Palestinians renew unity bid

RAMALLAH: The Palestinians have relaunched efforts to reconcile their rival leaderships in the West Bank and Gaza Strip as US-brokered peace talks with Israel teeter on the edge of collapse.
A week before a nine-month target originally set for an Israeli-Palestinian deal, a Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) delegation was expected in Gaza City on Tuesday to try to revive long-stagnant unity efforts.
The team is being led by Azzam Al-Ahmad, a senior figure in the mainstream Fatah party of president Mahmoud Abbas, the head of the Western-backed Palestinian Authority (PA).
Independent MP Mustafa Barghuti and figures from two leftist parties, the Palestinian People’s Party and the Palestinian Arab Front, are also in the delegation.
They were to meet with Ismail Haniya, prime minister of the Hamas government which rules Gaza, and the number two in the Palestinian movement, Mussa Abu Marzuq, who arrived from Cairo on Monday.
At the same time, the Palestinians refloated and then played down a threat to dismantle the PA, which is Israel’s negotiating partner, if their peace talks remain deadlocked.
“No Palestinian is speaking of an initiative to dismantle the Palestinian Authority,” chief negotiator Saeb Erakat said on Tuesday.
“But Israel’s actions have annulled all the legal, political, security, economic and operational aspects of the prerogatives of the Palestinian Authority.”
The PA was set up under the 1993 Oslo accords and has won widespread international recognition but is fully dependent on foreign aid for its administration of autonomous areas of the West Bank.
Palestinian negotiators have warned they may hand responsibility for governing the occupied territories back to Israel, a senior Palestinian official said on Sunday.
He said the Palestinians had told US peace envoy Martin Indyk that unless Israel releases Palestinian prisoners as agreed and freezes settlement building, they could dismantle the Authority.
US State Department spokeswoman Jennifer Psaki criticized the threat as “extreme” and warned that any such move would affect American aid to the Palestinians.