Palestinian Elections
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The shortest election history in the atlas, and one of the most consequential: the annulled Mandate election of 1923, the Authority's founding votes of 1996, the 2005 presidency Mahmoud Abbas still holds, and the free and fair 2006 election whose result froze Palestinian democracy for two decades. The next vote is scheduled for 28 November 2026.
A democracy frozen mid-step. Palestinians have voted in exactly one round of genuinely contested national elections — 2005–2006 — and its outcome ended the experiment: Hamas won a free and fair vote, the world boycotted the result, Fatah and Hamas split the territories between them in 2007, and every scheduled election since was postponed. The Legislative Council elected in 2006 was dissolved in 2018 without a successor, and Mahmoud Abbas has governed on a four-year mandate for over twenty years. A new PLC election is scheduled for 28 November 2026 — the entries below are the entire national record it would extend.
Legislative elections
3
1923 (annulled), 1996 and 2006 — the entire record
Presidential elections
2
Arafat 1996, Abbas 2005 — none since
Years without a vote
20
no national election since 25 January 2006
Next scheduled
2026
PLC election, 28 November 2026 — 200 seats
Presidential elections
Both of them, newest first — and both won by Fatah's founding generation with the Islamist factions boycotting.
Legislative elections
All three, newest first: the Hamas landslide of 2006, the Authority's founding vote of 1996, and the Mandate's annulled attempt of 1923.
Under the British Mandate · 1923
The Mandate's one attempt at an elected Legislative Council collapsed before it began: the Arab majority boycotted a body designed with a built-in official majority, so few electors were returned that the results were annulled, and Palestine was governed without an elected legislature for the rest of the Mandate.
The numbers to know
Years since the last national vote
20
no presidential or legislative election has been held since January 2006
The Hamas landslide
74
seats of 132 in 2006 — a free and fair election whose result froze Palestinian democracy
Arafat's share
89.8%
the Authority's first presidential vote, against a single token challenger
Abbas's term, as elected
4 yrs
the 2005 mandate has been extended without election for over two decades
Turnout in 2006
71.2%
higher than most established democracies manage — in the last election held
The annulled beginning
1923
the Mandate's only Legislative Council election, boycotted and annulled
How Palestinian elections work
The system on paper
A directly elected president and a 132-seat Legislative Council (200 seats under the 2021 law), elected by proportional representation. The 2026 election is called for a 200-seat PLC on full national lists.
Who votes, and where
Palestinians of the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem — the last a perennial flashpoint, since Israel has restricted Jerusalem voting and the 2021 election was postponed over it. The diaspora does not vote.
Why 2006 froze everything
Hamas won 74 of 132 seats on 44% of the vote against a divided Fatah. The Quartet demanded conditions Hamas rejected, funding was cut, and within eighteen months Hamas held Gaza and Fatah the West Bank — each side ruling without the legislature.
What an election needs now
Fatah–Hamas agreement on holding it, Israeli acquiescence in Jerusalem and the occupied West Bank, and a Gaza in a condition to vote. The 28 November 2026 date, announced for the post-war transition, is the first scheduled national vote in two decades.