Palestine

02 Apr 2021; MEMO: The Palestinian Authority President, Mahmoud Abbas is claimed to have slammed the Israeli intelligence service's interference in the upcoming Palestinian parliamentary elections scheduled for May, Israel's public broadcaster KAN reported.

01 Apr 2021; MEMO: Newly dismissed Fatah member, Nasser Al-Qudwa, yesterday registered the electoral list formed jointly by him and imprisoned Fatah leader Marwan Barghouti, Safa news agency reported.

This came after Al-Qudwa and close aides of Barghouti signed an agreement to form their own electoral list for the parliamentary election.

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip (AP) — After months of torture and interrogations in a Hamas prison, Palestinian activist Rami Aman says he was offered an unconventional proposition: Divorce your wife and you are free to go.

31 Mar 2021; MEMO: An Executive Member of the Central Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organisation called on Tuesday for the international community to bear the consequences of Israel's possible refusal to allow Palestinians in Jerusalem to participate in the upcoming elections. Ahmed Majdalani said that it is impossible to hold elections without Jerusalemites' involvement.

RAMALLAH, Mar 27 (NNN-WAFA) – Israeli forces, yesterday arrested, in the West Bank, three more leaders of Hamas, ruling party of Gaza, according to Palestinian sources, close to the movement.

The sources said that, the Israeli forces arrested the three Hamas leaders, Hatem Qafisha, Eisa al-Jabari and Mazen al-Natsheh, from their homes, in the southern West Bank city of Hebron.

GAZA/RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - Palestinians took another step in preparations for their first parliamentary election in 15 years on Saturday, opening registration offices to admit the political parties and independent candidates that will take part.

The May 22 election in the West Bank and Gaza is part of a broader push for reconciliation between President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah faction and rival Islamist group Hamas. This is seen as vital to building broader support for any future statehood talks with Israel, frozen since 2014.

RAMALLAH, Mar 16 (NNN-WAFA) – Palestinian Prime Minister, Mohammed Ishtaye, said yesterday that, great progress has been made in the government’s efforts to obtain the COVID-19 vaccine.

During the weekly cabinet meeting, Ishtaye said, “We made significant progress in the contacts, which were successful, in relation to obtaining the vaccines, either through the COVAX scheme, or through multinational companies that produce the vaccines.”

COVAX is an international coronavirus vaccine scheme, co-led by the World Health Organisation and its partners.

RAMALLAH, March 14 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The Palestinian Authority and the Arab League condemned the Czech Republic’s opening of a diplomatic office in Jerusalem as a violation of international law.

Prague opened a Jerusalem branch of its Israel embassy, which is located in Tel Aviv, on Thursday.

The inauguration was attended by Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis, two weeks after Israel sent 5,000 Moderna COVID-19 vaccine doses to the Czech Republic under a “vaccine diplomacy” programme that later came under legal scrutiny and was frozen.

RAMALLAH, Mar 12 (NNN-WAFA) – Palestine’s Fatah movement, yesterday dismissed a senior member from the ruling party and its central committee, over his violation of internal rules.

The dismissal came, days after Nasser al-Qudwa announced his intention to form an independent electoral list, under the name of the National Democratic Forum, in the legislative elections, scheduled on May 22.

GAZA, Mar 4 (NNN-WAFA) – The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), said, living conditions of Palestinian refugees in the besieged Gaza Strip “are getting worse, due to 14 years of Israeli blockade and lack of jobs,” said Matthias Schmale, director of UNRWA operations in the Gaza Strip.

“The agency resorted to implementing the unified food basket system in the Gaza Strip, because the living standards have become the same and it isn’t easy to differentiate between the poor people and their levels of living,” Schmale said.