Aziz Dweik, speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) has been released from custody after more three years in prison. PLC member Jamal Hweil was also released. While was arrested ... More...
Egypt is working on a final draft of a power-sharing agreement between Hamas and Fatah, reports the London-based Al-Hayat daily newspaper. The draft reportedly includes arrangements for the period following of the ... More...
The Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) has held its first session since the Israeli war on Gaza in December. The members discussed the latest Hamas-Fatah clashes in Qalqiliya and demanded the ... More...
Hamas hopes the Egyptian-brokered talks set for 7 July will be successful, said party leader-in exile Khalid Meshaal following a rare meeting with Egyptian officials on Tuesday. Meshaal states that ... More...
Senior Fatah official Ibrahim Abu An-Naja denies media reports suggesting that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas might have intentionally thwarted unity talks with the rival Hamas movement. The statements were published ... More...
A spokesman for Hamas' armed wing has stated that PA security forces in the West Bank will be dealt with as occupying forces. The statement came as a response to ... More...
About two hundred Arab writers, journalists, analysts, poets, academics, and politicians partook in the panel of an online symposium arranged by the Paris-based Euro-Arab Center for Studies. The topic was ... More...
Senior Fatah leader Ibrahim Abu An-Naja asserts that Fatah has refused a Hamas suggestion to limited the role of joint security forces to the Rafah crossing. According to An-Naja, the ... More...
A reconciliation committee of Palestinian factions urges Hamas to cancel the death sentences against three Palestinian. The Palestinians were sentenced in a Hamas military court. In a letter, the committee ... More...
Hamas confirms that it has rejected an Egyptian proposal for a joint Gaza security force with Fatah. The joint force was to administer the Rafah crossing. Reform of the security forces is a ... More...
The Palestinian Basic Law is to function as a temporary constitution for the Palestinian Authority until the establishment of an independent state and a permanent constitution for Palestine can be achieved.
The Basic Law was passed by the Palestinian Legislative Council in 1997 and ratified by President Yasser Arafat in 2002. It has subsequently been amended twice; in 2003 the political system was changed to introduce a prime minister. In 2005 it was amended to conform to the new Election Law. The 2003 reform was comprehensive and affected the whole nature of the Palestinian political system, whereas the 2005 amendment was only minor and affected only a few paragraphs.
A parallel effort has been made to draft a permanent Palestinian constitution for an independent state, but this was shelved in favor of amending the existing Basic Law.
This website presents a collection of various drafts and amendments related to the Basic Law and other constitutional texts that have been compiled from various other sources.
You can also expect to find links to news items and reports that are of relevance to Palestinian constitutional law, the electoral framework, political reform and the PA branches of government.
The website was created by the Norwegian journalists Erik Bolstad and Tonje M. Viken in February 2008. The site is a private initiative and has no affiliation to any organizations or authorities.
All external links are purely for information purposes and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editors of this site.
