Palestinian exit polls as accurate as American ones!

[minionofmidas]

Here's the election result.

Turnout 74.6%
Turnout, West Bank 73.1%
Turnout, Gaza 76.0%
Constituency with highest turnout Rafah, 82.7%

List vote (66 seats distributed by Saint-Lague, with 2% threshold)
Change & Reform (=Hamas) 43.0% (of voters, not of valid votes) 30
Fatah Movement 39.9% 27
Martyr Abu Ali Mustafa 4.1% 3
The Alternative 2.8% 2
Independent Palestine (=Barghouti) 2.6% 2
The Third Way 2.3% 2
others or invalid 5.3%

Constituencies (66 seats distributed to 16 predefined constituencies. 1 to 9 seats per constituency. Every voter has as many votes as there are seats. Top vote getters elected. 6 seats reserved to Christian minority, see below.)

Jericho 1  - 1 Fatah
Hebron 9 - 9 Change & Reform
Jerusalem 6 - 4 Change & Reform, 2 Fatah. Fatah won Christian seats.
Bethlehem 4 - 2 Change & Reform, 2 Fatah. Fatah won Christian seats.
Jenin 4 - 2 Change & Reform, 2 Fatah
Khan Younis 5 - 4 Change & Reform, 1 Fatah
Deir al-Baleh 3 - 2 Change & Reform, 1 Fatah
Ramallah & al-Bireh 5 - 4 Change & Reform, 1 Fatah. Fatah won Christian seat.
Rafah 3 - 3 Fatah
Salfit 1 - 1 Change & Reform
North Gaza 5 - 5 Change & Reform
Tubas 1 - 1 Change & Reform
Tulkarem 3 - 2 Change & Reform, 1 independent
Gaza 8 - 5 Change & Reform, 3 independents. 1 Independent won Christian seat.
Qalqilya 2 - 2 Fatah
Nablus 6 - 5 Change & Reform, 1 Fatah.
Total 46 Change & Reform, 16 Fatah, 4 independent.
Notice that Muslims in constituencies with reserved Christian seats still had as many votes as there were total seats. I've only seen winning candidates' vote totals, but it would appear that in the West Bank seats, Hamas simply put up only as many candidates as there were unreserved seats, and told its supporters not to cast all their votes. The independents in Gaza, including the Christian, appear to have been elected with Hamas support.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

You mean Hamas didn't win the Christian seats? I. Am. Shocked.

I *am* shocked that Fatah lost in Ramallah though...

[minionofmidas]

You mean Hamas didn't win the Christian seats? I. Am. Shocked.

Given how they were awarded, they could have won them if they had so chosen - and in Gaza, they sort-of-did. Elsewhere they didn't try to.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

You mean Hamas didn't win the Christian seats? I. Am. Shocked.

Given how they were awarded, they could have won them if they had so chosen - and in Gaza, they sort-of-did. Elsewhere they didn't try to.

Yeah, I read what you wrote

[angus]

Abbas Asks Hamas to Form New Government

"...Israel Rules Out Peace Talks With Palestinian Administration..."

disappointing, but not surprising.

read all about it here


Emily Messner has a nice piece breaking down the opinions on the Hamas victory into three categories:

1. Hamas is a terrorist organization that will always be hell bent on the destruction of Israel. Hamas's rise to power is just more bad news for the already fragile two-state solution.

2. Winning a place in government will force Hamas to take a more moderate position in order to ensure the continuing flow of international aid, and to negotiate on behalf of its constituents, most of whom want to live in peace in a country of their own.

3. We have no idea how this will turn out, and we have no way of knowing how a Hamas-led Palestinian government will affect Israel's March elections -- or anything else, for that matter.

The grammar is atrocious, but it's a compelling read.  Prescient, imho.

http://blogs.washingtonpost.com/thedebate/

[minionofmidas]

Constituencies (66 seats distributed to 16 predefined constituencies. 1 to 9 seats per constituency. Every voter has as many votes as there are seats. Top vote getters elected. 6 seats reserved to Christian minority, see below.)

Jericho 1  - 1 Fatah
Hebron 9 - 9 Change & Reform
Jerusalem 6 - 4 Change & Reform, 2 Fatah. Fatah won Christian seats.
Bethlehem 4 - 2 Change & Reform, 2 Fatah. Fatah won Christian seats.
Jenin 4 - 2 Change & Reform, 2 Fatah
Khan Younis 5 - 4 Change & Reform, 1 Fatah
Deir al-Baleh 3 - 2 Change & Reform, 1 Fatah
Ramallah & al-Bireh 5 - 4 Change & Reform, 1 Fatah. Fatah won Christian seat.
Rafah 3 - 3 Fatah
Salfit 1 - 1 Change & Reform
North Gaza 5 - 5 Change & Reform
Tubas 1 - 1 Change & Reform
Tulkarem 3 - 2 Change & Reform, 1 independent
Gaza 8 - 5 Change & Reform, 3 independents. 1 Independent won Christian seat.
Qalqilya 2 - 2 Fatah
Nablus 6 - 5 Change & Reform, 1 Fatah.
Total 46 Change & Reform, 16 Fatah, 4 independent.

Map

[M]

Are there not seats reserved for the Samaritans and Netorei Karta (anti-Zionist Orthox Jewish movement)? If so, how are these represented?

[minionofmidas]

Are there not seats reserved for the Samaritans and Netorei Karta (anti-Zionist Orthox Jewish movement)? If so, how are these represented?

I thought the Samaritans were in Israel?

[??????????]

Hamas is a terrorist party. Hamas leaders and activists deserve the death.

The same goes for Ariel 'Veggie' Sharon and his Mossad gang.

[minionofmidas]

This just in ... results above were based on 95.something% of ballots. After counting 100.0% of the ballots, Fatah picks up two additional seats from Hamas - one in the proportional vote, one in Khan Younis constituency.


Whatever happened to the talk of the West Bank being Fatah's area, the Gaza Strip being Hamastan? That's not really borne out by these results.

[Angel of Death]

Are there not seats reserved for the Samaritans and Netorei Karta (anti-Zionist Orthox Jewish movement)? If so, how are these represented?

In the 1996 legislative elections, one seat in Nablus was reserved for a Samaritan, but this is no longer the case.