The Palestinian Authority announced on Wednesday that Rawhi Fattouh, 75, will temporarily assume leadership in the event of Mahmoud Abbas’s death. The decision comes just two weeks after Abbas marked his 89th birthday, raising questions about the future of the P.A.’s leadership.

The PA’s official Wafa news agency reported that Abbas signed a declaration naming Fattouh as the organization’s interim leader “pending the holding of presidential elections as per the Palestinian Elections Law.” Abbas said that the decision aimed to “maintain stability” during a challenging period for the P.A.

Fattouh, a longtime Abbas confidant and current leader of the Palestinian National Council, briefly served as interim leader of the P.A. following Yasser Arafat’s death in 2004. Despite his decades of experience within the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), Israeli analysts describe him as “dull and lacking political influence or ability to actually rule.”

In 2008, Fattouh was caught by Israeli border guards attempting to smuggle 3,000 cell phones from Jordan into Yehuda and Shomron using his Israeli-issued entry permit. The incident reportedly angered Abbas, who banned Fattouh from entering his offices for a time. More recently, then-Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant revoked Fattouh’s VIP entry permit after he visited a released Palestinian terrorist, Karim Younis, who served 40 years for the 1980 murder of IDF Cpl. Avraham Bromberg.

Fattouh has also made inflammatory claims, including laughably stating in 2023 that Arabs had lived in Jerusalem for 1.5 million years (not a typo).

The announcement highlights the uncertainty surrounding the P.A.’s leadership transition. Abbas is currently in the 20th year of his four-year term, as no presidential elections have been held since 2006. The decision to name Fattouh as his temporary successor has drawn skepticism about whether he can navigate the P.A. through growing internal and external challenges.

The move also raises questions about how this decision aligns with international calls for administrative reforms within the P.A., particularly from Washington.

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)