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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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UN Resolution 1701 at the Heart of the Israel-Hezbollah Ceasefire

An empty United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) observation tower on the Israel-Lebanon border, near the southern Lebanese city of Al-Khiam, as seen from northern Israel, 26 November 2024, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel. (EPA)
An empty United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) observation tower on the Israel-Lebanon border, near the southern Lebanese city of Al-Khiam, as seen from northern Israel, 26 November 2024, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel. (EPA)
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UN Resolution 1701 at the Heart of the Israel-Hezbollah Ceasefire

An empty United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) observation tower on the Israel-Lebanon border, near the southern Lebanese city of Al-Khiam, as seen from northern Israel, 26 November 2024, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel. (EPA)
An empty United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) observation tower on the Israel-Lebanon border, near the southern Lebanese city of Al-Khiam, as seen from northern Israel, 26 November 2024, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel. (EPA)

In 2006, after a bruising monthlong war between Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah armed group, the United Nations Security Council unanimously voted for a resolution to end the conflict and pave the way for lasting security along the border.

But while relative calm stood for nearly two decades, Resolution 1701’s terms were never fully enforced.

Now, figuring out how to finally enforce it is key to a US-brokered deal that brought a ceasefire Wednesday.

In late September, after nearly a year of low-level clashes, the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah spiraled into all-out war and an Israeli ground invasion. As Israeli jets pound deep inside Lebanon and Hezbollah fires rockets deeper into northern Israel, UN and diplomatic officials again turned to the 2006 resolution in a bid to end the conflict.

Years of deeply divided politics and regionwide geopolitical hostilities have halted substantial progress on its implementation, yet the international community believes Resolution 1701 is still the brightest prospect for long-term stability between Israel and Lebanon.

Almost two decades after the last war between Israel and Hezbollah, the United States led shuttle diplomacy efforts between Lebanon and Israel to agree on a ceasefire proposal that renewed commitment to the resolution, this time with an implementation plan to try to reinvigorate the document.

What is UNSC Resolution 1701? In 2000, Israel withdrew its forces from most of southern Lebanon along a UN-demarcated “Blue Line” that separated the two countries and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights in Syria. UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) peacekeepers increased their presence along the line of withdrawal.

Resolution 1701 was supposed to complete Israel’s withdrawal from southern Lebanon and ensure Hezbollah would move north of the Litani River, keeping the area exclusively under the Lebanese military and UN peacekeepers.

Up to 15,000 UN peacekeepers would help to maintain calm, return displaced Lebanese and secure the area alongside the Lebanese military.

The goal was long-term security, with land borders eventually demarcated to resolve territorial disputes.

The resolution also reaffirmed previous ones that call for the disarmament of all armed groups in Lebanon — Hezbollah among them.

“It was made for a certain situation and context,” Elias Hanna, a retired Lebanese army general, told The Associated Press. “But as time goes on, the essence of the resolution begins to hollow.”

Has Resolution 1701 been implemented? For years, Lebanon and Israel blamed each other for countless violations along the tense frontier. Israel said Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Force and growing arsenal remained, and accused the group of using a local environmental organization to spy on troops.

Lebanon complained about Israeli military jets and naval ships entering Lebanese territory even when there was no active conflict.

“You had a role of the UNIFIL that slowly eroded like any other peacekeeping with time that has no clear mandate,” said Joseph Bahout, the director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy at the American University of Beirut. “They don’t have permission to inspect the area without coordinating with the Lebanese army.”

UNIFIL for years has urged Israel to withdraw from some territory north of the frontier, but to no avail. In the ongoing war, the peacekeeping mission has accused Israel, as well as Hezbollah, of obstructing and harming its forces and infrastructure.

Hezbollah’s power, meanwhile, has grown, both in its arsenal and as a political influence in the Lebanese state.

The Iran-backed group was essential in keeping Syrian President Bashar Assad in power when armed opposition groups tried to topple him, and it supports Iran-backed groups in Iraq and Yemen. It has an estimated 150,000 rockets and missiles, including precision-guided missiles pointed at Israel, and has introduced drones into its arsenal.

Hanna says Hezbollah “is something never seen before as a non-state actor” with political and military influence.

How do mediators hope to implement 1701 almost two decades later? Israel's security Cabinet approved the ceasefire agreement late Tuesday, according to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office. The ceasefire began at 4 am local time Wednesday.

Efforts led by the US and France for the ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah underscored that they still view the resolution as key. For almost a year, Washington has promoted various versions of a deal that would gradually lead to its full implementation.

International mediators hope that by boosting financial support for the Lebanese army — which was not a party in the Israel-Hezbollah war — Lebanon can deploy some 6,000 additional troops south of the Litani River to help enforce the resolution. Under the deal, an international monitoring committee headed by the United States would oversee implementation to ensure that Hezbollah and Israel’s withdrawals take place.

It is not entirely clear how the committee would work or how potential violations would be reported and dealt with.

The circumstances now are far more complicated than in 2006. Some are still skeptical of the resolution's viability given that the political realities and balance of power both regionally and within Lebanon have dramatically changed since then.

“You’re tying 1701 with a hundred things,” Bahout said. “A resolution is the reflection of a balance of power and political context.”

Now with the ceasefire in place, the hope is that Israel and Lebanon can begin negotiations to demarcate their land border and settle disputes over several points along the Blue Line for long-term security after decades of conflict and tension.