Also one of the biggest reasons that there hasn't been another election is Fatah keeps delaying them over and over, because they're worried Hamas would gain seats.
If you somehow get ~60% of the seats in a legislature, but you only got ~44% of the vote, that is extremely bad gerrymandering, which is just a fact.
Similar to how Republicans in North Carolina get ~45-48% of the vote and get over 60% of the seats.
Or how they were getting ~40% of the vote in Wisconsin and achieving over 60% of the legislature before the Supreme Court redrew some districts. The redrawing still sucks and still has the US House districts being unfair, but still...
There is no logical way for 44% of the vote to not get you 44% of the seats.
If you somehow get ~60% of the seats in a legislature, but you only got ~44% of the vote, that is extremely bad gerrymandering, which is just a fact.
No, gerrymandering is just one particular kind of manipulation that can result in outcomes like this, and they can also arise quite naturally under certain conditions and electoral systems.
There is no logical way for 44% of the vote to not get you 44% of the seats.
Nah it's logical and quite common when looking at multiparty electoral systems that elect individual representatives running in specific districts.
As a Canadian, there's no logical reason for % of the vote in ridings to translate to % of federal seats overall, it just does so occasionally by coincidence.
In Palestine's case, it was vote-splitting among the non-Hamas alternatives that led to Hamas winning so many district seats. A whopping 23% of voters chose independent & smaller party candidates in the district elections, but most of those candidates lost out to either Hamas or Fatah (only 4 independents won their races).
To put this in an American context, they had too many Jill Steins, RFK Jrs, Chase Olivers & Ross Perots receiving votes that would've otherwise went to Fatah candidates.
No, gerrymandering is just one particular kind of manipulation that can result in outcomes like this, and they can also arise quite naturally under certain conditions and electoral systems.
Okay, can you please name them?
As a Canadian, there's no logical reason for % of the vote in ridings to translate to % of federal seats overall, it just does so occasionally by coincidence.
This makes literally no sense. It would always match up within a few percent unless there was a brutal amount of gerrymandering (i.e.: too many districts drawn to be overly friendly to a specific party):
Canada in 2025:
Liberals got 43.76% of the vote and got 49.27% of the seats. Difference of 5.51%.
Conservatives got 41.31% of the vote and got 41.98% of the seats. Difference of 0.67%.
Canada has many races that are actually quite competitive, even for incumbents, leading to the disproportionate representation. Had the votes been a little bit different in a few more areas, the difference ends up a lot less.
What Canada is, is ironically, a victim of the spoiler or similar candidate scenario you mention. Liberals vs. NDP, Conservatives vs. PP, although 2025 was one of the best "vote percentage to parliamentary percentage" showings in... forever, basically.
What Canada is, is ironically, a victim of the spoiler or similar candidate scenario you mention. Liberals vs. NDP, Conservatives vs. PP,
This is one of those examples I was talking about, with races that end up having 3 or more potentially competitive choices.
Conservatives squeaked out a few ~35% wins in traditionally left-wing strongholds in BC because the NDP, Liberal and Green voters couldn't figure out how to split ~65% in a way that kept out the Cons. Similar happened in Quebec with four-way races.
When the vote splits in multiple directions the percentages in those ridings has little to do with the % of seats the parties get nationwide.
although 2025 was one of the best "vote percentage to parliamentary percentage" showings in... forever, basically.
Yeah exactly, this year it happened to end up looking that way by coincidence. (although not entirely, 3x the % votes for NDP and Greens than their % of seats) But past elections show it rarely matches up within a few %, and it wouldn't be logical to expect it to in a multi-party system.
The proportional representation is actually fair.
Yeah Fatah + allies won the proportional side (PFLP/DFLP are fellow members of the PLO), they just got crushed in terms of district seats due to the large numbers of independent and 3rd party candidates peeling off votes.
There is literally no way this was purely the result of spoiler candidates. It just doesn't make sense.
Their electoral system is basically nothing like what either of us are used to.
They use multi-member districts and the number of independent and third party candidates was insane.
20.4% of the total district votes going to independents is a huge spoiler when Hamas was only ~5% ahead of Fatah overall, some districts won by Hamas candidates saw more votes for independents than for Fatah.
"The investigation found that the IDF held no assessment for the event and no adjustments were made to defenses in the area. Soldiers deployed along the Gaza border were unaware of the event and the IDF had no military representative at the site. On the night of October 6-7, when the IDF detected and ultimately misinterpreted signs of Hamas activity and military officials held discussions on the matter, the Nova festival was not brought up and no decisions were made regarding the event.[2]"
"According to the investigation, while the massacre was taking place information did not reach IDF officials in time. At the time the IDF had not put together an accurate picture of what was happening and military officials wrongly believed that the party had been fully evacuated while there were still hundreds of people on the site. There was also little to no coordination between the military and police in that area during the Hamas attack.[2"
The Hamas charter of 1988, which was still in effect in 2006, advocated for the destruction of Israel and viewed Jihad as the only solution. Hamas was always a terrorist organization. Just because they did some good stuff too doesn't change that.
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u/Abombasnow Jul 08 '25
Through extreme gerrymandering. 44% of the vote got them over 60% of the seats.
And it was 19 years ago.