Ukraine in Arabic | The unity between Hamas and Palestine may be ended
KYIV/Ukraine in Arabic/ Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas has threatened to break off a unity agreement with Hamas if the movement does not allow the government to operate properly in the Gaza Strip.
His remarks came on the eve of talks in Cairo with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sissi and a key address to the Arab League nearly two weeks after a cease-fire ended a major 50-day confrontation with Israel in Gaza.
"We cannot continue working with Hamas this way. There are 27 undersecretaries of ministries who are running the Gaza Strip, and the national unity government cannot do anything on the ground," Abbas said on arrival to Cairo.
Abbas is in Egypt's capital for a three-day visit where he is scheduled to meet with Arab League foreign ministers to discuss both the unity agreement with Hamas as well as renewed peace negotiations with Israel.
"The Palestinian Authority must be singular and operate within the framework of one regime, even in the Strip," Abbas reportedly said.
Responding to Abbas' comments, Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri wrote on Facebook that there was no justification for the remarks and that they were based on faulty and imprecise information, Haaretz reported.
Abu Zuhri also wrote that an additional meeting will be held between Hamas and Fatah in the near future to continue reconciliation talks.
Abbas comments come after the leaked transcript of an apparently heated 21 August meeting in Qatar between Abbas, chief Palestinian negotiator, Saeb Erekat, and Hamas chief Khaled Meshaal was published last week.
During the meeting, according to the transcript, Abbas said he would transfer responsibility for the West Bank to Israel is peace talks failed to establish a Palestinian state on 1967 borders.
Abbas also accused Hamas of planning a couple against the Palestinian Authority, an allegation which sprang from a conversation he had with an Israeli security official in early August.
Abbas said the security official told him that a cell that had plotted to kill him had been arrested in the West Bank and was connected to Saleh al-Arouri, a senior Hamas official living in Turkey, according to the minutes.
“I don’t know anything about reports from the Israeli Shin Bet,” Meshaal is reported to have said. “And nobody knows about it. Since the meeting started, you have been irritable and I understand your anger, but you must not build a theory or base a position on an Israeli story that talks about a coup. You come to meet with us, but you don’t trust us.”
“I believe Israel’s reports," Abbas reportedly responded.
Later in the meeting, Abbas said many Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and the UAE opposed the Palestinian reconciliation deal and asked him to "marginalise Hamas".
"About 80-90% of what was published is true," Abbas told late Saturday, "but I never said that Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia are opposed to the reconciliation government."
