Historic PA visit to Gaza failed after Hamas confined ministers
Abbas’s delegation left hastily after they were placed under ‘house arrest’ at hotel and kept incommunicado
Elhanan Miller is the former Arab affairs reporter for The Times of Israel
Palestinian factions blamed Hamas on Wednesday for the failed visit of unity government ministers to Gaza earlier this week, claiming that Hamas confined the ministers to a hotel, preventing them from moving freely across the Gaza Strip.
A delegation of 11 ministers from the Mahmoud Abbas-controlled West Bank had arrived in Gaza Sunday, in coordination with Israel, to resolve the civil servant crisis, the most burning point of contention between Hamas and the Fatah-controlled Palestinian Authority since a reconciliation government of technocrats was formed last June.
Some 40,000 civil servants and security personnel employed by Hamas following its violent takeover of the Gaza Strip in 2007 have not received full salaries in over a year as a result of Hamas’s financial crisis. Meanwhile, some 32,000 civil servants employed by the Palestinian Authority prior to the takeover have been ordered by Abbas to stay home in protest, while receiving full salaries from the PA government in Ramallah.
The delegation arrived in Gaza with the mission of tallying the exact number of PA employees (who haven’t been counted since 2007), in order to ascertain the proportion of Hamas civil servants who can be integrated into the official Palestinian bureaucracy. The ministers were meant to spend a week working in Gaza, but after being confined to their hotel by Hamas security, the ministers were ordered back to Ramallah by Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah just one day later, on Monday evening.
Palestinian officials who took part in the Gaza meetings told the Jerusalem-based daily al-Quds that the ministers were prevented from visiting their ministries in Gaza, or even receiving visitors at their hotel.
“The ministers were placed under house arrest,” said Walid Awadh, a member of the Palestinian People’s Party. “They could not leave the hotel they were staying at, and delegations weren’t allowed to enter. This made the ministers feel unwelcome.”
Naturally, Hamas’s version of the events was different. Spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said the ministers decided to remain in the hotel of their own volition.
“Most government ministers refused to leave the hotel for their ministries, insisting on remaining in the hotel and receive the PA employees, since they do not recognize the legitimacy of the current civil servants,” Abu Zuhri wrote on Facebook late Monday night, following the delegation’s departure. “This reflects the partisan nature of this government. It should respect itself before demanding others to respect it.”
Remaining above the blame game, Hamdallah, on a diplomatic visit to Indonesia, said the visit’s failure did not necessarily spell an end to reconciliation efforts between Fatah and Hamas.
“Things have not reached a dead end yet; the pending differences can still be resolved,” Hamdallah said, calling on the Palestinian public “not to lose hope in reconciliation and mutual understanding.”
But things did seem quite hopeless for Gaza’s PA employees on Tuesday night. In a communique published on Fatah’s website, the “legitimate” civil servants warned of a plan by Hamas unions to once again shutter local banks and prevent them from collecting their salaries.
“We warn Hamas employees and its security agencies from closing the banks and preventing us from receiving what we deserve,” the message read. “We tell them: go to those who employed you and ask them for your salaries.”
This would not be the first time Palestinian and international ministers were given a less-than-warm welcome in Gaza. Last July, the convoy of PA health minister Jawad Awad was pelted with eggs and shoes by angry protesters as it entered the Strip through the Rafah border crossing with Egypt.
The Times of Israel Community.