Skip to main content

Palestinian President Names Adviser As New Prime Minister

Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas has appointed Mohammed Mustafa, a long-trusted adviser on economic affairs, as Prime Minister, the official Wafa news agency said on Thursday.

Mustafa's appointment comes less than three weeks after his predecessor, Mohammed Shtayyeh, resigned, citing the need for change after the Hamas attack of October 7 triggered war with Israel in Gaza.

The 69-year-old now faces the task of forming a new government for the Palestinian Authority, which has limited powers in parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

Mustafa, who studied at George Washington University in Washington, is an independent executive committee member of the Palestine Liberation Organisation -- dominated by the ruling Fatah movement.

He has served as deputy prime minister for economic affairs, held a board seat at the Palestine Investment Fund and worked in several senior positions at the World Bank.

He has also advised the Kuwaiti government and the sovereign wealth fund of Saudi Arabia, the Public Investment Fund.

Since 2007, control of the Palestinian territories has been divided between Abbas's Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

Mustafa was involved in reconstruction efforts in Gaza after Israel's 2014 invasion.

'Right-hand man'

Mustafa's appointment represents an attempt to bolster Palestinian institutions and "close some loopholes in the Palestinian Authority" at a time when Abbas is "under siege and under pressure" from Israel and the United States, Palestinian analyst Abdul Majeed Sweilem told AFP.

Mustafa would likely be seen as "acceptable to the Americans as he follows a liberal approach," Sweilem added.

Yet Khalil Shaheen, political analyst and writer, said Mustafa's closeness to Abbas limits prospects for major change.

"In the end, the man (Mustafa) remains the right-hand man of President Abbas... Abbas wants to say that he supports reforms, but they remain under his control," Shaheen said.

The current Gaza war broke out after Hamas operatives attacked southern Israel on October 7, which resulted in the deaths of around 1,160 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli figures.

The retaliatory Israeli military offensive in Gaza has killed at least 31,341 people, most of them women and children, according to the territory's health ministry.

During the war, violence in the West Bank has flared to levels unseen in nearly two decades.

Israeli troops and settlers have killed at least 430 Palestinians in the West Bank since the Gaza war began, according to the health ministry in Ramallah.

The United States and other powers have called for a reformed Palestinian Authority to take charge of all Palestinian territories after the end of the war.

Shortly after Shtayyeh's resignation in late February, Palestinian factions including Hamas and Fatah participated in talks hosted by Russia that addressed the war in Gaza and post-war plans.

Afterward, the factions said in a statement they would pursue "unity of action" in confronting Israel.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)



from NDTV News-World-news https://ift.tt/9uOyzpf
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

US Power Firm Admits It May Have Sparked Texas' Largest Wildfire Ever

A US power company admitted Thursday that its equipment may have sparked the largest wildfire in Texas' history. Xcel -- the parent of Southwest Public Service Company, which provides electricity to part of the state -- said it was working with officials investigating the cause of the blaze that charred more than a million acres (over 400,000 hectares). "Based on currently available information, Xcel Energy acknowledges that its facilities appear to have been involved in an ignition of the Smokehouse Creek fire," the company said. Hundreds of homes are thought to have been destroyed in the fire, which is known to have killed at least two people and over 3,000 farm animals. Xcel, which is facing at least one lawsuit, denied its equipment was improperly maintained. "However, we encourage people who had property destroyed by, or livestock lost in, the Smokehouse Creek fire to submit a claim to Xcel Energy through our claims process," the statement said. The W
Post a Comment
Read more

It's Official, Kamala Harris Is Democratic Candidate For US Election

US Vice President Kamala Harris effectively secured the Democratic party's presidential nomination Friday, confirming her remarkable rise to party standard bearer in November's showdown against Republican Donald Trump. Kamala Harris was the sole candidate on the ballot for a five-day electronic vote of nearly 4,000 party convention delegates. She will be officially crowned at a Chicago convention later this month. "I am honored to be the presumptive Democratic nominee for President of the United States," Kamala Harris, 59, said on a phone-in to a party celebration after securing enough votes by the second day of the marathon vote. In the two weeks since President Joe Biden ended his reelection bid, Kamala Harris has gained full control of the party. No other Democrats stepped forward to challenge her elevation to the top of the ticket, making her confirmation as the first Black and South Asian woman ever to secure a major party's nomination a formality. The a
Post a Comment
Read more

All You Need To Know About Donald Trump's 1st Criminal Trial

Donald Trump goes on trial Monday for allegedly covering up hush money payments to hide affairs ahead of the 2016 presidential election which propelled him into the White House. He will become the first former US president to go on criminal trial when jury selection begins next week. Here are the key questions ahead of the landmark trial: What is Trump accused of? As Trump closed in on victory in the 2016 presidential election, adult film star Stormy Daniels was paid $130,000 to keep quiet about an alleged 2006 sexual tryst with Trump. The payments, made by Trump's lawyer at the time, Michael Cohen, were revealed by The Wall Street Journal in January 2018. Prosecutors have seized on the concealment of the payments as "legal fees" in the Trump Organization's accounts when Cohen was reimbursed as the heart of their case. Prosecutors say Trump "concealed the reason for these payments... which clearly were paid in order to influence voters," former prosec
Post a Comment
Read more