• Palestinians fear Abbas is increasingly becoming a dictator -
    The Palestinian Constitutional Court ruled that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas can revoke the parliamentary immunity of Palestinian Legislative Council members, thus effectively enabling him to sideline rivals.

    Amira Hass Nov 11, 2016
    read more: http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.752530

    An academic from the Gaza Strip wrote on Facebook in response to Donald Trump’s election victory: “As a first step Trump will order to prepare security reports about the perverts in his party who voted for Clinton, and set up a constitutional court to fire Congress members who didn’t vote for him.”
    The average Palestinian has no difficulty understanding the barb. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has been conducting for years a purge and silencing campaign against those he sees as supporters of Mohammed Dahlan, or deviate from the official party line. Even Nikolay Mladenov, the special UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, hinted in public at Abbas’ silencing efforts.
    On Wednesday evening an inauguration ceremony for the Yasser Arafat Museum was held, by invitation only, in Ramallah. The museum itself opened to the public yesterday, on the 12th anniversary of Arafat’s death. Mladenov, who was among the speakers, pointed out landmarks in the life of “the leader who turned refugees into a nation.”
    “He was a man who respected his opponents’ opinions,” he said. Right or wrong, this statement is in keeping with the way PLO and Fatah members remember Arafat, when they contrast his leadership with that of Abbas.
    The Palestinian Constitutional Court ruled on November 3 that Abbas can revoke the parliamentary immunity of Palestinian Legislative Council members, thus effectively enabling him to sideline rivals. In the short term this upholds Abbas’ 2012 order to revoke Dahlan’s parliamentary immunity.