RAMALLAH, 2 December 2006 — Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas yesterday met Palestinian leaders to discuss future steps after declaring that talks to form a unity government with Hamas were at a dead end.

His meeting with the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) executive committee and leaders of all parliamentary groups apart from Hamas took place at the Palestinian Authority headquarters in Ramallah.

“The president briefed the PLO executive committee on his decision to halt talks with Hamas, and his conclusion that discussions on a unity government have reached deadlock and that Hamas does not want to see such a Cabinet come to light,” committee member Yasser Abed Rabbo said afterward.

On Thursday, Abbas told a joint news conference with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that talks with the ruling Islamist movement Hamas on forming a unity government had reached a dead end.

Palestinians had seen such talks as integral to efforts to end a crippling aid freeze which the West has imposed on the Hamas-led Cabinet until it recognizes Israel, renounces violence and abides by past peace agreements.

After yesterday’s meeting, Abed Rabbo said Palestinian leaders discussed various steps that Abbas could take in the light of the failed Hamas talks.

“Various options are being looked at, including organizing a referendum, presidential and early legislative elections or the dissolution of government,” he told reporters.

“The president wants to look at the different alternatives properly because he does not want the decision he makes to be a jump into the unknown.” The PLO executive committee is to meet again on Monday, officials said.

Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erakat, who also took part in yesterday’s talks, said that Abbas would “very soon” deliver a speech to explain the situation to the Palestinian people. Erakat said that a committee of legal experts put together by the president should present its recommendations during Monday’s follow-up meeting.

Abbas and Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh had held a series of talks in Gaza in recent weeks to try to finalize an agreement on a unity Cabinet.

Meanwhile, Israel has ruled out any immediate blanket truce with the Palestinians, despite US calls for a comprehensive cease-fire, and yesterday demanded a complete halt to Palestinian rocket fire from Gaza.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Thursday pressed Israeli and Palestinian leaders to expand a fledgling truce as a step toward reviving the moribund peace process and easing conditions for millions of Palestinians.

But while Abbas joined her by calling for the cease-fire to be extended from the Gaza Strip to the far larger Palestinian territory of the West Bank, Israel has taken no immediate decision. The influential security Cabinet, chaired by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, will discuss the matter tomorrow, an official said.

Israeli authorities are deeply concerned that the six-day-old truce, violated by rocket fire from the Gaza Strip yesterday for the fourth time, is merely an opportunity for armed groups to regroup, rearm and plot further attacks.

At least one senior security official, quoted by public radio, made clear his opposition to extending the cease-fire to the West Bank. He warned against what he called the risk of armed groups taking advantage of an end to Israeli military operations by preparing suicide bombings, far deadlier than rocket attacks, and more easily staged against Israel from the West Bank than Gaza.

The latest of four Palestinian violations of the arrangement came yesterday when militants launched a makeshift rocket from Gaza toward southern Israel, albeit causing no casualties or damage, a military source said.

In the occupied West Bank, two Palestinians have been killed by Israeli gunfire since late Thursday, the first a 16-year-old throwing stones at troops and the second a 20-year-old man who lobbed a Molotov cocktail.

Israeli troops operating in the territory overnight also arrested 29 people on Israel’s wanted list who are suspected of belonging to Hamas. Local media has widely reported that the cease-fire agreement was brokered by Olmert’s advisers without prior consultation with army supremos who are largely hostile to any such arrangement.

Late on Thursday, Israeli and Palestinian security officials met at the Erez crossing point to try to consolidate the Gaza cease-fire.

Israel also said that it will not free prisoners to Hezbollah unless the Lebanese guerrilla group proves that two Israeli soldiers it captured before this year’s war are alive.