Palestinian President threatens to end Gaza reconciliation with Hamas
RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Monday blamed the Islamist Hamas group for a bomb attack on the convoy of Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah in Gaza, and threatened to end reconciliation efforts with his bitter rivals.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas gestures as he speaks during a meeting with the Palestinian leadership in Ramallah, in the occupied West Bank March 19, 2018. Palestinian President Office (PPO)/Handout via REUTERS
The rancour between Hamas and Abbas’s Fatah faction has escalated since Hamdallah and Palestinian security chief Majid Faraj’s convoy was attacked by a roadside bomb on March 13. They were uninjured.
“We congratulate the two big brothers (Hamdallah and Faraj) that they are safe after the sinful and despicable attack that was carried out against them by the Hamas movement in the Gaza Strip,” Abbas said. He offered no evidence of Hamas’s involvement but said he did not trust Hamas to investigate the incident honestly.
“We do not want investigation from them, we do not want information from them and we do not want anything from them because we know exactly that they, the Hamas movement, ware the ones who committed this incident,” he said.
The Palestinian leader said there had been “zero” progress in reconciliation, citing recent efforts to bring a power-sharing deal to bear on the crossings out of the Gaza Strip and on security within the enclave.
In a speech to a Palestinian leadership summit in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Abbas warned Hamas that it would have to give up control of Gaza or risk taking full responsibility for the enclave and its two million residents without any help from his western-backed Palestinian Authority.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas gestures as he speaks during a meeting with the Palestinian leadership in Ramallah, in the occupied West Bank March 19, 2018. Palestinian President Office (PPO)/Handout via REUTERS
He said he would take the necessary “national, legal and financial measures” but did not specify what decisions that would involve.
“In my capacity as the president of the Palestinian people I have tolerated much in order to regain unity and unite the homeland and I was met with rejection by Hamas and their illegitimate authority,” he said.
Fatah and Hamas have tried for years to come to an accommodation over running the Gaza Strip, but have repeatedly failed to implement deals mainly brokered by Egypt.
Abbas also criticised U.S. ambassador to Israel David Friedman for his support of Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank, calling the envoy a “son of a dog”.
Friedman is a strong supporter of Israel’s settler movement, and was an early and enthusiastic advocate of U.S. President Donald Trump’s Dec. 6 decision to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and move the U.S. embassy there.
Friedman responded to Abbas’s slur during a speech to a conference on combating global anti-Semitism in Jerusalem, saying: “His response was to refer to me as son of a dog. Anti-semitism or political discourse? Not for me to judge, I leave that all up to you.”
Trump’s announcement about Jerusalem delighted the Israeli government, but infuriated Palestinians. Israel regards Jerusalem as its eternal and indivisible capital, although that is not recognized internationally. Palestinians feel equally strongly, saying that East Jerusalem must be the capital of a future Palestinian state.