Abbas appoints veteran spokesman Abu Rudaineh as deputy PM
In a surprise move, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has appointed veteran PA presidency spokesman Nabil Abu Rudaineh as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Information.
Abu Rudaineh was sworn in on Thursday before Abbas in a ceremony in the PA Muqata presidential compound shortly after the announcement of his appointment was made.
Born in Bethlehem in 1952, Abu Rudaineh previously served as an assistant to Fatah co-founder Khalil al-Wazir – known by the nom de guerre Abu Jihad – who was assassinated by Israel in Tunisia in 1988.
Abu Rudaineh, who is Greek Orthodox, is the first Christian to hold a senior position in the PA government.
After the signing of the Oslo Accords in 1993, he was appointed by former PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat as spokesman for the PA presidency – a job he held onto also under Abbas.
“The decision to appoint Abu Rudaineh as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Information was taken by President Abbas in coordination with Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah,” said Yusef al-Ahmed, spokesman for the Ramallah-based PA government.
It was not immediately clear what prompted Abbas to appoint Abu Rudaineh to the senior position in the PA government.
However, sources in Ramallah said the appointment was probably connected to reports about tensions between Abbas and Hamdallah.
According to the sources, the promotion of Abu Rudaineh may be interpreted as a sign that Abbas wants to see him replace Hamdallah.
Earlier this year, officials from Abbas’s ruling Fatah faction reportedly demanded that he fire Hamdallah under the pretext that the prime minister sees himself as a “natural successor” to the PA president. The reports surfaced amid rumors that Abbas’s health was deteriorating.
Hamas, meanwhile, criticized the appointment of Abu Rudaineh and said the Hamdallah government was no longer a “Palestinian national consensus government.” Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said on Twitter that “any reconciliation (between Hamas and Fatah) should be sponsored by a Palestinian unity government and not a Fatah government.”
The Palestinian national consensus government was announced in June 2014 on the basis of a reconciliation agreement signed between Hamas and Fatah. Abbas said then that the new government was “transitional,” and that negotiations with Israel would remain in the hands of the PLO.