Rights
A Basic Law, a legislature that has not sat since 2007, and rule by decree
The 2003 Basic Law as amended serves as the constitutional instrument for the Palestinian Authority. The Legislative Council has not convened since 2007 and was dissolved in 2018, so primary legislation is made by presidential decree.
Key rules
- Jurisdiction — West Bank areas under Palestinian Authority administration and, differently, Gaza. Areas B and C remain subject to Israeli military jurisdiction under the Oslo arrangements.
Governing law
- Palestinian Basic Law 2003, amended 2005
- Article 43 — presidential power to issue decrees having the force of law when the Council is not in session
- Law of the Supreme Constitutional Court No. 3 of 2006
In practice
Article 43 was drafted as an emergency provision for periods between sessions; since 2007 it has become the ordinary mode of legislation, and hundreds of decree-laws now form much of the statute book. The Supreme Constitutional Court, established in 2006 but only constituted in 2016, ruled in 2018 that the Legislative Council should be dissolved — a decision itself criticised as consolidating executive power. Gaza's administration has issued its own legislation since 2007, so on many subjects there are now two divergent bodies of Palestinian law. Any statement about Palestinian law as a single body needs to specify which territory and which period.