showed the Palestinian people want change and want Hamas." The new mayor of Obeidiyeh, Maher Radaideh, a leader of the Reform Bloc, denied any political ties to Hamas, many of whose leaders have been arrested or killed by Israeli forces. The Hamas Web site, however, lists Radaideh and his colleagues as Hamas candidates, and voters saw them as such. "The security situation in our country is bad, so many people don't want to give the Israeli government a reason to take them to prison," Rateb Abayat, 33, Obeidiyeh's architectural engineer, said this week as the new town council was meeting in an adjoining room. Ali Issa Issawi, 43, an unemployed construction worker, offered another reason council members were reluctant to be labeled as members of Hamas: "All the municipality's money comes from the outside, from foreign countries, and when people from abroad hear 'Hamas,' they think it's a terrorist organization, and so they won't give money to the town of Obeidiyeh." While Hamas leaders acknowledge that the organization, founded in 1987, has an armed wing that has conducted dozens of suicide bombing attacks against Israeli civilians, they say a key objective of the group is operating a vast network of social welfare programs in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. Israeli officials say they make no distinction between the various wings of Hamas, asserting that its political and social activities are directed at building support for terrorist operations. Many Palestinian and Israeli political analysts said that the group's goals were more nuanced and that its leaders recognized it eventually would have to evolve into a more moderate and mainstream political organization to survive and grow. One of the first steps, they said, was the participation of Hamas in local elections, giving it a grass-roots base for parliamentary elections this year. Eventually, they said, Hamas would contest the presidency and aim to become an internationally accepted political party. "We will participate in local elections and parliamentary elections, and we will find power there in those two groups," said Hamad, the Hamas editor. "The local elections prove we can succeed. . . . It was an important step that can lead us to establishing a democratic process." Walid Abu Sirhan, 32, a senior editor at Al Quds newspaper who won as the only independent in the Obeidiyeh race, called the elections "a tweak of Fatah's ear. The message was: Correct your ways and be careful. There is an alternative." Moore reported from Gaza City. ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Give underprivileged students the materials they need to learn. Bring education to life by funding a specific classroom project. http://us.click.yahoo.com/FHLuJD/_WnJAA/cUmLAA/TySplB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> -------------------------- Want to discuss this topic? Head on over to our discussion list, [EMAIL PROTECTED] -------------------------- Brooks Isoldi, editor [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.intellnet.org Post message: osint@yahoogroups.com Subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] *** FAIR USE NOTICE. 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