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Palestinian Prime Ministers Since 2003

Ahmed Qurei, Mahmoud Abbas, and Nabil Shaath
Ahmed Qurei, Mahmoud Abbas, and Nabil Shaath
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Palestinian Prime Ministers Since 2003

Ahmed Qurei, Mahmoud Abbas, and Nabil Shaath
Ahmed Qurei, Mahmoud Abbas, and Nabil Shaath

Mahmoud Abbas (Fatah Movement): He assumed the position of prime minister from March 19 till September 6, 2003. He was born in Safad in the far north of Palestine in 1935. His family moved to Syria after the 1948 Nakba. Abbas graduated from the University of Damascus. After enrolling briefly at the Faculty of Law at Cairo University in Egypt, he pursued his studies in Russia and received a Doctorate in political history from the People’s Friendship University in Moscow. He worked in the field of teaching and educational administration in Qatar and was active in political work. He was one of the first leaders of Fatah movement after its establishment. Since then, he took on leadership positions until 2005, when he became president of Fatah and the Palestinian Authority, succeeding former President Yasser Arafat, aka Abu Ammar.
Ahmed Qurei (Abu Alaa) (Fatah): He served as prime minister from October 7, 2003 until December 18, 2005. He was born in Abu Dis, a suburb of East Jerusalem in 1937. A political activist, he started working in the banking sector in Saudi Arabia. Then he got fully engaged in politics with Fatah in 1968. He founded the "SAMED" (Sons of Martyrs of Palestine) in Beirut during the early 70's and served as its director general until it stopped working in 2007-2008. He assumed the post of director general of the Department of Economic Affairs and Planning of the Palestine Liberation Organization. He played a key role in the peace negotiations, where he served as general coordinator of Palestinian delegations for multilateral negotiations and headed the Palestinian delegation during the Palestinian-Israeli talks in Oslo, Norway.
Nabil Shaath (Fatah): He was an interim prime minister between December 18 and 24, 2005. He was born in Safad in 1938 to a father who was the director of the Arab Bank and a Lebanese mother. He was a political banker, a businessman and an academic. His family settled in the Egyptian city of Alexandria. He graduated with a Bachelor's degree in business administration from the University of Alexandria and continued his higher education in the United States, where he received a Master's and Doctorate from the famous Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. He founded several companies, worked as an economic consultant, and for years was a professor at the American University of Beirut. Shaath served as an adviser to Yasser Arafat.
After the establishment of the Palestinian National Authority, he returned to Gaza, where he was elected deputy to Khan Yunis, appointed Minister of Planning and International Cooperation. Under Qurei’s government, he was appointed Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Information.
Ahmed Qurei (Fatah): From December 24, 2005, till March 29, 2006.
Ismail Haniyeh (Hamas): From March 29, 2006, to June 14, 2007. During this period, he served as the head of the “tenth government” and then the “eleventh government” - known as the “national unity government” - until its dissolution and its transformation into a caretaker government, in accordance with the Palestinian Basic Law, and its effective authority has since been confined to the Gaza Strip. Haniyeh was born in Al-Shati refugee camp in the Gaza Strip in 1962. His parents fled to the city of Ashkelon after 1948. He studied at the Islamic University in Gaza and graduated with honors in Arabic literature. He was awarded an honorary doctorate from the same university in 2009.
He began his political activity within the "Islamic bloc", which was the student arm of the Muslim Brotherhood, from which emerged the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas). He was imprisoned by the Israeli authorities in 1989 for three years and then exiled in 1992 for a year in Marj al-Zuhour in south-eastern Lebanon with a group of Hamas leaders. In 1997, Haniyeh was appointed head of the office of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the spiritual leader of Hamas. In December 2005, he headed the Change and Reform List, which won the majority of votes in the second Palestinian legislative elections in 2006. On February 16, 2006, Hamas nominated him for the post of prime minister, to which he was appointed on February 20.
Dr. Salam Fayyad (the "Third Way" bloc): He took office on June 17, 2007, until April 11, 2013. He was born in 1952 in the town of Deir al-Ghusun, near the city of Tulkarm in the far west of the West Bank. In 1975, he received a BA from the American University of Beirut. He then traveled to the United States where he received his Master's degree in accounting from the University of St. Edward, Texas, and then in 1986 his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Texas - Austin.
Fayyad then worked at the World Bank headquarters in Washington, DC, and was promoted to the post of Executive Advisor to the Executive Director (1992-1995). After the signing of the Oslo Agreement in 1993, he served as Resident Representative in Jerusalem to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). In 2002, he was appointed Minister of Finance until 2005. In 2007 he headed an emergency government.
Dr. Rami Hamdallah (Fatah): From June 3, 2013, until March 10, 2019. He was born in 1958 in the town of Anabta near Tulkarm. He graduated from the University of Jordan and then traveled to Britain where he received a Master’s degree from Manchester University in 1982 and a Doctorate in Applied Linguistics from Lancaster University in 1988. He worked as an English professor at An-Najah University, before becoming university president in 1998. He is the secretary-general of the Palestinian Central Elections Commission since 2002.
Dr. Mohamed Ashtiyeh (Fatah): he became prime minister on March 10, 2019.
Read more on Ashtiyeh by clicking here.

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Israel Wary of Egypt's 'Military Infrastructure' in Sinai: Peace Treaty at Risk?

Egyptian army chief Ahmed Khalifa inspects troops near Israel's border late last year. (Military spokesman)
Egyptian army chief Ahmed Khalifa inspects troops near Israel's border late last year. (Military spokesman)
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Israel Wary of Egypt's 'Military Infrastructure' in Sinai: Peace Treaty at Risk?

Egyptian army chief Ahmed Khalifa inspects troops near Israel's border late last year. (Military spokesman)
Egyptian army chief Ahmed Khalifa inspects troops near Israel's border late last year. (Military spokesman)

Israel has voiced growing concerns over Egypt’s military presence in the Sinai Peninsula, fearing a potential escalation between the two sides amid the ongoing Gaza war.

Israeli media reports said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has asked both Washington and Cairo to dismantle what it describes as a “military infrastructure” established by the Egyptian army in Sinai.

However, an informed Egyptian source and experts cited by Asharq Al-Awsat insisted that Egypt has not violated its peace treaty with Israel. They argued that Cairo’s military movements are a response to Israeli breaches of the agreement.

Israel’s Israel Hayom newspaper, citing a senior Israeli security official, reported that Egypt’s military buildup in Sinai constitutes a “major violation” of the security annex of the peace treaty.

The official said the issue is a top priority for Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz, stressing that Israel “will not accept this situation” amid what it views as Egypt’s growing military footprint in the peninsula.

The official added that the issue goes beyond the deployment of Egyptian forces in Sinai exceeding the quotas set under the military annex of the Camp David Accords.

The real concern, he said, lies in Egypt’s continued military buildup in the peninsula, which Israel views as an irreversible step.

Moreover, he stressed that while Israel is not seeking to amend its peace treaty with Egypt or redeploy troops along the border, it believes the current situation requires urgent action to prevent a potential escalation.

Egypt-Israel relations have not seen such tensions since the outbreak of the Gaza war, particularly after Israel violated a ceasefire agreement with Hamas brokered primarily by Egypt. Israeli forces resumed airstrikes on Gaza last month and failed to fulfill their commitments to withdraw from the Philadelphi Corridor and Palestinian border crossings.

A senior Egyptian source dismissed Israel’s accusations, telling Asharq Al-Awsat that “these repeated Israeli pretexts ignore the fact that Israeli forces have violated the peace treaty, seizing control of areas where Egypt objects to their presence without the necessary coordination with Cairo.”

Egypt has the right to take all necessary measures to safeguard its national security against any threats, emphasized the source.

“Nevertheless, Cairo remains fully committed to the peace treaty and has no intention of aggression against any party,” it added.

Israeli forces seized control of the Gaza-Egypt border, including the Philadelphi Corridor and the Rafah crossing, in May 2024. Israel has accused Egypt of not doing enough to stop weapons smuggling into Gaza through border tunnels—an allegation Cairo has denied.

Under the terms of the ceasefire agreement with Hamas, which Israel later broke, Israeli forces were supposed to begin withdrawing from the Philadelphi Corridor on March 1, completing the pullout within eight days. However, Israel failed to do so and instead resumed airstrikes on Gaza.

Israel also announced the creation of an administration aimed at facilitating the “voluntary departure” of Gaza residents, a move Cairo strongly rejected and formally condemned.

Egypt has insisted that Palestinians must remain in their homeland and has put forward a reconstruction plan for Gaza and called for the implementation of the two-state solution. The plan was endorsed at an emergency Arab summit three weeks ago.

Media reports have indicated that Egypt responded to Israel’s control of the Gaza border by increasing its military presence near the frontier—an act that some Israeli officials claim violates the peace treaty and threatens Israel’s security.

Former Egyptian intelligence official Gen. Mohammed Rashad told Asharq Al-Awsat that Israel itself violated the peace treaty by seizing the Philadelphi Corridor, controlling border crossings, and blocking aid to Gaza while seeking to forcibly displace Palestinians into Egypt.

“Every Israeli action along Gaza’s border with Egypt constitutes hostile behavior against Egypt’s national security,” said Rashad, who previously headed the Israeli military affairs division in Egypt’s intelligence service.

“Egypt cannot sit idly by in the face of such threats and must prepare for all possible scenarios.”

The Philadelphi Corridor is a strategically sensitive buffer zone, serving as a narrow 14-kilometer passage between Egypt, Israel, and Gaza, stretching from the Mediterranean Sea in the north to the Kerem Shalom crossing in the south.

Military expert General Samir Farag insisted that Egypt has not violated the peace treaty or its security annex in over 40 years, arguing that Israel has repeatedly breached the agreement and is attempting to shift blame onto Cairo.

“Israel is doing this to distract from its internal problems, including public discontent over its ballooning defense budget,” Farag told Asharq Al-Awsat.

“It also wants to deflect attention from Egypt’s reconstruction plan for Gaza and leverage its claims to pressure the United States for more military aid by portraying Egypt as a threat.”

Farag emphasized that Egypt’s actions are solely aimed at protecting its national security, adding: “There is no clause in the peace treaty that prevents a country from defending itself.”

“The so-called ‘military infrastructure’ Israel refers to consists of roads and development projects in Sinai.”

“The US has satellite surveillance over the region—if Egypt had violated the treaty, Washington would have flagged it. Moreover, security coordination between Egypt and Israel continues daily,” he explained.

Egypt and Israel signed their landmark peace treaty on March 25, 1979, committing to resolving disputes peacefully and prohibiting the use or threat of force. The agreement also established military deployment guidelines and a joint security coordination committee.

Meanwhile, US Republican Party member Tom Harb told Asharq Al-Awsat that Washington has received intelligence from multiple sources indicating that Egypt has amassed a significant military force in Sinai.

Israel considers this a breach of the peace treaty, which designates Sinai as a demilitarized zone to prevent surprises like the 1973 war, Harb said.

While the US fully supports Israel’s concerns, it also wants to prevent further escalation, as that would destabilize the region, he added.

Ultimately, Egypt must clarify whether its troop movements are aimed at threatening Israel or preventing Palestinians from crossing into Egyptian territory, he stated.