Israel Matzav

Another acrimonious Hamas-Fatah breakup on the way?

Remember when Hamas and Fatah made up in 2007 and the deal fell apart in a matter of weeks? Well it's apparently happening again.

It's been about seven weeks since Hamas and Fatah allegedly made up, and now it seems that they're breaking up again. That was fast.

What are they fighting about? Salam Fayyad for one. Each side is accusing the other of not being serious about reconciliation for another. I'll have more below, but first we need to get into the mood.

Let's go to the videotape.



Three shows nightly? Wow.... Anyway, back to Hamas and Fatah.

“Hamas is nothing but a tool in the hands of Iran,” a PA official said. "There can be no agreement with a movement that serves the agenda of a regime like Iran, which is a threat to Arab national security."

Hamas leaders and representatives claimed that Abbas has succumbed to US, EU and Israeli pressure to abandon the reconciliation accord, which was announced in Cairo on May 4, following threats to suspend financial aid to the Palestinians if the agreement is implemented.

“The honeymoon between Fatah and Hamas seems to have ended very quickly,” remarked a Fatah official in Ramallah. “The gap between the two parties remains very wide on most issues.”

The Fatah official claimed that Abbas has decided to postpone the implementation of the agreement with Hamas until after September, when the PA plans to ask the United Nations to recognize a Palestinian state along the pre-1967 lines.

Earlier this week, Abbas called off a planned meeting with Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal in Cairo this week, where the two men were supposed to announce the establishment of a unity government dominated by independent technocrats.

Abbas justified his decision by saying that he had made earlier plans to visit Turkey and did not have time to go to Cairo to see Mashaal.

Fatah and Hamas officials said the summit had been postponed indefinitely because the two sides could not agree on who would head the unity government. Abbas insists that current Prime Minister Salam Fayyad head the government, while Hamas has been demanding that the premier should come from the Gaza Strip.

Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh criticized Abbas for insisting on the nomination of Fayyad. He said that the PA’s security crackdown on Hamas supporters in the West Bank was also hindering the implementation of the reconciliation pact.

Hanieyh confirmed that Hamas’s preferred candidate for the prime minister post was Jamal al-Khudari, a prominent businessman from the Gaza Strip.

Hamas’s Lebanon-based “foreign minister,” Osama Hamdan, said that he was convinced that Abbas has not been able to resist American and Israeli pressure to dump the agreement with Hamas.

Hamdan pointed out that Hamas was not alone in rejecting Fayyad as head of the proposed unity government. “More than half of the members of the Fatah Central Committee are also opposed to Fayyad,” he said. “It’s a disaster that there isn’t any Palestinian who could replace Fayyad.”

Read the whole thing.

By the way, Hamas legislator Salah Bardaweel is right that most of Fatah cannot stand Fayyad. But the 'international community' won't give money to anyone else.

I can't wait to see if they start throwing each other off the tops of buildings again. Heh.

Labels: Abu Mazen, breaking up, Hamas-Fatah reconciliation, Ismail Haniyeh, Salam Fayyad

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 12:35 AM