France calls on President Abbas to back down from postponing the Palestinian elections to September 2027

Paris - Ofoq News - France called on the Palestinian leadership to retract the decision to postpone the presidential and legislative elections until September 2027, demanding that they be held as soon as possible, after Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas announced a new date for the vote, according to what the French newspaper Le Monde reported on Sunday, October 11.

The French Foreign Ministry spokesman said that postponing the elections once again deprives the Palestinian people of their right to democratic expression through the ballot boxes, stressing the need to enable the Palestinians to choose their representatives in free and transparent elections, nearly twenty years after the last national legislative elections.

On Saturday, Abbas issued a decree stipulating that presidential and legislative elections be held on September 11, 2027, which means postponing the legislative elections that were scheduled to be held on November 28, while the presidential elections were expected at the beginning of 2027.

The Palestinian presidency justified the decision by the presence of obstacles imposed by Israeli measures that prevent holding the elections on their previous date, in addition to the need to create the necessary political, security and field conditions to ensure free, fair and comprehensive elections.

The decision came after a meeting held in Cairo, last Wednesday, with the participation of Palestinian factions, including the Fatah and Hamas movements, where the factions agreed, according to a source familiar with the discussions, to hold a national dialogue and to demand that the vote be postponed.

This development brings to the forefront the Palestinian election crisis that has been ongoing for years. In 2021, President Abbas canceled the legislative elections that were scheduled to be held, justifying his decision by not ensuring Palestinian participation in East Jerusalem under Israeli restrictions.

The last Palestinian legislative elections were held in 2006, in which Hamas won over Fatah. This was followed by the escalation of disputes between the two movements, leading to the Palestinian division in 2007, and since then the Legislative Council has no longer carried out its work regularly.