Hamas to end rule to get aid

[Kamalu Diin]

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/11/11/MNGBRMAK351.DTL ]

 

Hamas to end rule to get aid flowing

Prime minister says he'll resign, let new government form

- Ian Fisher, New York Times

Saturday, November 11, 2006

 

 

(11-11) 04:00 PST Gaza City, Gaza Strip -- Hamas committed Friday to folding its eight-month government if that would restore the international assistance that was cut off after it won national elections earlier this year.

 

Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas said he would probably resign in the next two or three weeks to make way for a national unity government more acceptable to international donors than his party. The United States, the European Union and other donors have cut off aid to the Palestinian Authority because of Hamas' hard-line anti-Israel stance.

 

"When they put the siege on one hand, and having me the prime minister on the other, I said, 'No: Let us end the siege, and let us end the suffering of the Palestinian people,' " Haniyeh told worshipers at Friday prayers.

 

It was a public acknowledgment that Haniyeh and his government would soon be replaced by a "unity" government of technocrats, currently being negotiated with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.

 

Hamas refused to meet the three conditions set out by donors: to recognize the right of Israel to exist, to forswear violence and to accept previous Palestinian-Israeli agreements that imply a two-state solution. In addition to the withheld aid, Israel has refused to turn over more than $50 million a month in taxes and customs collected for the Palestinians.

 

Israeli officials have said they would not hand over the money they collect to a Palestinian government, led by anyone, that merely fudges the conditions.

 

Haniyeh's speech marked a symbolic public moment: an acknowledgment of the difficulties Hamas faced, internally and with the outside world, as it tried to move from fighting to governing. But it remains unclear whether his stated intentions could restart the flow of aid.

 

"We will not compromise," he told worshipers. "We are going ahead with a government that will not give political compromises."

 

For months, Hamas has been in negotiations with Fatah, the party led by Abbas, to form a national unity government of professionals and technocrats not immediately beholden to any faction. In recent days, those talks seem to have picked up steam, and Haniyeh's announcement offered a sign of hope that they may succeed.

 

Haniyeh said that he expected more talks next week and that "within two or three weeks, we will announce joyful news."

 

In theory, such a government would be able to win back international aid that paid about half of the $165 million the Palestinian Authority needs every month to pay salaries and operating expenses, with the money the Israelis collect on behalf of the Palestinians making up a part of the remainder. Even so, the Palestinian government was running a deficit.

 

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