It’s no surprise that Israel is upset over the Palestinian unity government deal that reconciles the “moderates” with terrorists. But it is intriguing to hear that there are Palestinians who aren’t pleased with the situation either.
Two of the “leftist” Palestinian factions, terror groups in their own right, are troubled by the way the two main groups – Hamas and Fatah – are putting the new government together. Quite simply, the leftist groups believe the two main factions are excluding them. And that’s dangerous.
The Ma’an News Agency reported that one official from the DFLP group said Hamas and Fatah are limiting the government planning discussions to just themselves, a recipe that he said had “led both parties to nothing but conflicts.”
Indeed, Hamas kicked Fatah out of Gaza in 2007 in a bloody coup and the sides have opposed each other ever since.
While the smaller factions were allowed to submit candidates for the new unity government, they complained to Ma’an that just making requests isn’t the same as partnership.
Of course, participation of more terror groups would doubtless make a bad situation even messier. Already the Palestinians risk killing what’s left of the peace process with Israel and losing millions of dollars of American aid by bringing Hamas into the government.
Hamas refuses to recognize Israel or renounce violence. They have repeatedly claimed all of Israel’s territory as their own.
The US, by the way, is refusing to comment on the proposed unity Palestinian government until it’s settled, according to comments released by the State Department.
“There’s only been an announcement about a process moving forward. We’re going to see that play its way through, so I don’t have any further comment than that,” US spokesperson Jen Psaki said when asked if the Palestinian government is still a partner with Israel.
Of course, the “moderate” Palestinians led by the Fatah group haven’t been very good partners with Israel either, keeping up anti-Israel rhetoric and incitement in their media. But joining together with terrorists would be much worse.
And right now, even some of the terrorists are unhappy in this lose-lose situation.
(By Joshua Spurlock, www.themideastupdate.com, May 20, 2014)