PALESTINE: Rival Palestinian factions are close to forming a new power-sharing government which the militant group Hamas expects to lead, the Palestinian prime minister Ismail Haniyeh said yesterday.
A national unity government is intended to lift the international freeze on funding to the Palestinian Authority (PA), which has left it facing an economic crisis and a wave of strikes by thousands of unpaid civil servants.
But Hamas officials say even in a new joint government with its main political rival Fatah, the movement will not give explicit recognition to Israel - one of the conditions set by the international community for funding to resume.
Mr Haniyeh, whose Hamas movement won a surprise victory in elections in January, said his party would not give up leadership of the government. "The majority in the parliament will head the government," he said.
Asked if the international community would accept that, he said: "First of all, everybody has to respect the choice of the Palestinian people. The European position is more positive than the American position." One of his senior advisers Ahmed Yousef said Hamas had received "signals" from European governments suggesting they would accept a Hamas-led power- sharing government but acknowledged there had been no similar signal from the US or Israel. It may still be some weeks before a final list of ministers is agreed and a government sworn in.
Mr Haniyeh said talks about power-sharing between his movement and Fatah, the political party loyal to the Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas, were close to a conclusion. "We are not talking about problems, only procedures to complete the discussion," he said. "I hope this will be completed in a short time."
When the Hamas government was formed in March, the US and Europe halted their monthly $30 million in aid to the PA, insisting Hamas had to first recognise the state of Israel, end violence and accept previous peace agreements. Israel also froze its $60 million a month in customs duty transfers.
As a result, the 160,000 employees of the PA have not been paid since March, including doctors and teachers. Most Palestinian schools have remained closed since term started on Saturday and a growing lawlessness has gripped the Gaza Strip. A Hamas spokesman wrote a newspaper article last week critical of the Palestinians, saying: "We have lost our sense of direction."
Mr Haniyeh said the new government would be based on an agreement known as the Prisoners' Document which calls for a Palestinian state on land occupied by Israel in 1967 - some regard this as implicit recognition of Israel's existence.
It also says armed resistance to Israel should be confined to the land occupied in 1967 and it gives authority to Mr Abbas to negotiate with Israel.