Rival Palestinian factions meeting in Algiers for talks mediated by the Algerian government have agreed on a reconciliation deal that aims to resolve 15 years of discord through new elections in the occupied Palestinian territories, Aljazeera reported.
The agreement was signed by senior Fatah leader Azzam al-Ahmad; chief of the Hamas political bureau, Ismail Haniya; and the secretary general of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, Talal Naji.
Haniya thanked Algerian President Abdulmajeed Tabboune for his country’s efforts in sponsoring the talks.
For his part, al-Ahmad said, “We are proud to stand in this moment, under the auspices of President Abdulmajeed Tabboune, … to sign this deal and get rid of this [political] split and cancer that has entered the Palestinian body.”
“As Fatah, we pledge to be the first to execute this agreement,” he added.
Other Palestinian figures who were invited to sign the document included Ahmed Majdalani, a senior member of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO); Mustafa Barghouti, the secretary general of the Palestinian National Initiative; and Bassam al-Salhi, secretary general of the Palestinian People’s Party.
The agreement was signed after the leaders of 14 factions, including President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah movement and Hamas, the group that governs the besieged Gaza Strip, held two days of talks in the run-up to an Arab summit in Algiers next month.
RHM/PR