(RTTNews) - Palestinian officials announced Friday that the presidential and parliamentary elections, which were originally scheduled to be conducted across the Palestine territories in January, have been postponed.

Without providing further details, the officials said that a new date will be set for the elections, which were originally scheduled to take place on 24th January.

The announcement came just a day after Palestine Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said in a interview that the elections scheduled for January will be postponed to a later date. Abbas said in the interview that Palestinian leaders would now take the necessary steps to avoid a constitutional vacuum when the term of the current legislature and his term as president expire on Jan. 25.

Abbas also stressed that he will nor run for a second term in office, reflecting his frustration over Israel's failure to halt the expansion of Jewish settlements in the occupied West bank and East Jerusalem, which the Palestinians hope to make their future capital.

Abbas also accuses the United States of failing in its efforts to persuade Israel to halt its settlement activities in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, a pre-condition kept by the Palestinians and Arab states for the resumption of the stalled Middle East peace process.
It is understood that Abbas was extremely disappointed when U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said during a recent visit to Israel that the Jewish country was making "unprecedented" concessions to the Palestinians by offering to freeze the new housing projects in the occupied Palestinian territory for a limited time.

Though Clinton clarified later that Washington still considers any sort of Israeli settlement activity in the occupied Palestinian territories as "illegitimate," she urged Palestinians to resume negotiations with Israel without insisting on a total settlement freeze. Many Palestinians believe that her statements signaled the collapse of their main precondition for resuming peace talks with Israel.

Last week, Palestine's Election Commission had recommended delaying the elections over opposition from Hamas, a radical Islamic group that controls Gaza. The group had warned that it would not allow Palestinians in Gaza to vote as Abbas' Fatah faction that controls only the West Bank set the date for the elections without consulting Hamas leaders.

Last month, Abbas had announced that presidential and parliamentary elections would be held across the Palestinian territories in January. A statement released by his office said that Abbas has "invited the Palestinian people in Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip to take part in free and direct presidential and legislative elections on Sunday January 24, 2010."

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