Loyalists of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas won most races in Palestinian municipal elections, polls officials said on Sunday, in a vote that for the first time in nearly two decades included ?a city in the Gaza Strip run by rival Hamas.
Saturday¡¯s ballot marked the first elections of any ?kind in Gaza ?since 2006 and the first Palestinian polls since the Gaza war began more than ?two years ago with Hamas¡¯ cross-border attack on southern Israel.
Abbas¡¯ West Bank-based Palestinian Authority (PA) said the inclusion of the Gaza city Deir al-Balah, which suffered less damage than other areas of the coastal territory during the ?war, was intended to show that Gaza was an inseparable part of a future Palestinian state.
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