Gaza and West Bank on ‘verge of split’

Ramallah: Senior Palestinian politicians have warned that the Gaza Strip is on the verge of a permanent split from the West Bank and that the prospect of two separate entities constitutes a grave existential threat to the Palestinian national project.

The warning was made during a post-war conference themed Opportunities and Challenges held at the Grand Park Hotel in Ramallah on Tuesday.

Qais Abdul Karim (Abu Layla), the Deputy Undersecretary of the Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine and member of the Palestinian delegation to the Cairo talks, warned that the ongoing propaganda attacks between Fatah and Hamas could easily destroy whatever has been achieved between the two groups and possibly reverse the course of Palestinian internal reconciliation.

“The dispute between Fatah and Hamas is totally focused on the leadership of the Palestine Liberation Organisation [PLO] and the Palestinian National Authority [PNA],” he said, adding that their split does not have anything to do with the ideology or the means to achieve goals.

“The indirect talks that Hamas has been conducting with Israel are similar to recognising Israel. Hamas’s direct talks with Israel are only a matter of time and circumstances,” he said.

Abu Layla said that the Palestinian national consensus government had been set up by Hamas and Fatah and that the rest of the Palestinian factions and political parties had not played any role in setting it up, but blessed the government to give the reconciliation a push forward.

Yasser Abed Rabbo, the PLO Secretary-General, said that the Gaza Strip is today at the closest point of splitting from the West Bank and the danger of that point is greater today than ever. “Israel has been trying for years to split the Gaza Strip from the West Bank by planting and watering the dispute seeds between the Palestinian rival factions,” he said.

Abed Rabbo said that the international conference to rehabilitate Gaza could be postponed under the pretext of Palestinian internal differences. “Palestinians must resolve their differences politically and must bridge the gap to ensure Gaza’s reconstruction starts immediately after granting the international guarantees,” he said.

“Rival factions imposing conditions on one another is not, cannot and will not produce genuine internal reconciliation — a deeper and more comprehensive vision is demanded with immediate effect,” he argued, adding that a national and political unity government in which all the Palestinian factions participate was urgently needed.

Abed Rabbo said the world is busy fighting terrorism and Palestinians must send positive signals to draw international attention towards the Palestinians cause.

Qadourah Fares, a key Fatah leader and head of the Palestinian Prisoner Club, said that there has been no Palestinian reconciliation although there have been many signed reconciliation deals. “Hamas will use direct negotiations with Israel very shortly, as all the negotiations which started between the Arabs and Israel started with indirect negotiations and ended up in direct negotiations,” he said.

Fares said that the Palestinian public had been not involved in achieving reconciliation between the Palestinian rival factions. “Following every signed reconciliation deal, things deteriorate and become even worse than they were before the deal was signed,” he said, adding that after deals are forged, the Palestinian public gradually discovers the unbridgeable size of the gap between the rival factions.