The PA has not held a presidential election since 2005. The four-year term of Mahmoud Abbas, who won that year with 62 percent of the vote, expired in 2009, but he has continued to rule with the support of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), led by his party, Fatah. The primary obstacle to new Palestinian elections is the ongoing rift between the West Bank–based PA government, under the control of Fatah, and the de facto Hamas government in the Gaza Strip. Hamas, an Islamist political movement and militant group, seized control of Gaza in 2007. This followed its victory in 2006 legislative elections and a period of armed struggle between Hamas and Fatah that left each in control of a separate territory. A 2014 agreement between Hamas and Fatah to form a unity government did not result in actual power sharing. In 2017, the two sides committed to a reconciliation deal brokered by Egypt, but there has been little progress on implementation.

Under PA laws, the prime minister is nominated by the president and requires the support of the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC). However, the PLC elected in 2006 was unable to function due to the Fatah-Hamas division and Israel’s detention of many lawmakers. Abbas has since appointed prime ministers and cabinets without legislative approval. Mohammad Shtayyeh was appointed and sworn in as prime minister along with a new Fatah-led cabinet in April 2019. He succeeded Rami Hamdallah, whose more technocratic government resigned in January, reflecting the breakdown of reconciliation efforts. Hamas opposed Shtayyeh’s appointment.

In October 2019, Abbas instructed the Central Elections Commission to start preparing for presidential and legislative elections. However, he said in December that he would not allow elections to occur unless Israel allowed Palestinians in East Jerusalem to participate, which appeared unlikely.

Palestinians in the West Bank do not have a functioning legislative body. Elections for the 132-seat PLC have not been held since 2006, when Hamas won 74 seats and Fatah took 45. Israel’s suppression of Hamas and fighting between Fatah and Hamas left the PLC unable to function. Israeli forces have repeatedly detained elected PLC members since 2006, and the legislature’s electoral mandate expired in 2010. In December 2018, President Abbas ordered the formal dissolution of the PLC, backed by a Supreme Constitutional Court ruling that also called for legislative elections within six months. Hamas rejected the decision. Despite Abbas’s October 2019 order to prepare for elections, it remained unclear at year’s end when legislative balloting would actually be held.

Overdue local council elections were held in the West Bank in 2017, but they did not feature meaningful political competition, as key opposition groups boycotted. Just 145 municipalities—fewer than half of the West Bank’s total—had competitive races. Some two-thirds of those council seats went to independents, while Fatah captured nearly 28 percent and smaller groups divided the remainder. In 181 municipalities, a single candidate list ran unopposed and won automatically; Fatah won 75 percent of the seats in those locations.

The majority of Palestinian residents in East Jerusalem do not hold Israeli citizenship and thus did not have the right to vote in Israel’s April and September 2019 Knesset (parliamentary) elections. Noncitizen Palestinian residents are permitted to vote in Israeli municipal council elections in Jerusalem, but most have traditionally boycotted; turnout for the 2018 elections was estimated to be under 1 percent in Palestinian neighborhoods, and a prominent Palestinian candidate dropped out following pressure from both Israeli authorities and fellow Palestinians.

Israeli citizens living in West Bank settlements are represented by the Israeli Knesset and participated in the two 2019 Israeli legislative elections.

The PA’s laws provide a credible framework for elections, but presidential and legislative elections have not been held since 2005 and 2006, respectively. The Palestinian Central Elections Commission oversees elections in the West Bank and Gaza. The body’s nine commissioners are appointed by the president, although the law requires them to be experienced and politically impartial judges, academics, or lawyers. Local elections that were set to be held in 2016 were postponed until 2017 while the judiciary heard a set of complaints, but the delay was seen by many as politically motivated.

Israel’s Central Elections Committee oversees Knesset elections, and its Interior Ministry manages Israeli municipal elections, including in Jerusalem. While these elections are generally free and fair, Palestinian residents of the West Bank cannot vote in Knesset balloting, and East Jerusalem Palestinians typically boycott municipal polls.

In addition to Fatah, a number of small Palestinian parties operate relatively freely in the West Bank. However, the PA deals harshly with supporters of Hamas and rivals of President Abbas within Fatah. Israel detains and arrests political activists if they are perceived as threats to Israeli security.

Since 2007, the PA and Israeli forces in the West Bank have collaborated in surveillance and repression of Hamas, periodically engaging in mass arrests and closures of affiliated institutions.

East Jerusalem Palestinians can form party lists to run in the city’s Israeli municipal elections, as they did in 2018, but doing so may lead to increased scrutiny by Israeli authorities and harassment from Palestinians who oppose participation.

The prolonged and indefinite postponement of presidential and legislative elections has prevented any rotation of power in the West Bank, and the PA leadership has been accused of avoiding any contest that could lead to a Hamas victory. Moreover, the boycott of the 2017 local elections by opposition groups left them largely unrepresented in West Bank municipal councils.

Israeli authorities regularly surveil, detain, and harass political figures from Hamas and other factions that Israel considers terrorist groups. In addition, Israel’s restrictions on freedom of movement—including checkpoints, roadblocks, and permit restrictions, as well as the continuous barrier it has constructed along the West Bank side of the pre-1967 border—can impede Palestinian political organizing and activity.

Foreign government donors sometimes exert influence over the PA to promote or marginalize certain politicians or political factions.

Women and religious or ethnic minorities enjoy formal political equality under PA laws, and both women and Christians have held PLC seats and cabinet positions. However, they tend to be underrepresented in such posts, and their particular interests are not necessarily addressed by the political system. About one-fifth of the council seats in the 2017 municipal elections went to women.

Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem have the option to apply for Israeli citizenship, though most decline for political reasons, and about half or more of those who apply each year are unsuccessful. In 2019, Israeli officials approved 1,200 applications and denied 1,361. Similarly, while noncitizen residents can vote in Israeli municipal elections in Jerusalem, most have traditionally boycotted; noncitizens cannot vote in Knesset elections. A Palestinian Jerusalem resident who is not a citizen cannot become mayor under current Israeli law. East Jerusalem Palestinians are entitled to vote in PA elections, conditional on Israel’s approval.

There are over 400,000 Jewish settlers in the West Bank excluding East Jerusalem, and approximately 200,000 Jewish settlers in East Jerusalem, all of whom are Israeli citizens with full political rights in Israel.

The PA lacks an elected executive and legislature. Because the legislature has not functioned since 2007, new laws are introduced via presidential decree. The ability of the PA president and ministries to implement policy decisions is limited in practice by direct Israeli military control over much of the West Bank. The PA has virtually no ability to provide services, access farming communities, or develop water, waste management, or land resources in Area C, the more than 60 percent of West Bank territory—much of it rural—that is under exclusive Israeli control. Israel periodically withholds the transfer of tax revenues to the PA, which affects salary payments and policy implementation.

Official corruption remains a major problem that is widely recognized by the public, according to opinion surveys. The PA’s Anti-Corruption Commission is responsible for implementing an anticorruption strategy, but a December 2019 report released by Transparency International showed that 78 percent of Palestinians are unfamiliar with the body. The Coalition for Accountability and Integrity (AMAN) has consistently identified challenges such as ensuring the rule of law, combating nepotism and favoritism, and safeguarding a strong and fair judiciary.

Documents published online in June 2019 revealed that PA cabinet members under former prime minister Hamdallah had secretly received large salary increases in 2017, during a time of economic stagnation, with approval from Abbas. Prime Minister Shtayyeh suspended the raises and pledged to investigate them.

Government transparency is generally lacking in the PA, and in the absence of basic accountability mechanisms including regular elections and legislative oversight, the administration has little incentive to make substantive improvements. Journalists, activists, and others who attempt to scrutinize PA policies or internal operations are subject to intimidation and harassment.

The operations of Israeli military authorities in the West Bank are opaque, and the Israeli military and civil administrations are not accountable to Palestinians.

The news media are generally not free in the West Bank. Under PA law, journalists can be fined and jailed, and newspapers closed, for publishing information that might harm national unity, contradict national responsibility, or incite violence. The Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms (MADA) reported 87 violations of media freedom by Palestinian authorities in the West Bank in 2019, similar to the previous year. Most involved the closure of websites; there were also interrogations, arrests and detentions, and physical assaults of journalists.

In 2017, President Abbas issued the Electronic Crimes Law, prescribing heavy fines and lengthy prison terms for a range of vaguely defined offenses, including the publication or dissemination of material that is critical of the state, disturbs public order or national unity, or harms family and religious values. In October 2019, a Palestinian court in Ramallah ordered 59 websites, many of which carried news content, and social media pages blocked under the Electronic Crimes Law, claiming that they disturbed public order and threatened civil peace. The sites featured criticism of Abbas, were affiliated with opposition groups, or focused on combating corruption. The decision was appealed and referred to the Constitutional Court, which had not ruled on it by year’s end.

Reporters are subject to surveillance, assault, and detention by Israeli forces. Israeli authorities were responsible for 297 media freedom violations in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip in 2019, according to MADA. These violations included physical abuse, preventing journalists from covering certain events, and arrest and detention. Facebook also shut down pages and accounts of Palestinian journalists due to alleged incitement to violence and terrorism.

The PA Basic Law declares Islam to be the official religion of Palestine and states that “respect and sanctity of all other heavenly religions (Judaism and Christianity) shall be maintained.” Blasphemy is a criminal offense. The 2017 Electronic Crimes Law criminalizes expression aimed at harming moral and religious values without defining those values, allowing for arbitrary enforcement.

Security-related restrictions on movement, and vandalism or physical assaults against worshippers or places of worship, affect Jewish, Muslim, and Christian residents of the West Bank to varying degrees. The Israeli authorities regularly prevent Palestinian Muslims in the West Bank from reaching Jerusalem to pray, and generally restrict access for young adult males to the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif compound on Fridays.

The PA has administrative authority over Palestinian education. Political activism is common on university campuses, and student council elections generally proceed freely—an Islamist bloc sympathetic to Hamas has performed strongly in several of the past Birzeit University student council elections, for example. However, students affiliated with the bloc have been detained by Israeli and Palestinian authorities. In March 2019, Israeli forces entered Birzeit University, arrested three students, and raided the office of the student council.

According to the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, East Jerusalem’s schools are underfunded compared with schools in West Jerusalem, and East Jerusalem lacks almost 2,000 classrooms.

Israeli authorities have more actively restricted visas for foreign academics attempting to visit Palestinian universities in the West Bank since 2016, according to the Right to Enter Campaign.

Residents have some freedom to engage in open private discussion, though Israeli and PA security forces are known to monitor online activity and arrest individuals for alleged incitement or criticism of Palestinian authorities, respectively. The adoption and enforcement of the 2017 Electronic Crimes Law has increased concerns about the freedom of personal expression online.

Human rights organizations have accused the PA of monitoring social media posts and detaining individuals for harsh questioning related to their comments. In 2018, evidence emerged that the PA has engaged in extensive electronic surveillance of lawyers, activists, political figures, and others, which could have a deterrent effect on expression more broadly. Issa Amro, a prominent human rights activist who was allegedly beaten and tortured in detention in 2017, had his first court hearing in March 2019; he faced a potential prison term for “disturbing public order” under the Electronic Crimes Law. He has since been arrested on other charges, including in April for allegedly insulting an Israeli military official on social media.

The PA requires permits for demonstrations, and those held to protest against PA policies are generally dispersed by security forces. In 2019, hundreds of women peacefully demonstrated in the West Bank to call for an end to gender-based violence following the August murder of a 21-year-old Palestinian woman, Israa Ghrayeb, allegedly by her male relatives.

Israel’s Military Order 101 (1967) requires a permit for all political demonstrations of more than 10 people. Israeli Military Order 1651 (2009) is used to prosecute and sentence those who are accused of harming public order or engaging in alleged incitement. Israeli authorities frequently restrict and disperse demonstrations, some of which become violent, and certain protest areas are designated as closed military zones. Protesters are at risk of injury by tear-gas canisters, rubber-coated bullets, or live ammunition, and clashes between demonstrators and Israeli troops periodically result in fatalities.

A broad range of NGOs operate in the West Bank. However, Israeli restrictions on movement can impede civil society activity, Islamist groups have been periodically shut down by Israeli or PA officials, and activists who criticize the PA leadership can face harassment and abuse by security services.

A 2017 Israeli law bars entry for any foreign individual who publicly supports a boycott of Israel or its West Bank settlements. In August 2019, the law was used to prevent US congresswomen Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib from visiting Israel and the West Bank; while Tlaib’s prohibition was modified later in the month so that she could visit relatives in the West Bank, she rejected the offer. The law was also used in November to expel Omar Shakir, the Israel and Palestine representative for Human Rights Watch, for his advocacy against Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

In September 2019, Israel raided the offices of the Palestinian prisoners’ rights organization Addameer, seizing computers and other equipment. In August, the PA police spokesperson announced that the LGBT+ activist organization Al-Qaws would be banned, accusing it of sedition and an intent to “destroy” Palestinian society. The statement was withdrawn later in the month after drawing criticism from activists.

Workers may establish unions without government authorization, but labor protections in general are poorly enforced. Palestinian workers seeking to strike must submit to arbitration by the PA Labor Ministry, and various other rules make it difficult to mount a legal strike. Palestinian workers in Jerusalem are subject to Israeli labor law.

Palestinians in the West Bank are subject to the jurisdiction of both the Palestinian judiciary and the Israeli military court system, neither of which is fully independent. In July 2019, President Abbas issued two decrees, the first dissolving the existing High Judicial Council and replacing it with a transitional body, and the second lowering the retirement age of judges. A number of judges and human rights organizations denounced the moves as an effort to increase executive control over the judicial branch. Although the transitional council included former members of the High Judicial Council, it was given an expanded mandate to restructure the judicial system.

Enforcement of judicial decisions is impeded by PA noncompliance as well as lack of Palestinian jurisdiction in Area C, where the Israeli military exerts exclusive control.

The Israeli civilian courts, which have jurisdiction over Israeli settlers in the West Bank, are independent.

The opaque distinction between criminal and security-related offenses, the regular use of detention without trial by Palestinian and Israeli security forces, and the use of martial law and a military court system that applies exclusively to Palestinians in the West Bank all violate the due process rights of Palestinians. Jewish settlers are tried in Israeli civilian courts, which generally provide due process protections.

Human rights groups regularly document allegations of arbitrary detention by PA security forces. Palestinians are also regularly detained without charges for extended periods by Israeli authorities. The Israeli military frequently conducts home raids without a warrant. According to the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem, there were 4,248 Palestinian security detainees and prisoners from the West Bank being held in Israeli prisons at the end of December 2019.

A reported 186 Palestinian minors from the occupied territories were being held in Israeli prisons as security detainees and prisoners at the end of December 2019. Such minors are usually interrogated without a lawyer or parental guardian present and tried by a special military court. Acquittals are very rare, and the courts have been criticized for a lack of due process protections. East Jerusalem Palestinian minors are tried in Israeli civilian juvenile courts.

Penal codes applicable in the West Bank permit capital punishment, but no executions have been carried out since 2005. In 2018, the State of Palestine became a signatory to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which severely restricts the use of capital punishment.

Physical abuse of detainees by PA authorities in the West Bank has been documented by human rights organizations. Individual testimonies also attest to the use of excessive violence by the Israeli military.

Israeli soldiers accused of excessive force or abuse of Palestinian civilians are subject to Israeli military law, though convictions, which are rare, typically result in light sentences. Jewish settlers who attack Palestinian individuals, property, and agricultural resources generally enjoy impunity. B’Tselem reported that 26 Palestinians were killed by Israeli security forces in 2019, and two were killed by settlers.

Israeli security personnel and civilians face small-scale terrorist attacks in the West Bank. According to B’Tselem, three Israeli civilians and two security personnel were killed in the West Bank by Palestinians during 2019.

The legal arrangements operative in the West Bank are fundamentally discriminatory in that Israelis and Palestinians who reside or commit crimes in the same location are subject to different courts and laws.

Palestinian women are underrepresented in most professions and encounter discrimination in employment, though they have equal access to universities. Women are legally excluded from what are deemed dangerous occupations. Gender-based harassment and violence remain major problems in the West Bank.

Although LGBT+ people in the West Bank do not face prosecution for same-sex sexual activity, they have been subject to harassment and abuse by PA authorities and members of society.

Israeli checkpoints, travel permits, and other restrictions continue to seriously constrain freedom of movement, stunt trade, and limit Palestinian access to jobs, hospitals, and schools.

The Israeli separation barrier, 85 percent of which lies in West Bank territory and which was declared illegal in 2004 by the International Court of Justice, divides Palestinian communities and causes general hardship and disruption of services.

East Jerusalem Palestinians are vulnerable to revocation of their residency status if they leave the city for extended periods of time, affecting their freedom to travel, or if they are deemed to be a threat to public safety, security, or the state of Israel.

While Palestinians are able to own property and engage in business activity, their rights are seriously undermined by Israel’s movement and access restrictions and the expansion of Israeli settlements, which is encouraged by the Israeli government and private groups. Israeli authorities employ a variety of methods to prevent Palestinians from developing their privately owned land, particularly in Area C, for example by declaring nature reserves or denying permit requests. Palestinian property is also illegally damaged by Israeli settlers.

Palestinian structures built in and around Jerusalem are consistently under threat of demolition by Israeli security forces, even if they fall in the area of the West Bank technically under the jurisdiction of the PA.

Palestinian laws and societal norms, derived in part from Islamic law, put women at a disadvantage in matters such as marriage and divorce. For Christians, personal status issues are governed by ecclesiastical courts. Rape and domestic abuse remain underreported and frequently go unpunished, as authorities are allegedly reluctant to pursue such cases.

The widely publicized August 2019 murder of Israa Ghrayeb drew attention to the problem of so-called honor killings and other gender-based violence. Ghrayeb was allegedly killed by three of her male relatives who objected to her posting a photo of herself with her fiancé online. The men were charged with her murder in September. A 2018 law amended a provision in the penal code that had been used to grant leniency to the perpetrators of “honor” killings, prohibiting its application in cases of serious crimes against women and children. However, activists argue that the practical effects of these changes have been minimal.

Unemployment rates in the Palestinian territories are high compared with the rest of the Middle East and global averages. The excess supply of workers creates conditions in which labor exploitation is more likely.

In 2017, the PA signed international protocols dealing with human trafficking, child trafficking, and child prostitution. However, child labor is still prevalent in the occupied territories.

Many West Bank Palestinians, mostly male, work in Israel and the settlements, where the PA has no jurisdiction. While these workers are covered by Israeli labor laws, the International Labour Organization (ILO) reported in 2018 that inconsistent application of these laws remains a concern. The Palestinians’ work permits usually tie them to a single employer, creating a relationship of dependency, according to the ILO. Nonetheless, some laborers have achieved collective bargaining agreements with their Israeli employers. Tens of thousands of Palestinians work without permits, making them vulnerable to greater exploitation. Many Palestinians lose considerable income to “brokers” who are needed to connect Palestinian workers to jobs. Israel has revoked work permits for those who share last names with individuals whom Israel considers to be security threats, even if they are not related.