Fatah and Hamas trade blame for ongoing crisis in unity gov't talks

[Behind the Aegis]

Hamas and Fatah traded accusations yesterday over the ongoing crisis in talks on a unity government.

An advisor to Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, Nabil Amru, accused Hamas leaders of trying to fundamentally change a critical Arab peace initiative in order to cause it to fail, while Hamas Information Minister Youssef Rezqa told reporters that associates of Abbas "were conducting media wars" against Hamas to cause it "to lose its principles."

Qatari Foreign Minister Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani met twice each with Abbas and PA Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh in Gaza on Monday.

The meetings went on until 3 A.M. yesterday, but no breakthrough was achieved.

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[shergald]

1. Factionism is par for the course in Arab politics.

So what's new.

One would like to see cooperation here, but Hamas may just be cynical on the assumption that they don't want to be fooled twice, and that is just likely. That their actions would undermine "a critical Arab peace initiative in order to cause it to fail," is silly. It will fail. Israel wants it to fail. They have been stalling or circumventing peace efforts for ages, while they continued settlement activity on the West Bank. That's the point. If we stop, there will not be enough facts on the ground to just annex the West Bank, which is part of Ben Gurion's master plan.

If stalling is the point, this factionalism only plays into Israeli hopes for a Greater Israel. It should not therefore be criticized by those who support the right wing annexation plan of Israel hawks.