Abbas Says He’ll Visit Gaza Strip to Restore Relations With Hamas Movement
Palestinian Authority President Mahmud Abbas
Abbas Momani/AFP/Getty Images
Palestinian Authority President Mahmud Abbas.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmud Abbas. Photographer: Abbas Momani/AFP/Getty Images
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said he plans to visit the Gaza Strip for the first time since 2007 in a bid to end a split with the Islamic Hamas movement that controls the territory.
Abbas told the Palestinian National Council he expects to travel to the area “within four days.” Hamas welcomed the initiative and said it would prepare for his arrival, movement spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said in an e-mailed statement.
“I have asked Haniyeh to meet me at the entrance of Gaza with all the factions,” Abbas told the council in the West Bank city of Ramallah today, referring to Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh. “I am not talking about more negotiations. It is time we reached an agreement.”
The initiative, the first serious move toward reconciliation in months, comes amid spreading popular uprisings across the Arab world calling for increased democracy. Thousands of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip rallied yesterday in support of efforts to resolve the divide.
“This is what the people want,” said Mahdi Abdul Hadi, director of the Palestinian Academic Society for the Study of International Affairs in Jerusalem. “Tunis and Egypt are contagious and Palestine is no exception. We used to be the pioneers for uprising and revolt and now we are the followers.”
Uprisings have toppled Tunisia’s leader, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, and threatened the rule of Muammar Qaddafi in Libya, where anti-regime protests have escalated into civil war.
Partnership Government
The division between Abbas’s Fatah movement and Hamas dates back to 2007, when Hamas ousted Abbas’s forces from Gaza a year after winning parliamentary elections, ending a partnership government with Fatah and leaving Abbas in control of only the West Bank.
Abbas’s Palestinian Authority in February said it plans to hold parliamentary and presidential elections by September, the first polling in more than five years. At the time, Hamas said it wouldn’t participate.
“We need to move forward to put elections in place in the next six months,” Abbas said today. He also told the council he has no plans to run for re-election, a statement he has made before.
Abbas said the sides have agreed on reconciliation points that were raised in talks mediated by Egypt and only formal approval of the document is required. In the past, Palestinian Authority officials said reconciliation talks failed because of Hamas’s refusal to officially accept a non-violent policy regarding Israel.
Israeli Airstrike
Two Palestinians were killed today in an Israeli airstrike on a security position in the Gaza Strip, Hamas official Adham Abu Selmeya said in a phone interview. Israel said it launched the attack in response to the firing of a rocket from Gaza into Israel. Hamas, which refuses to recognize Israel or any peace agreements signed with it, is considered a terrorist organization by Israel, the U.S. and the European Union.
Peace negotiations with Israel broke down in September when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu refused to extend a 10-month partial construction freeze in West Bank settlements and Abbas said he wouldn’t talk without a total halt to building.
Abdul Hadi said Palestinian reconciliation would rule out a resumption of peace talks with Israel in the immediate future.
“This is the people talking about putting the Palestinian house in order,” he said. “Netanyahu can just sit and watch.”
To contact the reporter on this story: Saud Abu Ramadan in Jerusalem at sramadan@bloomberg.net Tanya Habjouqa in Jerusalem at thabjouqa@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Andrew J. Barden at barden@bloomberg.net.
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