PA: US okays Hamas-Fatah government

[azurnoir]

The Obama administration has given the Palestinian Authority a "green light" to talk to Hamas about forming a Palestinian unity government, a PA official in Ramallah said over the weekend.

Cairo has issued invitations to representatives of Hamas, Fatah and several other Palestinian groups to attend reconciliation talks that are due to begin in Cairo on Wednesday.

Fatah and Hamas officials confirmed that the Egyptians had invited them to the talks.

Hamas spokesman Mushir al-Masri said that for the talks to succeed, the PA must first release all "political prisoners" from its West Bank jails.

nother Fatah official, Ibrahim Abu al-Naja, said the fact that Likud chairman Binyamin Netanyahu has been tasked with forming the next government "proves that Israeli public opinion favors war and destruction."

In the wake of the "dangerous developments in Israel, the Palestinians must unite their ranks by forming a unity government," Naja said.

Meanwhile, Hamas leaders said over the weekend that Democratic Sen. John Kerry's visit to the Gaza Strip last Thursday signaled a change in US policy toward their movement.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1233304839598&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

[Idealism]

1. How do you have a unity parliament when around 50 of your elected officials are imprisoned?

[Alamuti Lotus]

2. So glad that a foreign power decides the makeup of a democratic government(*)

I would think that the fact that it is completely, totally, and royally fucked as a concept would have dawned on somebody.. but, there it is spoken with the most casual presentation. I realize that Hamas is probably naive and stupid enough to even care about such a thing, but why is American (outside, in general) approval relevant to anything of the sort?!

(*)--well, it is still a government under occupation, therefore technically entirely illegitimate (see other sockpuppets of Iraqi and Afghan flavours for a sped-up trajectory)..

[Vegasaurus]

3. Good luck with that

Hamas is too busy murdering anyone from the alternative party who disagrees with them.

Let's see them learn to compromise for unity.

Highly highly doubtful.

[Bodhi BloodWave]

4. Well they have had a good teacher in Israel n/t