<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?><oembed><version><![CDATA[1.0]]></version><provider_name><![CDATA[Occupied Palestine | فلسطين]]></provider_name><provider_url><![CDATA[https://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com]]></provider_url><author_name><![CDATA[occupiedpalestine]]></author_name><author_url><![CDATA[https://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com/author/hajarhajar/]]></author_url><title><![CDATA[Interior Ministry: Elections illegitimate, a cover-up for leaked&nbsp;scandals]]></title><type><![CDATA[link]]></type><html><![CDATA[<table width="100%" align="center">
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<td><span class="PublishedDate">[ 					15/02/2011 &#8211; 11:10 AM ] </span></td>
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<p><img src="https://i2.wp.com/www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/DataFiles%5CCache%5CTempImgs%5C2011%5C1%5Cimages_News_2011_02_15_ghussain_300_0.jpg" alt="" /></div>
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<p style="font-size:10pt;">GAZA, (PIC)&#8211; The Gaza Ministry of  Interior said presidential and legislative elections to be held by the  PLO by September lack legitimacy and called the move a cover-up for  recently leaked scandals in the Palestinian Authority.</p>
<p style="font-size:10pt;">As protests calling for government reforms  take the Arab world by storm, the PLO&#8217;s Executive Committee announced  decisions to hold a ballot in the West Bank. Hamas which governs the  Gaza Strip has boycotted the move saying it will not confer legitimacy  to results.</p>
<p style="font-size:10pt;">”The elections announced by the PLO lack  legitimacy and represent no one but the people who compromised on  Palestinian constants. Therefore, all that stems from them is  illegitimate,” the Interior Ministry said in statements posted on its  official website on Monday.</p>
<p style="font-size:10pt;">”We reject conducting elections in light  of the absence of national agreement and in light of the continuation of  suppressive acts in the occupied West Bank by Fatah security  apparatuses against citizens and resistance fighters there,” the  statement says.</p>
<p style="font-size:10pt;">”The step is an attempt to cover historic  concessions by Fatah on Palestinian constants in light of the Fatah  authority&#8217;s loss of its greatest support after the downfall of the  Mubarak regime,” the statement says.</p>
<p style="font-size:10pt;">In separate statements, the Popular Front  for the Liberation of Palestine, another resistance faction in Gaza,  rejected the move, saying it would perpetuate the current split in  Palestine.</p>
<p style="font-size:10pt;">”Elections are a constitutional and legal  right and a road to democracy, but conducting them requires Palestinian  national agreement and end to the split and restoration of  unity&#8230;without that it would reinforce and perpetuate division,” the  PFLP said.</p>
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”We will not participate in elections hat could consolidate or  deepen the state of division,” it added. ”We will try by all means  whether by political contacts or national and popular efforts to end the  division as a key primary national task.”</p>
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<p><a href="http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/En/default.aspx?xyz=U6Qq7k%2bcOd87MDI46m9rUxJEpMO%2bi1s7Usy0xxGSs%2fHjU9V6IutbjeLVcjtmEsgjNFdH8NWOsWKAAVvTzv%2ff9VW%2bfq77vku0xHnSHqzmHtvuLOz0cZryIfaVvXwTT1s98Y2v74n6bjg%3d">Interior Ministry: Elections illegitimate, a cover-up for leaked scandals</a>.</p>
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