RAMALLAH, West Bank, 8 October 2003 — New Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qorei said yesterday he would make the pursuit of a mutual cease-fire with Israel his government’s main goal as his Cabinet officially took office.
Qorei and six others from the new nine-member Cabinet were sworn in by Yasser Arafat in a ceremony at the Palestinian president’s headquarters here before they held their first Cabinet meeting. Arafat wished the ministers “full success in serving our people.”
Asked about the top priorities of his new Cabinet, Qorei told reporters: “Trying to reach a mutual cease-fire with the Israeli side.” And he told the Palestinian daily Al-Ayyam he was ready to start “negotiating today” with Israel as he expressed his readiness to sit down with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
“I will meet him when it is necessary and useful. I have no veto on dealing with anyone ... there must be preparations for any meeting because (it) should bring about something positive for both the Palestinian people and the Israeli people,” he said.
The outgoing speaker of Parliament was declared premier Sunday night as Arafat called a state of emergency in the West Bank and Gaza. Qorei’s predecessor Mahmoud Abbas resigned last month over differences with Arafat concerning the control of the Palestinian security services.
Even though Qorei and Arafat have spent most of the past week discussing incoming Interior Minister Nasser Yussuf’s powers, Yussuf himself did not attend the swearing-in ceremony. Some sources said that Yussuf had wanted the Cabinet to be officially approved by the Palestinian Parliament while others said that he was unhappy about the definition of his powers.
“There is no crisis, it’s a technical problem. Nasser Yussuf is willing to carry out his mission and could be sworn in later on today,” Palestine Liberation Organization executive committee member Ghassan Al-Shakaa told reporters.
Minister without portfolio Jawad Tibi was unable to be sworn in as he was not granted a permit by Israel to travel from Gaza to the West Bank. Qorei said that “real and sufficient powers have been granted to the government and to the interior minister to ensure that the various security services are unified,” while stressing that Arafat would have the last word as the head of the newly created national security council.
“President Arafat is the supreme commander of the security forces. The national security council he heads is in charge over defining security policy. The interior minister executes (this policy),” he said. Qorei said he wanted to “establish an intra-Palestinian dialogue more serious than anytime before in order to reach a common ground on the way of ending the present crisis.”
Sources close to Qorei had said Monday the government would move against hard-line factions such as Hamas and Islamic Jihad, but Qorei is also understood to be determined to avoid any descent into a civil war among Palestinian ranks. “We will not be pushed into a civil war ... but we will not be lenient in imposing the law and order,” he told Al-Ayyam.
Former Palestinian Security Minister Mohammed Dahlan said the emergency government had little chance of success and questioned Arafat’s decision to form a crisis Cabinet. Dahlan, 41, told Reuters in an interview he would not have advised Arafat to declare a state of emergency.
“The preparation and the direction for the emergency government seem not to have been studied in a real and serious manner. Therefore, I do not think there is a mechanism and a vision to get out of the crisis,” he said.
“I hope I am wrong because President Arafat — not only the prime minister — shoulders the burden at this stage because he was the one who declared the state of emergency.”
