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Palestinian National Council

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Legislative body of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO)

Not to be confused with thePalestinian Legislative Council, the legislative body of thePalestinian National Authority.

Palestinian National Council المجلس الوطني الفلسطيني

Type
Type	Legislative body of thePalestine Liberation Organization
History
Founded	1964; 62 years ago (1964)
Leadership
Chairman	Rawhi Fattouh
Vice Chairpersons	Ali Faisal Mousa Hadid
Secretary-General	Fahmi al-Za’arir
Structure
Seats	747
Meeting place
Ramallah
Website
www.palestinepnc.org

ThePalestinian National Council (PNC;Arabic:المجلس الوطني الفلسطيني,romanized: Al-majlis Al-wataniu Al-filastiniu) is the legislative body - in Arabic, theMajlis - of thePalestine Liberation Organization (PLO). The PNC is intended to serve as the parliament that represents all Palestinians inside and outside thePalestinian territories, and all sectors of the worldwide Palestinian community, including political parties, popular organizations, resistance movements, and independent figures from all sectors of life.^[1]

The Council met formally 20 times in the 27 years between 1964 and 1991. Since theOslo Accords, the council met formally only twice: in 1996 and 2018.

The PNC is intended to be responsible for formulating the policies and programs for the PLO, and elects thePLO Executive Committee, which assumes leadership of the organization between its sessions. Resolutions are passed by a simple majority with a quorum of two-thirds. The PNC elects its own Chairman.^[2]

Representation

Although Article 5 of the PLO Basic Law, adopted at the first PNC meeting in 1964, states that members should be chosen by "direct election... by the Palestinian people", such elections have never happened.^[3] Since the PNC and PLO were created originally by theArab League, the initial membership of the PNC was chosen by the Arab states, particularly Jordan and Egypt.^[4] Even Palestinian factions were wary of direct elections, worrying about the ability for outside actors to influence such elections and thus undermine the emerging Palestinian resistance. On the other hand, the Palestinian factions were conscious of the value of having a Palestinian institution recognized by the Arab world.^[5]

After theSix Day War in 1967, the PNC was reconstituted. From 1968 onwards, PNC membership was reallocated based on a quota system, allocating seats to Palestinian political parties and resistance groups based on the claimed size of their membership. This mechanism was used, and continues to be used, byFatah to ensure its monopoly over the Executive Committee, the decision-making body of the PLO.^[6]

Structure

The PNC serves as the legislative body of the PLO. While the PNC has a number of PLC members, it is not an organ of thePalestinian National Authority. Rather it is the equivalent of PA's PLC. According to its charter, the PNC must meet annually, and can hold special meetings if necessary. The PNC is responsible for formulating PLO's policies, and elects thePLO Executive Committee.^[7]

Candidates for the PNC are nominated by a committee consisting of the PLO Executive Committee, thePNC chairman, and thecommander in chief of thePalestine Liberation Army.^[2] After nomination, PNC candidates are elected by a majority of the entire PNC membership.^[2] However, due to the impossibility of holding elections, PNC elections have never been held and most members are appointed by the executive committee.^[1]

ThePalestinian Central Council (PCC) serves as the intermediary body between the PNC and the EC. The PCC is chaired by the PNC chairman, and has increasingly eclipsed the PNC as the main decision-making body of the PLO. In 2018, the PNC transferred its legislative powers to the PCC, including powers to elect the EC.^[8]

Though not members of PLO,Hamas andPalestinian Islamic Jihad members were invited to the PNC as observers in 2018, although they refused.^[7]

As of 2012 the main office of the PNC is inAmman and a branch office is located inRamallah.^[9]

Meetings

The first PNC, composed of 422 representatives, met inJerusalem in May 1964 and adopted thePalestinian National Covenant (also called Palestinian National Charter). It also established the PLO as the political expression of the Palestinian people and electedAhmad Al-Shuqeiry as the first chairman of thePLO Executive Committee. At the conference were representatives from Palestinian communities inJordan,West Bank, theGaza Strip,Syria,Lebanon,Kuwait,Iraq,Egypt,Qatar,Libya, andAlgeria.

Subsequent sessions were held inCairo (1965),Gaza (1966), Cairo (1968–1977),Damascus (1979–1981),Algiers (1983),Amman (1984), Algiers (1988), Gaza (1996 and 1998),Ramallah (2009).^[10]^[11]

At the February 1969 meeting in Cairo,Yasser Arafat was appointed leader of the PLO. He continued to be PLO leader (sometimes called Chairman, sometimes President) until his death in 2004.

In a November 1988 meeting in Algiers, the PNC approved thePalestinian Declaration of Independence^[12] by a vote of 253 in favour 46 against and 10 abstentions.

After the signing of theOslo Accords in 1993, the PNC met in Gaza in April 1996 and voted 504 to 54 to void those parts of thePalestinian National Covenant that deniedIsrael'sright to exist, but the charter itself has not been formally changed or re-drafted. One of its most prominent members, thePalestinian-American scholar and activistEdward Said, left the PNC because he believed that theOslo Accords sold short the right ofPalestinian refugees to return to their homes in pre-1967 Israel and would not lead to a lasting peace.

In December 1998, the PNC met in Gaza at the insistence of the Israeli Prime MinisterBenjamin Netanyahu, who called it a condition of the continuation of thepeace process. In the presence of theUS PresidentClinton, it reaffirmed again the annulling of the parts of the Covenant which denied Israel's right to exist, but it still did not formally change or re-draft the Covenant. Clinton gave a speech to the event appealing to the PNC not to allow their grievances against Israel to stifle Palestinian progress.^[13]

In 1996, when the Council had to vote on the revision of the Palestinian National Charter, the total number of PNC members was increased from 400 to about 800. By 2009, some 700 from them had remained.^[14] As of 2003^[update], the PNC chairman wasSalim Zanoun and the PNC had 669 members; 88 are from the firstPalestinian Legislative Council (PLC), 98 represent the Palestinian population living in theWest Bank andGaza Strip, and 483 represent thePalestinian diaspora.^[2]

For the first time in 22 years, since its last full meeting in 1996, the 700 member PNC met on 30 April 2018 in Ramallah to discuss recent developments, but many groups did not attend, includingHamas (the leading Palestinian political party),Islamic Jihad andPopular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. The PNC also filled vacancies in thePLO Executive Committee with loyalists toPalestinian presidentMahmood Abbas.^[15]^[16]

The PNC have met formally 23 times since inception, in addition to three extraordinary meetings. The table below summarizes the meetings:^[17]

Number	Year	Dates	Outcome	Place	Chairman of the EC	Chairman of the PNC
1	1964	28 May - 2 June	Creation of the PNC, PLO and adoption of thePalestinian National Covenant	Jerusalem	Ahmad Shukeiri	Ahmad Shukeiri
2	1965	31 May - 4 June		Cairo
3	1966	20–24 May		Gaza
Following theSix-Day War:
Transitional period	1967	From 25 December			Yahya Hammuda	Yahya Hammuda
4	1968	10–17 July		Cairo	Yahya Hammuda	Abdel Mohsin Al-Qattan
5	1969	1–4 February	Election ofYasser Arafat		Yasser Arafat	Yahya Hammuda
6	1969	1–6 September
7	1970	30 May - 4 June
Extraordinary	1970	27–28 August		Amman
8	1971	28 February - 5 March		Cairo
9	1971	7–13 July				Khaled al-Fahoum
10	1972	6–12 April
11	1973	6–12 January
12	1974	1–9 June	PLO's Ten Point Program
13	1977	12–22 March
14	1979	15–22 January		Damascus
15	1981	11–19 April		Damascus
16	1983	14–22 February		Algiers
17	1984	22–29 November		Amman		Abd al-Hamid al-Sayih
18	1987	20–25 April		Algiers
19 (extraordinary)	1988	12–15 November	Palestinian Declaration of Independence
20	1991	23–28 September
Following theOslo Accords:
21	1996	22–25 April		Gaza	Yasser Arafat	Salim al-Za'nun
Election of Chairman	2004	11 November	Election ofMahmoud Abbas	Ramallah	Mahmoud Abbas
22 (private meeting)	2009	26–27 August
23	2018	30 April - 4 May	Transfer of powers to thePCC

Bibliography

Becker, Jillian (1984).The PLO: The Rise and Fall of the Palestine Liberation Organization. St. Martin's Press.ISBN 978-0-312-59380-3. Retrieved2024-05-05.
Sayigh, Yezid (1997).Armed Struggle and the Search for State: The Palestinian National Movement, 1949-1993. Clarendon Press.ISBN 978-0-19-829265-4. Retrieved2024-05-05.
Badarin, Emile (2016).Palestinian Political Discourse: Between Exile and Occupation. Routledge Studies on the Arab-Israeli Conflict. Taylor & Francis.ISBN 978-1-317-32600-7. Retrieved2024-05-05.

References

^^a ^bPLO vs. PA Archived 2016-03-04 at theWayback Machine. Passia, September 2014
^^a ^b ^c ^dPalestine National Council. Gale Encyclopedia of the Mideast & N. Africa, 2004. Archived 28-06-2011
^Badarin 2016, p. 45: "In addition to the quota system, the roots of power distribution go back to the initial formation of the PLO. The PLO Basic Law demands “direct election of the PNC by the Palestinian people” (Article 5), which has never been fulfilled, and at the same time it concentrates power inside the Executive Committee. The gist of the Basic Law gives prominence to the Executive Committee and diminishes other institutions."
^Badarin 2016, p. 24: "Retrospectively, the details of the Palestinian representation (i.e., effective political institutions) were tailored to the size of the Arab regimes’ political reckonings at that time. Thus representatives were appointed based on their loyalty to the regimes in Jordan and Egypt in particular. Members of the PNC were chosen using an appointment mechanism at odds with the PLO Basic Law, which endorsed the principle of “direct election of the PNC members” (article 5). Although the PLO is meant to answer the question of representation, neither its initial Charter nor Basic Law (of 1964) gave it the right to represent the Palestinians. Instead, representative capacity and highest power were consigned to the Executive Committee (see articles 15 and 16/a of the Basic Law). Furthermore, the Executive Committee was molded according to the political divisions of Arab politics (mainly with respect to Jordan, Egypt, and Syria). The Arab League appointed Al-Shuqayri, and he appointed himself the chairman of the Executive Committee; he also appointed the other members."
^Sayigh 1997, p. 101: "Fateh's immediate concerns in mid-1964 were political in any case. One was that general elections, if held, could grant 'legitimacy to representatives who might emerge on the political stage and implement decisions that are categorically rejected by the Palestinian people, [by] taking cover in [that] legitimacy'. The establishment of the PLO therefore threatened to abort the 'mass movement'. As Khalid al-Hasan later explained, 'we considered the PLO to be an Arab instrument and [its military wing] a part of the Arab armies. In view of our experiences with the Arabs and especially in 1936, and our deep lack of trust towards them . . . we feared that the PLO would kill or divert the awakening of our people'. Wazir added that the PLO had been created with the express purpose of pre-empting the revolutionary process among the Pales tinians. A subsequent Fateh memorandum also took task with the PLO for being 'the child of the [Arab] summit conference, which inherited its blood and flesh from the conference and so reflected its contradictions'. The Arab states had shied away from confronting Israeli plans to divert the Jordan River head waters, it argued, and so created the PLO as a means of distracting public attention. Yet Fateh was also aware, as Wazir later explained, that 'the PLO enjoyed Arab legitimacy, and this was important' ."
^Salem Barahmeh,The Palestinians, the PLO, and Political Representation: the Search for Palestinian Self-Determination, June 2014
^^a ^b"Palestinian National Council (PNC)".European Council on Foreign Relations. 20 March 2018. Retrieved11 October 2023.
^"Palestinian Central Council (PCC)".European Council on Foreign Relations. 20 March 2018. Retrieved11 October 2023.
^"Palestine National Council - Main Office, Branch Offices". Archived fromthe original on June 6, 2013.
^"The parliament of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) elected on Thursday six new members to its executive body". Archived fromthe original on 2014-11-29. Retrieved2011-01-27.
^"Palestinian affairs. - Free Online Library".www.thefreelibrary.com.
^Dan Cohn-Sherbok,The Palestinian State: A Jewish Justification, Impress Books, 2012 p.105.
^Ross, Dennis.Doomed to Succeed: The U.S.-Israel Relationship From Truman to Obama. New York: Farrar, Starus and Giroux, 2015. p. 287.
^On the Experience of the Palestinian Liberation OrganizationArchived 2015-09-24 at theWayback Machine. Middle East Monitor (MEMO), 20 October 2012
^"Palestinian forum convenes after 22 years, beset by division".Reuters. April 30, 2018 – via www.reuters.com.
^Fawcett, Harry."Palestinian National Council meets for first time in 22 years".www.aljazeera.com.
^PNC (2014-03-14)."دورات المجلس الوطني 1964 ـ 1996".المجلس الوطني الفلسطيني (in Arabic). Archived fromthe original on 2024-02-16. Retrieved2024-05-05.