Damascus (PIC)- Leaders of Palestinian factions based in Damascus on Saturday evening held a press conference in which they read a joint statement absolutely rejecting PA chief Mahmoud Abbas’ call for early parliamentary elections.
The leaders of Hamas Khaled Mishaal and Islamic Jihad Ramadan Shallah along with PFLP politburo member Maher Al-Taher and the PFLP – General Command secretary general Ahmed Jibril and Mahmoud Kaddoumi the Fatah secretary general described Abbas’ step as “unjustified” pointing to the elections held in January this year that were held amidst absolute transparency as testified by the world which negated the need for other elections.
They called for the formation of a national unity government on the basis of the national harmony document signed by all factions and on the basis of the results of the parliamentary elections last January.
They also strongly condemned the shooting incident at the motorcade of PA premier Ismail Haneyya at the Rafah terminal on returning from a tour abroad.
They charged that the attempt on the life of Haneyya aimed at igniting a civil war as long aspired for by the Israeli occupation.
The leaders called for the formation of an independent committee to probe the incident and also denounced the murder of the three Palestinian children in Gaza city a few days earlier.
They called for cooling tensions in the Palestinian arena describing any internal Palestinian fighting as a red line.
They also asserted that resistance was the main method towards grabbing all national rights rather than negotiations or agreements that had already proven to be a failure.
Kaddoumi had told the Doha-based Al-Jazeera TV network that he refused early legislative elections warning that certain agents to occupation were interested in deepening the rift in the Palestinian arena.
