On September 2, 2007, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas issued Decree No. (1) of 2007 regarding general elections, stipulating the abolition of Palestinian Election Law No. (9) of 2005. The decree is based in its preamble on the provisions of the law amending the Palestinian Basic Law, in particular What is stipulated in Article (43) of it, which gives the President the right to issue decisions that have the force of law in cases of necessity when the Legislative Council is not in session.
The decree-law replaces Election Law No. (9) of 2005 issued by the Palestinian Legislative Council and ratified by the Palestinian President on August 13, 2005.
The most prominent amendment in the decree law was the adoption of the principle of full proportional representation system (lists) in the Legislative Council elections, considering the Palestinian territories as one electoral district, instead of the mixed system specified in Law No. (9), under which the last legislative elections were held in January 2006, and accordingly, All members of the Legislative Council will be elected according to the list system, where nominations will take place within the framework of closed electoral lists at the national level, and seats will be distributed among the electoral lists in a proportional manner according to the “Sainte-Laguë ” method, so that each list gets a number of seats based on the number of the votes obtained at the national level.
The decree-law adopts most of the provisions of Election Law No. (9) of 2005, such as the definition of resident, nomination conditions, and procedures for the electoral process, with some amendments, including the addition of a new condition for eligibility to run for the position of president or council membership, that “he must be committed to the Palestine Liberation Organization as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people and to the
Palestinian Declaration of Independence.” And the provisions of the Basic Law.
It is also noteworthy that the aforementioned resolution adopted a two-round system to elect the Palestinian president, noting that Law No. (9) of 2005 adopted a majority system in electing the President of the Palestinian National Authority, and the two-round system was based on the requirement that the winning candidate obtain a majority of votes (more than 50%). Therefore, if no candidate obtains an absolute majority of votes, a second round is resorted to between the two candidates with the highest votes, and here the candidate who obtains a majority of votes in the second round wins.
Following the issuance of the decree calling to hold the general elections in January of 2021, President Mahmoud Abbas issued Decree Law No. (1) of 2021, according to which, the Decree Law No. (1) of 2007 was amended regarding general elections. The new decision did not change the electoral system, as it maintained the full proportional representation system for electing members of the Legislative Council “closed electoral lists” at the national level.