Fatah denies end of unity government with Hamas

A senior Fatah official on Sunday told Ma'an that there was never any agreement that the Palestinian unity government would last only six months, hours after a Hamas spokesman said the government's term had expired.

Faisal Abu Shahla said that the national consensus government was assigned to carry out a number of tasks, including holding elections, "within at least six months," but that it was never agreed that the government term would end if it did not complete those tasks within that time frame. 

"If the Hamas movement has retracted the reconciliation agreement and the termination of rivalry, that is a different case," Abu Shahla said.

The Fatah official added that further reconciliation discussions were pending a response from Hamas regarding the attacks with explosives against Fatah leaders' property in Gaza and the cancellation of a ceremony commemorating the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in Gaza City in early November.

Earlier Sunday, Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said that the six-month mandate of the national consensus government had ended.

Any decision on whether the government should be disbanded or continued or be reshuffled must be made only through national dialogue and consensus, Abu Zuhri said.

Hamas "isn't interested in incitement, but rather seeks to maintain national unity," he said.

The Hamas movement has repeatedly condemned and denied responsibility for bomb attacks on Nov. 7, which damaged Fatah members vehicles and houses in Gaza but caused no injuries. It also shirked responsibility for the cancellation of a ceremony planned in Gaza to commemorate the 10th anniversary of Arafat's death. The movement said it could not provide security forces for the Arafat commemoration given that the PA had not paid Gaza security officers for months in the wake of the unity deal.

A Gaza-West Bank government was agreed upon by Hamas and the Fatah-led PLO in April, and was sworn in in June, ending seven years of political discord.

But critics say the government has yet to make any real changes on the ground in Gaza.

Until the signing of the unity government, Hamas ran its own government in the Strip.

After it won legislative elections across Palestine in 2006 and violent clashes broke out between the movement and its rival Fatah party in 2007, Hamas declared sovereignty over Gaza. Israel then severely tightened its restrictions on the Strip, leading to frequent humanitarian crises and outbreaks of violence between Gaza militants and Israeli forces.