Salam Fayyad | SilverScorpio.Com

Palestinians take Gandhi’s path and win followers

April 29, 2010 By vani Leave a Comment

West Bank, Apr.29 (ANI): Though militancy and stone throwing remain deeply ingrained in the
Palestinian psyche, passive resistance protests on the lines of what India’s iconic leader Mahatma Gandhi followed and espoused at the turn of the 20th century, is gaining favor with some West Bank politicians and the public.

It”s taken years, but the predominantly passive Palestinian protest movement started in Bilin seems to be making inroads among a broader swath of Palestinians, winning public support from the likes of Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, reports the Christian Science Monitor (CSM).

Frustrated with unending peace talks and disillusioned with the recent military Intifada, many Palestinians are looking for a new path to statehood.

Those advocating passive resistance are asking Palestinians to swallow a bitter pill — accepting the inefficacy of Arab militants against Israel”s military superiority.

Organizers in Bilin admit that moving Palestinians away from stone throwing to the fully non-violent doctrine of passive resistance promoted by Gandhi in India and American civil rights leader Reverend Martin Luther King in the segregated south of the 1950s is not easy.

Palestinians believe they have the right to armed resistance and rock throwing under international law, and therefore, it would take more courage to lie in front of a bulldozer.

Abandoning violence for the most part, Bilin residents along with international and Israeli sympathizers have staged marches to the Israel”s security fence for the last five years. (ANI)

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Envoy to hear Palestinian stance on talks with new Israeli cabinet

April 19, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Ramallah – US President Barack Obama’s envoy to the Middle East was due in Ramallah Friday to hear the Palestinians’ position on renewing peace negotiations with the new Israeli government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

George Mitchell, who held his first talks in Israel Thursday since the government was sworn in, was to travel the short distance from Jerusalem to the central West Bank city for talks with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and acting Prime Minister Salam Fayyad.

Abbas has said Netanyahu must openly endorse the two-state solution to the Middle East conflict for him to be a peace partner.

Netanyahu, of the hardline, but mainstream Likud party, has thus far not done so.

Instead, in his talks with Mitchell in Jerusalem late Thursday, he demanded the Palestinians recognize Israel as a Jewish state, in what appeared a new condition for resuming peace talks.

Avigdor Lieberman, Israel’s outspoken and controversial new foreign minister of the ultra-nationalist Israel Beiteinu coalition party, also told Mitchell that past approaches to the conflict with the Palestinians, such as the 1993 interim Oslo peace accords, had failed and that “new ideas” were needed.

An Israeli newspaper Friday quoted a senior US diplomat as voicing concern that Netanyahu’s demand for Palestinian recognition of Israel as the state of the Jewish people was a bid to buy time.

“Israel will define itself as it sees fit. Why should the Palestinians be demanded to recognize it as a Jewish state and not as a nation state?” the diplomat told Ma’ariv.

An Israeli government official told the daily that the Obama Administration would give Israel some six to eight weeks to consolidate its position regarding the peace process – until Netanyahu is expected to travel to Washington at the end of May. (dpa)

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Senior Fatah, Hamas leaders meet in Gaza

April 9, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Gaza, April 9 (DPA) Leaders of the rival Hamas and Fatah movements held a meeting in Hamas-ruled Gaza Wednesday to discuss reconstruction of the Gaza Strip and mutual reconciliation.

The meeting between the two movements’ leaders is the first of its kind since Hamas’s takeover of the Gaza Strip in the summer of 2007 following weeks of bloodshed between the two groups’ warring militants.

Four Fatah leaders, headed by Abdallah el-Ifranji arrived at the office of Hamas spokesman in Gaza Ayman Taha to hold talks with four Hamas leaders headed by senior Hamas leader Salah el-Bardawil.

On Tuesday, Palestinian National Authority President Mahmoud Abbas sent el-Ifranji and another Fatah leader to the Gaza Strip to look at the damage caused by a 22-day Israeli military offensive on the enclave that ended Jan 18.

A series of talks were held in Cairo last month between the two movements as well as with leaders of other Palestinian factions, but these failed to agree on the outstanding issues, mainly the formation of a new unity government.

After Hamas took control of Gaza, Abbas sacked the Hamas national unity government and nominated a new government headed by Salam Fayyad. Hamas kept its government in Gaza and rejected Abbas’ decree.

Fatah and Hamas have also agreed to hold another meeting in Cairo April 26.

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Abbas rejects Fayyad’s resignation, PM stays on

April 3, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s government, which resigned last month, will stay on until the formation of a new government, Foreign Minister Riyad al-Malki said on Thursday.

He told Reuters that Abbas had rejected the resignation of Prime Minister Salam Fayyad and asked him to stay on until Abbas’s Fatah Faction and Hamas Islamists, now negotiating a new interim government in Cairo, reach a deal.

“This government will stay on to avoid having a constitutional vacuum, Malki said.

“We hope that the dialogue (in Cairo) will be crowned by an agreement on a national consensus government.”

Former World Bank economist Fayyad tendered his resignation on March 7, effective March 31, in order to help rival Palestinian factions reach an agreement.

Officials made clear on Monday that he would be staying on in the post until the Cairo talks were completed and on Wednesday Fayyyad confirmed he was not leaving yet.

Fatah and Hamas, which drove out Abbas forces in a brief civil war in 2007 culminating in seizure of Gaza Strip, on Wednesday began a third round of talks in Cairo aimed at forging

a possible unity government deal.

“We’ll decide on the way forward after the current round of talks (in Cairo) and after consultations with our Arab brothers,” Abbas was quoted as saying on Palestine television. Fayyad’s government had submitted its resignation to “facilitate the national dialogue”, Abbas added.

Chances of reaching a deal between Fatah and Hamas are slim, which could mean that Fayyad, whom Abbas appointed immediately after Hamas took control of Gaza in June 2007, stays on longer.

Diplomats say Fayyad — who says he won’t reconsider resignation — has grown increasingly frustrated both by a lack of progress in peace talks with Israel and by opposition within Abbas’s secular Fatah faction to his control over the Palestinian Authority’s purse strings.

Hamas won a 2006 Palestinian election but its government was shunned by Western powers for refusing to recognise Israel, renounce violence and abide by interim peace deals with the Jewish state.

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Palestinians head for Cairo to grind out unity deal

March 9, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Gaza City – Representatives of rival Palestinian factions headed to the Egyptian capital Cairo Monday to begin key talks aiming at reconciliation and the formation of a unity government.

The meeting on Tuesday will be the first substantive talks between President Mahmoud Abbas’ secular Fatah movement and its bitter Islamist rival Hamas since the two groups severed ties following Hamas’ violent take-over of the Gaza Strip.

Last month, the two sides agreed to form committees to tackle outstanding issues. One of them will deal with forming a unity government that would mainly comprise moderate members of both Hamas and Fatah.

A London-based Arabic daily reported that Hamas and Fatah are heading for Cairo as a preliminary deal on power sharing is already being discussed.

“The deal says Hamas will get 10 portfolios, Fatah eight and the rest of the ministries will be for the other factions and the independents,” al-Hayat newspaper reported.

However, Abbas opposes such a government, the newspaper said, and prefers a government of technocrats with independents holding most of its posts. Hamas in any case is said to insist on either having the premiership or at least selecting it.

The Gaza Strip and West Bank are ruled by two feuding governments, since Hamas routed pro-Abbas forces from the Gaza Strip in 2007. On Saturday, Acting Premier Salam Fayyad of West Bank government resigned to pave the way for the formation of a new government, but Abbas asked him to continue until the new government is formed.

Hamas, which controls Gaza with a government that Abbas fired, has demanded to extend its rule to West Bank until the formation of the unity government.

In Cairo, other committees will discuss ways to settle the remaining controversial issues of security, the elections, the reform of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) and reconciliation. (dpa)

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Palestinian Prime Minister to Resign

March 8, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) — The Palestinian prime minister said Saturday he submitted his resignation in a move that could help usher in a power-sharing deal between Western-backed President Mahmoud Abbas and his rivals in the militant group Hamas.

Salam Fayyad’s resignation was meant to be a goodwill gesture toward Hamas, but the group’s officials dismissed the announcement, saying Fayyad’s appointment and time in office has been unconstitutional.

Abbas appointed Fayyad as Prime Minister after Hamas seized control of the Gaza Strip in June 2007. The takeover effectively created two separate Palestinian administrations — an internationally backed government in the West Bank led by Abbas and technocrat Fayyad, and a blockaded government in the coastal patch of Gaza run by Hamas.

Fayyad said in a statement Saturday he hoped to pave the way for a unity government. ”This step comes in the efforts to form a national conciliation government,” he said.

Fayyad said his resignation would take effect after the formation of a Palestinian unity government but no later than the end of March. The announcement came before the resumption of power-sharing talks on Tuesday between Abbas’ Fatah and officials from Hamas, expected to take place in Cairo.

The rivals held an initial round of reconciliation talks in late February, agreeing to form separate committees to deal with grievances between the two sides, and to form a caretaker government to usher in new presidential and legislative elections.

Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum dismissed Fayyad’s announcement.

”This government did not work for the sake of the Palestinians, it worked for its own agenda. This end was expected for a government that was illegal and unconstitutional,” Barhoum said.

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