RAMALLAH, Dec 15: Hamas won control on Thursday of the council of the West Bank city of Nablus, beating the ruling Fatah party in a municipal vote seen as a test of strength beofre parliamentary elections, a poll showed. The survey by the Palestinian Centre of Policy and Survey Research said the militant group had won 68 per cent of seats in Nablus’s municipality, while President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah garnered 16 per cent. The city is home to about 187,000 people. —Reuters
