RAMALLAH, Thursday, November 05, 2020 (WAFA) – The heated US presidential elections dominated the front page headlines in Thursday’s issue of the three Palestinian Arabic dailies.
Highlighting US incumbent president Donald Trump’s move to undermine the credibility of the voting process if he loses, al-Quds and al-Ayyam said that Trump threatens to resort to the US Supreme Court, citing fraud.
Al-Quds added that important US states will determine the outcome.
Al-Ayyam also reported that the Americans have not identified their upcoming president pending the counting of millions of votes in several states.
Al-Quds also reported in this regard that Democratic challenger Joe Biden announced his confidence of win as he narrowed in on 270 electoral college votes.
On the other hand, al-Ayyam opted to highlight President Mahmoud Abbas’ meeting with the Romanian Prime Minister Ludovic Orban in its main news item.
It together with al-Quds and al-Ayyam reported that President Abbas received Orban and renewed his call for convening an international peace conference.
Al-Hayat al-Jadida added that President Abbas reiterated his readiness to go to negotiations on the basis of international legitimacy (the international law and the UN resolutions).
The dailies also highlighted Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh’s meeting with Orban.
Shtayyeh was reported in al-Quds and al-Hayat al-Jadida calling on Romania to pressurize Israel into halting its violations and the expansion of colonial settlements in the West Bank.
Orban was reported stating that his country would not spare any effort to sponsor negotiations that would be conducive to the two-state solution.
Furthermore, al-Quds said that Israeli forces killed Bilal Rawajbeh, a captain in the Palestinian Preventive Security Service, at Huwara military checkpoint, south of Nablus, purportedly for possessing a pistol.
Al-Ayyam and al-Hayat al-Jadida slammed the killing of Rawajbeh, 29, as an act of assassination.
Moreover, Hamas senior official Osama Hamdan was reported in al-Quds revealing that the movement was exerting political efforts to reach a prisoner exchange deal with the Israeli occupation authorities.
Al-Quds and al-Ayyam said that the Israeli occupation authorities notified four Palestinian communities in the Jordan Valley to evacuate their houses to make room for imminent military drills.
Al-Quds added that Israeli forces conducted multiple raids across the West Bank, rounding up 25 Palestinians.
Al-Quds and al-Ayyam spotlighted B'Tselem’s report In pandemic, of all times: Number of Palestinians Israel has left homeless hit four-year record.
B'Tselem was reported in al-Quds announcing that the Israeli occupation authorities demolished 218 Palestinian houses within 10 months.
Hamas movement was reported in al-Quds slamming the house demolitions in Jerusalem and the Jordan Valley as ethnic cleansing.
The case of Maher al-Akhras, 49-year-old father of six who has been on hunger strike for 102 days in protest of his arbitrary administrative detention without charge or trial, also hit the front page headlines.
Al-Quds said that al-Akhras is proceeding with his open-ended hunger strike and refuses to take any nutritional supplements.
Al-Hayat al-Jadida highlighted rising concerns that al-Akhras’ health conditions would further deteriorate, leading to his death, while al-Ayyam said that the popular campaign calling for his immediate release was gaining more traction.
Head of the Prisoners Affairs Commission Qadri Abu Baker was reported in al-Quds and al-Ayyam revealing that the number of prisoners who have contracted Covid-19 in the Israeli detention facility of Gilboa rose to 90.
Spotlighting the spread of the pandemic in the occupied Palestinian territories, the dailies reported Health Minister Mai al-Kaileh announcing that 734 Palestinians tested positive for the virus and three others died of it.
Among the new 734 confirmed cases, 281 were recorded in the besieged Gaza Strip and 132 others in Nablus, according to al-Ayyam.
Al-Quds printed Xinhua’s report Officials say Gaza health system under pressure amid COVID-19 spread.
It reported that Israeli police banned Deputy head of the Islamic Waqf (Religious Endowments) Department in Jerusalem Najeh Bkeirat access to Jerusalem’s flashpoint Al-Aqsa Mosque comnpimd for six months.
Al-Ayyam and al-Hayat al-Jadida said that President Abbas decided to award Osama Joudeh (Joda), a 23-year-old Palestinian immigrant, a medal in recognition of his courage in saving the life of a Austrian police officer in the Vienna gun attack.
Palestinian cartographer Khalil Tafakji was reported in al-Ayyam saying that Israel’s move to declare large swaths of the West Bank as state land would result in the annexation of 40 percent of the West Bank.
K.F.
