Mahmoud Abbas Announces First PLO Elections

Mahmoud Abbas has announced elections for November 1, 2026, in Palestine—the first direct, universal vote to elect members of the Palestinian National Council (PNC). As President of the Palestinian Authority and the PLO, Abbas issued a decree stating that elections ‘will be held everywhere possible, both inside and outside Palestine, to ensure maximum participation by the Palestinian people,’ according to Wafa news agency. Until now, PNC members were never directly elected; instead, they were appointed or indirectly chosen. The PNC—long serving as the PLO’s exiled parliament—is dominated by Fatah, Abbas’s movement co-founded with Yasser Arafat, who died in 2004. Islamist groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad are not PLO members and hold no representation in the council.