The Coming Crisis of the Palestinian Authority, and What Israel Can Do about It

On Sunday, the Central Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) appointed two loyal followers of its chairman, Mahmoud Abbas, to key positions within the organization, and ensured the continued dominance of his Fatah faction. Abbas is eighty-six years old, in the eighteenth year of his four-year term as president of the Palestinian Authority (PA), and faces declining popularity. Yohanan Tzoreff explains that these appointments signal to Palestinians that Abbas is “giving up on public legitimacy and nullifying it as a source of authority for his camp,” by shutting out his political rivals and, by extension, their supporters.