The forthcoming Palestinian elections have generated a good deal of speculation. Among the many players, one rather enigmatic figure is Mohammed Dahlan. Long believed to harbor the ambition of succeeding Mahmoud Abbas as president of the Palestinian Authority, he is currently facing a political dilemma.
“Dahlan is a convicted criminal,” said a PA official recently, “and as such he won’t be allowed to participate in the elections. If he enters Ramallah, he will be immediately arrested and thrown into prison.”
Dahlan’s past is replete with rumors of political maneuverings and conspiratorial plots (the Turkish government has a warrant out for his arrest on a charge of plotting the attempted coup against President Tayyip Recep Erdogan coup in 2016). Now he seems to have devised a characteristically convoluted strategy to achieve his political ambitions.
The Palestinian Central Elections Commission has the task of either approving or banning the lists. The rules governing its decisions are obscure, not to mention arbitrary. It is, therefore, far from certain that Dahlan’s party will be permitted to participate in the elections.
Dahlan was driven out of the West Bank after a row with Abbas in 2011. He took up residence in the United Arab Emirates, where he is now an adviser to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan. It is widely speculated that Dahlan played a key role in bringing the UAE-Israel normalization deal to fruition. Palestinian officials are quoted as saying they have no doubt about it.
Dahlan opened his campaign on March 17 with an interview on Al-Arabiya TV.
“Abbas made three promises,” he said, “to reform and strengthen Fatah, to reform the Palestinian Authority, which he said at the time was corrupt... and to make an honorable peace [with Israel]. He did none of them.”
DAHLAN MAINTAINED that Hamas and Fatah were conspiring to allow the 85-year-old Abbas to run unopposed in the forthcoming presidential election “as if he were 40 years old and his future was ahead of him.”
Without elaborating as to whether he would also run, Dahlan declared enigmatically, “Abbas will not be the only presidential candidate in the elections.”
Although Dahlan’s participation in the forthcoming Palestinian Legislative Council election virtually relies on the toss of a coin, Jerusalem Post political commentator Khaled Abu Toameh believes he is hoping that his supporters will win enough seats to allow them to be part of a future government coalition. Once Dahlan loyalists are in the parliament and government, Abu Toameh believes the plan will be for them to negotiate their leader’s participation in the presidential election scheduled for July 31.
He is also promising a swift solution of the endemic problem of inadequate electricity supplies in the Gaza Strip.
“One of my business associates could resolve it easily,” said Dahlan in his TV interview. “This isn’t such a big deal. We’re not talking about some enormous grant. It is the political divides and personal rifts that have – and I’m sorry to put it like this – turned the Palestinian people into beggars.”
A more covert move at strengthening his influence within the Palestinian political scene has been the deal Dahlan is reported to have struck with Hamas. Under its terms, Dahlan apparently agreed to pay blood money to the families of dozens of Palestinians killed by his men in the past three decades. In return, his supporters would be permitted to return to the Gaza Strip. And indeed, in the past few weeks scores of Dahlan loyalists began returning under assurances from Hamas that they would not be arrested or killed.
In the long term, the real significance of these Palestinian elections may be that Mohammed Dahlan, after years of exile in the UAE, is making a formal return to the political scene.