GAZA (PIC)– Secretary-general of the PA council of ministers Dr. Mohammed Awad has affirmed that the PA government was determined to return from Makkah meeting with glad tidings to the Palestinian people and an agreement on unity government.
“The PA government of premier Ismail Haneyya promises the Palestinian people of exerting all possible efforts to bring the ongoing Hamas-Fatah talks in the holy city of Makkah to full success and to heal Palestinian wounds once and for all” he asserted.
But he acknowledged that there were still thorny issues before the conferees that according to him could be overcome once a sincere intention and goodwill on unity were available.
Furthermore Awad condemned the Israeli demolition works at the Magharba gate one of the Aqsa Mosque’s gates highlighting seriousness of the issue which he confirmed would drag the entire region into chaos.
In this regard the PA official urged the Palestinian people to consolidate their ranks and to set aside their political differences in order to thwart Israel’s malicious plans against the Mosque.
He also called on Arab and Muslim Ummah peoples and governments to carry out their religious duties in defending the third holiest Muslim shrine worldwide and not to leave the unarmed Palestinian people alone in the battlefield.
For his part vice secretary-general of the PFLP-GC Talal Naji urged Hamas and Fatah delegations in Makkah talks to “put Palestinian national interests before their eyes and to come out from the meeting with a comprehensive agreement”.
“The entire Palestinian people in the homeland and in diaspora are attaching big hopes that the Makkah talks will end inter-Palestinian internecine and thwart a civil war in the Palestinian territories” Naji asserted in an exclusive statement he made to the PIC Wednesday.
He moreover warned that the existing security mess in Gaza Strip and the West Bank would provide the Israeli occupation government a precious chance to carry out its conspiracies against the Aqsa Mosque and the occupied city of Jerusalem.
Olmert to Abbas: don’t form unity government with Hamas:
In spite of the optimism that prevails on the Makkah talks Israeli premier Ehud Olmert warned PA chief Mahmoud Abbas against striking a unity deal with Hamas unless it “recognizes Israel and accepts the Quartet committee’s conditions”.
Olmert was speaking in Jerusalem before a group of leaders of US-based Jewish organizations where he declared that he will meet Abbas and US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice in the third week of this month.
“I wish that Abbas will not ally with Hamas in a way contradicting principles of the Quartet Committee and the international community” Olmert said in the forum.
The Israeli premier further alleged he is ready to talk to any PA government including a Hamas-led government as long as it meets western demands of recognizing the Hebrew state which was established on 78% of Palestinian lands usurped in 1948.
Hamas and the PA government it currently leads nixed the Quartet demands and threw the ball in its court urging its parties and the international community to end the Israeli occupation of Gaza Strip and the West Bank and to establish an independent and viable Palestinian state as stipulated in more than one UNSC resolution.
Olmert’s remarks were timing with the ongoing Fatah-Hamas talks in Makkah and were viewed as an obvious Israeli attempt to spoil the talks.
