Yesterday, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas blasted Hamas, the Islamist terrorist organization currently ruling the Gaza Strip.
Mr. Abbas started a speech to Arab foreign ministers in Cairo on Sunday discussing the bitter history of his Fatah faction’s fight with Hamas, the Islamist movement that dominates Gaza, but after a minute the meeting was closed to the news media. On Saturday night, he had accused Hamas of running a shadow government in Gaza and of illegally executing scores of Palestinians, according to Arab news reports.
The Ma’an News Agency detailed some of those earlier comments:
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Saturday accused Hamas of running a “shadow government” in the Gaza Strip…
Speaking to a group of Egyptian journalists and scholars in Cairo on the first day of a three-day visit, Abbas said that the Palestinian Authority “would not accept the situation in Gaza to continue as it is now and in this shape.”
“There are 27 undersecretaries of ministries who are running the Gaza Strip, and the national consensus government cannot do anything on the ground,” Abbas said, referring to the officials of the former Hamas government who continue to maintain power in Gaza despite an April agreement that led to a government of national reconciliation between PLO and Hamas.
Speaking to Egyptian journalists in Cairo on Saturday night, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas announced that “only 50 martyrs belonging to Hamas” were killed during Operation Protective Edge.
Abbas revealed that 861 Fatah members were killed during the operation, but did not say how they died or who killed them. …
If Abbas’s figures are true, that means that nearly half of the 2,100 Palestinians reportedly killed during the 50-day war were Hamas and Fatah members.
Abbas also accused Hamas of killing “more than 120 youths … for violating the curfew and house arrest orders issued against them,” as well as of arresting more than 300 members of Fatah, many of which the PA claims were shot.
Abbas further attacked Hamas for executing alleged collaborators with Israel, and confirmed the reported details of his comments regarding Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal, as well as the details of an alleged Hamas attempt to stage a coup against the PA in the West Bank.
Abbas’ statements on Saturday night confirmed the fears that the Fatah-Hamas unity agreement failed to either moderate Hamas or allow Fatah control over Hamas. Rami Hamdallah, the Palestinian Authority Prime Minister, acknowledged these flaws in the agreement shortly after it was concluded, saying the unity government is “not in control” of Gaza.
[Photo: Greek Foreign Ministry / flickr]