Growing Palestinian Power Struggle?
New Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh on Thursday dismissed efforts by President Mahmoud Abbas to wrest authority from the militant Hamas Cabinet by granting his loyalists new powers over the security forces.
The dispute over the security services, along with Abbas' insistence that he remain in charge of Palestinian foreign policy, was the latest indication of a burgeoning power struggle between the moderate president and the Hamas government, which took office last week.
"There are attempts to create parallel frameworks to some ministries in the Palestinian government," Haniyeh said in an interview with The Associated Press at his Gaza City headquarters. "But I don't think (Abbas) can continue this pressure and diminish some of the authorities of this government."
Abbas, who favors restarting long-stalled peace talks with Israel, is amassing more power to bypass Hamas' new rulers, who have provoked Western threats of an aid cutoff by rejecting Israel's right to exist and refusing to renounce violence. Hamas, which has killed hundreds of Israelis in suicide bombings, won Jan. 25 parliamentary elections.
Haniyeh said Abbas had assured him the security forces would remain under the control of the Hamas-led Cabinet, which, he said, did not take power "on the back of a tank" but in "transparent and fair elections."
But hours later, Abbas appointed a longtime ally, Rashid Abu Shbak, to head the three security services that were to be under Hamas' control, in addition to agencies already under the president's aegis.
In other developments:
At the street level, it was clear the difficulties Hamas would have in taking control of the security forces, which are filled with loyalists from Abbas' Fatah Party.
Ahmed Abou Sayah, a member of the preventive security service, which was responsible for a 1996 crackdown on Hamas, said he would not accept a Hamas leader. "We hate them and they hate us," he said in Gaza City.
However, Mohammed Barham, a police officer in the West Bank city of Nablus, said he would take orders from whoever is in charge.
"I belong to Fatah and I work in the Palestinian police. By law the interior minister is the boss and that is acceptable to me. I will do all that I am asked to by my bosses," he said.
Also Thursday, the Palestine Liberation Organization, which Abbas heads, ordered the Hamas-led Foreign Ministry to coordinate with it before making major pronouncements on diplomatic policy. The PLO is technically in charge of the Palestinians' foreign affairs.
Haniyeh told AP that Abbas, "as the head of the Palestinian Authority and the PLO, can move on political fronts and negotiate with whomever he wants. What is important is what will be offered to the Palestinian people." His comment appeared to open the door for Abbas to hold talks with Israel.
Abbas' actions were part of an effort to avoid Western sanctions on the Palestinian Authority, said Khalil Shahin, a political analyst with the Palestinian Al-Ayyam newspaper:
"I predict that he will keep stripping Hamas of more of its authorities, particularly on the financial ministries and other bodies responsible for infrastructure and the security," he said. "(Abbas) is trying with these measures to spare the Palestinian people more suffering and more sanctions."
The moves consolidating power under Abbas, who is known by the nickname Abu Mazen, are a reversal of the reforms undertaken during the reign of late-President Yasser Arafat, to move many of the president's powers to the Cabinet.
"We are moving now from the mixed parliamentary and presidential regime to a presidential regime similar to that of the Arafat era," Shahin said. "The problem would appear after the Abu Mazen era. We will be afraid of having another president who is a dictator."
In his interview with AP, Haniyeh denounced Israel's plans to unilaterally determine its future borders with the Palestinians if it deems that negotiations won't work.
Haniyeh said there has been no change in his group's refusal to recognize Israel, renounce violence and respect all past accords signed by the Palestinian Authority — the three conditions Israel and the United States have imposed for dealing with Hamas.
At the same time, he struck a conciliatory tone when speaking about the United States, saying, "we don't want feelings of animosity to remain in the region, not toward the U.S. administration and not toward the West."
Haniyeh said his government could overcome a crippling financial crisis by appealing to Arab and Muslim donors. However, those countries have yet to make specific new aid commitments and have fallen far short of meeting their past commitments.