Moreover, holding the congress in Palestine ended the role of many Fatah leaders who had opposed the Oslo accords, such as Farouk Qaddoumi and Mahmoud Jihad. Sidelining men like Qaddoumi, whose accusation, on the eve of the congress, that Abbas and Mohammad Dahlan had helped Israel poison Arafat, also distances Fatah from its one-time alliance with hard-line Arab countries such as Syria and Libya.