Agencies
Hamas gave its tentative support Tuesday to an Egyptian plan to reconcile the Islamist movement and the rival Fateh faction of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas amid a looming constitutional crisis.
“We will agree to the draft of the agreement and will not reject it,” Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhum told AFP, but he added that the plan would require some “modification” before it could be implemented.
“The draft contains positive elements, but also has some points that need modification and some points that need clarification from the Egyptian leadership.”
The two main Palestinian movements have been bitterly divided since Hamas drove Abbas’ security forces from the Gaza Strip in a week of fierce street clashes in June 2007, cleaving the territories into hostile rival camps.
Representatives from both sides have been invited to meet in Cairo on November 9 to discuss the Egyptian plan, which is aimed at restoring unity amid a looming constitutional crisis that threatens to deepen the internal rift.
Hamas has said that Abbas - who was elected in January 2005 - will cease to be president when his constitutionally mandated four-year term ends in January and that a new presidential election will have to be held.
Abbas loyalists, citing a separate clause in the constitution, say that presidential and parliamentary elections must be held at the same time, which would extend his term to 2010.
The Egyptian plan includes Abbas’ proposal for forming a “national consensus government” to lift the international blockade of Gaza and prepare for presidential and parliamentary elections.
The plan also calls for the rehabilitation of independent Palestinian security forces with assistance from Arab states and the incorporation of Hamas and the hardline Islamic Jihad into the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) headed by Abbas, which is responsible for negotiations with Israel.
Azzam Al Ahmed, who heads the Fateh parliamentary bloc, called the plan a “good foundation for an agreement and for ending Palestinian divisions”.
“We have received the suggested Egyptian document and the decision to hold a meeting on November 9, and we want to launch a comprehensive national dialogue to reach an understanding on all the issues,” he told AFP by phone from Egypt.
At the same time he criticised the “sceptical language” coming from Hamas, saying it did not bode well for the talks.
Eleven other Palestinian factions have also agreed to the plan.
A spokesman for Islamic Jihad said his movement had some “reservations” about some points in the plan but that it supported the overall initiative.
Israel and the West have embraced Abbas as a partner in US-backed peace negotiations relaunched in November 2007 but continue to blacklist Hamas as a terror group despite its victory in 2006 Palestinian parliamentary elections.
In the past the European Union and the United States have joined Israel in boycotting Palestinian governments that include Hamas, raising fears that full Palestinian reconciliation could lead to renewed international sanctions.
Israeli interest
in Saudi plan
Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al Faisal said on Tuesday he hoped that Israel’s next government would follow the lead of President Shimon Peres, who last month called for a revival of Arab-Israeli peace initiatives.
Peres, speaking at the United Nations, called on Saudi King Abdullah to “further” a dormant land-for-peace plan endorsed by the Arab League six years ago, and said Israel would attend any venue to end the decades-long conflict with its Arab neighbours.
The Saudi minister told a news conference in Riyadh that the interest in the plan voiced by the Israeli head of state, whose powers are largely ceremonial, was “better late than never”.
“We hope the new prime minister will use the same language,” Faisal added.
Israel’s prime minister-designate is Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, who was given extra time by Peres this week to form Israel’s next coalition government.
She has vowed to pursue US-sponsored peace negotiations with Abbas that were launched a year ago by outgoing Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.
Livni’s main coalition partner, Defence Minister Ehud Barak, also said last week that Israeli leaders were seriously reconsidering the 2002 Saudi peace initiative, which calls for full Arab recognition of Israel if it gives up lands occupied in a 1967 war and accepts a solution for Palestinian refugees.
Egypt and Jordan are the only two Arab countries to have signed full peace accords with the Jewish state.
Israel had previously balked at the Saudi initiative, saying Middle East rapprochement should not come with preconditions.
Disputes over Jewish settlement in the occupied West Bank and divisions among the Palestinians have deal a blow to Washington’s goal of clinching an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal by the end of this year.
Gaza crossings closed after rocket strike
Defence Minister Ehud Barak on Tuesday ordered the closure of Israel’s crossings with the Gaza Strip shortly after fighters fired a rocket on southern Israel, shaking a fragile truce.
The indefinite closure of the passages, through which badly needed foodstuffs and supplies are imported into the Hamas-ruled territory, will start on Wednesday morning, his spokesman told AFP.
The decision came after Palestinian fighters fired a rocket that struck southern Israel, causing no casualties or damage, according to Israeli police.
Tuesday’s rocket - the first projectile fired from Gaza in more than a month - threatened a fragile truce brokered by Egypt between the Jewish state and the Islamists on June 19 after months of deadly violence.
Both sides have accused the other of violating the truce, with Hamas demanding that Israel lift its embargo of Gaza and Israel accusing the Islamist movement of using the period of calm to rearm.
