RAMALLAH: Palestinians in the West Bank and central Gaza voted on Saturday in municipal elections, the first since the war in Gaza erupted, with low turnout and a limited political field.
Nearly 1.5 million people are registered to vote in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, as well as 70,000 people in Gaza’s Deir El-Balah area, according to the Ramallah-based Central Elections Commission.
In the opening hours, a steady trickle of voters made their way to polling stations in Al-Bireh in the West Bank and Deir Al-Balah.
By late morning, turnout was strikingly low at 15 percent, rising to 24.53 percent by 1 p.m., the election commission said.
We are very pleased to exercise democracy despite the many challenges we face, both locally and internationally.
Palestinian President, Mahmoud Abbas
An AFP journalist reported near-empty stations across parts of the West Bank, as foreign diplomats observed the process.
“We are very pleased to exercise democracy in spite of the many challenges we face, both locally and internationally,” Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas told journalists after voting in Al-Bireh, the Palestinian news agency Wafa said.
Abbas said that elections will eventually be held across the Gaza Strip.
“Gaza is an inseparable part of the state of Palestine. Therefore, we have worked by all means to ensure that elections take place in Deir Al-Balah to affirm the unity of the two parts of the country together,” he said.
Voter Khalid Eid said he hoped for a change in council composition.
“We can’t change the situation, but we hope to replace people ... people who might be better and help develop the community,” the 55-year-old said.
Some questioned the election’s timing.
“We did not want elections at this time — not with war in Gaza and settler attacks ongoing in the West Bank,” said Ziad Hassan, a businessman from Dura Al-Qaraa village.
“The decision was imposed on us, and so we are compelled to elect an administrative body for the village council.”
Israeli settler attacks have surged in recent months and have become a major concern.
“The main thing is security from settlers. That’s why we need new faces, young people willing to fight for our rights,” said Abed Jabaieh, 68, former mayor of Ramun village.
Most electoral lists are aligned with Abbas’s secular-nationalist Fatah movement or are composed of independents.
Hamas, Fatah’s rival and the ruling power in Gaza, is absent from the race.
In many municipalities, Fatah-backed lists face off against independents supported by smaller factions such as the Marxist-Leninist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.
Municipal councils oversee water, sanitation, and local infrastructure but do not enact legislation.
Still, with presidential or legislative elections frozen since 2006, councils have become one of the last remaining democratic mechanisms under the Palestinian Authority.
The PA faces widespread criticism over corruption, stagnation, and declining legitimacy.
Western and regional donors have increasingly tied financial and diplomatic support for the PA to visible reform, particularly in local governance.
The EU called the vote an “important step toward broader democratization and strengthened local governance ... in line with the ongoing reforms process.”
Two years of war have left swaths of Gaza destroyed and more than 72,000 people dead, according to the territory’s Health Ministry, whose figures are considered reliable by the UN.
Public infrastructure, sanitation services, and the health sector are all struggling to function.
Under Hamas control since 2007, Gaza is seeing its first vote since the 2006 legislative elections that the Islamist movement won.
The PA is holding elections only in Deir Al-Balah to test its “success or failure, since there are no post-war opinion polls,” said Jamal Al-Fadi, a political scientist at Cairo’s Al-Azhar University.
It was chosen as one of the few areas where the population has not been massively displaced.
After voting there, Mohammed Al-Hasayna, 24, said although the elections were largely symbolic, they served as a sign of people’s “will to live.”
“We are an educated people with strong determination, and we deserve to have our own state,” he said.
“We want the world to help us overcome the catastrophe of war. Enough wars — it is time to work toward rebuilding Gaza.”
