(JNS.org) Rami Hamdallah, the newly appointed Palestinian Authority (PA) prime minister, abruptly submitted his resignation to PA President Mahmoud Abbas after only 18 days in office. “The situation in this country forced me to resign,” Hamdallah tweeted on Sunday, June 23. “Conflicts, confusion, corruption. Palestine needs a real political reform.” Hamdallah, who was the president of An-Najah University in Nablus, was appointed to the position following the resignation of Salam Fayyad. A political newcomer, many analysts suspected that Abbas chose Hamdallah for the position in order to maintain the ties with Western countries, which provide the PA with substantial amounts of foreign aid, that Fayyad had established. But the PA, which is controlled by Abbas’s Fatah party, has been accused by many of corruption and mismanagement. The PA has not held elections since 2006.