The two leading Palestinian presidential candidates, Mahmoud Abbas and Marwan Barghouti, are in a statistical dead heat ahead of the election next month to succeed Yasir Arafat, two opinion polls released Monday indicate. A third poll gave a comfortable lead to Mr. Abbas, 69, a former prime minister and the official nominee of the dominant Fatah movement. The soft-spoken, gray-haired Mr. Abbas appeared to be coasting to victory in the Jan. 9 election until the charismatic Mr. Barghouti, who is also a member of Fatah, decided last week to enter the race despite being imprisoned in Israel. Mr. Abbas has a slim lead of 40 percent to 38 percent according to a poll by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research. Mr. Barghouti has a narrow advantage of 46 percent to 44 percent according to a poll conducted by Bir Zeit University’s Development Studies Program. Both polls, based on surveys last week of more than 1,000 Palestinians, have a margin of error of three percentage points. Full Story
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