The Most Suitable Parliamentary System for the Palestinian State

The Drafting Committee for the Constitution reviewed the form of the political system it is shaping to prepare the "temporary" constitution last week, without disclosing the nature or form of the political system or initiating a national public discussion regarding what is being circulated as "the constitution"—the social contract that should be agreed upon or believed in, as it determines the course of citizens' lives and their future, establishes state institutions and authorities, and regulates relations among them.

This raises the question of which political system is most suitable for the Palestinian state and Palestinians. In light of the absence of societal discussion and with respect for many reservations regarding the method, shape, and timing of establishing the Drafting Committee for the Constitution, it seems important to present ideas and methods or launch them for public debate to prefer the parliamentary system based on a president without executive powers (i.e., one who reigns but does not govern) in contrast to a prime minister who has the majority in the elected legislative council, and the government holds most of the executive powers. In contrast, the parliamentary system grants Parliament the authority to hold the entire executive accountable; these are key determinants for the form of the political system.

The call for a parliamentary political system is based on historical, political, and constitutional factors that are significant in the lives of Palestinians and their political system. Regarding constitutional rules, the Declaration of Independence, adopted by the Palestinian National Council on November 15, 1988, defined the shape of the political system for the State of Palestine as a parliamentary system, stating that "the State of Palestine is for Palestinians wherever they are; in it, they develop their national and cultural identity, enjoy full equality in rights, and their religious and political beliefs and human dignity are protected under a democratic parliamentary system."

In this context, the Constitutional Court affirmed, in its ruling issued on March 12, 2018, regarding interpretive request No. 5/2017, the high status of the Declaration of Independence by stating, "The Declaration of Independence is an integral part of the constitutional framework in Palestine, indeed the highest in status, followed by the Basic Law...". This has made it so that no individual or committee or institution can override this constitutional ruling "as the decisions of the Constitutional Court are supra-constitutional", and that "the court's rulings in constitutional lawsuits and its decisions on interpretation are binding on all state authorities and everyone in accordance with the provisions of Article 41 of the Law of the Constitutional Court. On the one hand, violating the Constitutional Court's decision and its orientations means committing a crime according to the provisions of Article 106 of the Basic Law, which states that judicial rulings are to be executed and that failure to execute them or obstructing their execution in any manner is a crime punishable by imprisonment and dismissal from office if the accused is a public employee or tasked with public service, and the party in favor has the right to file the lawsuit directly with the competent court, with the national authority ensuring full compensation for them."

Regarding the historical context, over the past thirty years, the presidential system that was in place before 2003 and the semi-presidential semi-parliamentary system, which was implemented after amending the Basic Law at that time, have both failed; political institutions fragmented, and division was reinforced, whereby in both there was an overreach of the executive authority over the legislative and judicial authorities. This necessitates avoiding the repetition of the constitutional failure that occurred, as seen in Third World systems that turned into a presidential system based on dependence on the person of the president rather than the status of constitutional institutions, or the predominance of tribal "partisan" loyalty over the nature of the political system, which allows a single person or institution to control the remaining components of the political system. This requires recognizing the parliamentary political system as the most suitable and best for the State of Palestine politically, preventing the commission of a crime by violating the binding decisions of Palestinian judiciary, which are punishable by the Basic Law.