Prisoners to Abbas: Delay election, nominate Barghouti as vice president

Palestinian security prisoners in Israeli prisons called on Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to postpone the election for the Palestinian parliament, the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC), slated for May 22.

The prisoners, who belong to Abbas’s ruling Fatah faction, said on Friday in a letter to the PA president and members of the Fatah Central Committee, the faction’s highest decision-making body, that one of the reasons why the vote needs to be delayed was because Israel will not allow the election to take place in Jerusalem.

The prisoners suggested that Abbas hold the presidential election according to the US electoral system, where the president and vice president run together.

Accordingly, they said, Abbas would run for president, while imprisoned Fatah leader Marwan Barghouti would be nominated for vice president. “This will affirm Fatah’s unity, which is based on the legitimacy of its historic leadership,” the prisoners added.

Barghouti is serving five life sentences in Israeli prison for his role in terrorist attacks during the Second Intifada (2000-2005). He and Nasser al-Kidwa, a nephew of former PLO leader Yasser Arafat, have joined forces to contest the parliamentary election as part of the Al-Hurriya list. Barghouti himself is not on the list. Kidwa is running together with Barghouti’s wife, Fadwa.

Earlier this week, Kidwa announced during a visit to the Gaza Strip that Barghouti would be Al-Hurriya’s candidate for the upcoming presidential election.

Another reason for delaying the election, the prisoners said, was the raging power