Fatah and Hamas sign reconciliation deal

28/04/2011| IslamWeb

Fatah, the Palestinian political organization, has reached an agreement with Hamas on forming an interim government and fixing a date for a general election, Egyptian intelligence has said.

In February, Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority and a member of Fatah, called for presidential and legislative elections before September, in a move which was rejected by Hamas at the time.

"The consultations resulted in full understandings over all points of discussions, including setting up an interim agreement with specific tasks and to set a date for election," Egyptian intelligence said in a statement on Wednesday.

The deal, which took many officials by surprise, was thrashed out in Egypt and followed a series of secret meetings.

"The two sides signed initial letters on an agreement. All points of differences have been overcome," Taher Al-Nono, a Hamas government spokesman in Gaza, told the Reuters news agency.

He said that Cairo would shortly invite both sides to a signing ceremony.

Speaking to Al Jazeera from Gaza, Ghazi Hamad, a senior Hamas official, said: I think we are optimistic because ... there is [an] official agreement between Hamas and Fatah, and I think we now have [an] impressive jump to the Palestinian unity.

"Maybe it does not come as one shock because I think it came as a fruit for long talks and discussion.

"I think that today we became very close to this agreement, we have finished some points. It is like [an] outline draft and I think it will be a good beginning.

"Maybe after that we will start how we can implement this agreement to be translated and practiced on the ground."

'Geopolitical situation'

Marwan Bishara, Al Jazeera's senior political analyst, said: "It is important news ... the geopolitical situation wasn't exactly helpful [to reconciliation] and then we went through six months of upheavals, certainly sweeping through Egypt.

"At the end, you could say that President Abbas has lost his patron in Egypt, which is President Mubarak, and Hamas is more on less facing almost similar trouble now, with Bashar Al-Assad [Syria's president] facing his own trouble in Damascus.

"So with the US keeping a distance, Israel not delivering the goods on the peace process and the settlements, it was time for Palestinians to come together and agree on what they basically agreed on almost a year and a half ago."

Binyamin Netanyahu, Israel's prime minister, said on Wednesday that Abbas could not hope to forge a peace deal with Israel if he pursued a reconciliation accord with Hamas.

PHOTO CAPTION

Azzam al-Ahmad (L), head of the Fatah group, and Mousa Abu Marzook (C), a senior member of Hamas, speak after a news conference in Cairo April 27, 2011.

Al-Jazeera