A poster for Abbas put up in a Ramallah square

GAZA CITY, January 3 (IslamOnline.net) – Palestinians woke up in 2005 to the posters of Palestinian presidential hopefuls decking the streets of the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, with the landmark vote only six days to go.

Platform leaflets, TV debates and first-hand tours of obliterated Palestinian cities and congested refugee camps have eclipsed happy New Year greetings.

“This year is, in effect, a watershed in Palestinian history,” Ahraf Al-Ajrami, a Palestinian analyst, told IslamOnline.net.

“It will lay to rest decades of political differences and help the Palestinian people act in unison.”

The presidential election — the first to be held since 1996 — is to take place on January 9 in the occupied territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

With seven candidates vying, Palestinian voters will elect a new chairman of the Palestinian Authority to replace their emblematic leader Yasser Arafat, who dramatically passed away on November 11, 2004.

Frontrunner Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen), Fatah’s candidate and chairman of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), wasted no time and continued his enthusiastic electioneering, using the Arafat’s refrains and peace mantras.

He toured Sunday, January 2, the Gaza Strip refugee camp of Jabaliya, home to up to 100,000 Palestinians displaced by incessant Israeli raids, pledging again to follow in the footsteps of Arafat to bring in the “peace of the brave.”

A day earlier, he took his election campaign to the refugee camp of Rafah where he was given a hero’s welcome.

Reach-Out

Greeted by his supporters in Beit Lahia, Barghouthi is Abbas’ nearest rival (AFP)

Other candidates were also keen to start the new year by reaching out to their people and beating a path to their doors.

Independent candidate Mostafa Al-Barghouthi, who is Abbas’ nearest rival, visited the West Bank city of Jenin where he was warmly welcomed by thousands of cheering Palestinians.

The Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research found that 65 percent of voters intend to back Abbas against a 22-percent rating for Barghouthi. The other five candidates combined managed just five percent.

Independent Sayed Barka, a former Islamic Jihad activist, toured the mosques of the Gaza City, trying to convince the voters of his Islamic-oriented blueprint.

Abdel Halim Al-Ashqar was conspicuous by his absence as he is under house arrest in the United States.

His supporters and family; nevertheless, never gave up hope that Ashqar could make it though he virtually stands slim chance.

Bassam Al-Salehi, the candidate of the communist Al-Shaab party, and Taysir Khaled, the candidate of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), focused on the West Bank city of Nablus and its adjacent villages and refugee camps.

Israel has given a hard time to Islamic-oriented Abdul Karim Shubeir, who tried in vain to cross several checkpoints to market his platform.

Hamas said on December 22 it would neither support any of the Palestinian presidential hopefuls nor name a candidate, charging the vote has been “tailored” for Abbas.