Reactions to Palestinian emergency government

Abbas issued decrees enabling new Prime Minister Salam Fayyad to rule without parliamentary approval.

The new government will exclude the president's Hamas rival, Ismail Haniya, who was sacked as prime minister last week after Hamas seized control of Gaza and factional fighting left more than 100 people dead.

Haniya has said the new government is illegal.

Haniya’s cabinet is a combination of independents and loyalists to Hamas and Fatah movements.

Iran has called on all Palestinian rival groups to gather around the coalition of government of Isamail Haniya.

On Monday, Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Mahdi Mostafavi said the formation of emergency government by Abbas runs contrary to “democracy.

“Such a move would actually fuel more political convulsions in occupied Palestine,” Mostafavi told the Mehr News Agency.

He added Iran has always recommended all Palestinian resistance groups to support the Haniya government.

He warned all Palestinian resistance fighters will definitely lose if the government is undermined.

“The formation of a government side by side with the legal government of Ismail Haniya will definitely harm Palestine.” Such a trend is really in the interest of the Zionist regime,” the official stated.

He called on the Palestinian groups to resolve their differences through dialogue and support the coalition government.

The conflicts between Palestinian groups would make happy only Israel's allies including the United States, the Iranian deputy foreign minister lamented.

U.S., EU back emergency government

Those major powers that squeezed the elected Hamas government since it took power in a democratic election, have now publicly backed the new Palestinian emergency government, offering aid and support to an administration without Hamas.

U.S. President Bush phoned Palestinian leader pledging to work with his new government, aides said as posted on the BBC News website.

The EU said it wanted to resume direct aid to the Palestinians, while Israel said the government was a "partner" and promised to release frozen funds.

In a 15-minute phone conversation with Bush, Abbas told the U.S. president that the time was right to push for new peace talks.

The U.S. Consul-General in Jerusalem, Jacob Walles, met the new Palestinian prime minister on Monday to explain how the U.S. could offer practical support to the new administration.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who is to meet Bush in Washington on Tuesday, claimed he considered the new Palestinian government a "genuine partner".

And speaking at an EU meeting in Luxembourg, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni confirmed that up to $800m of frozen tax revenues held by Israel would now be transferred to the Palestinian Authority.

'Direct relationship'

The EU and U.S. imposed an aid embargo on the previous government after Hamas won a surprise election victory in January 2006.

U.S. officials have already suggested that they would resume aid in the light of Hamas' removal from government.

Speaking in Luxembourg, the EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said the EU would be prepared to make some direct payments to Fayyad's government in the future.

"It is very important that he is able to construct a budget, and through that budget he will be able to help people in Gaza and the West Bank," Solana said.

Solana added that the EU also planned to deliver economic aid to Palestinians in Gaza, but for the moment would continue to channel money through a temporary mechanism that bypasses Hamas.

"In order to help the Palestinian people in Gaza, we will need some mechanism that cannot be direct support," he said.

The EU, the biggest donor to the Palestinians, continued to give emergency humanitarian aid during the ban on contacts with the former Hamas-led government.

The EU commissioner for external affairs, Benita Ferrero-Waldner, said the bloc would not immediately resume direct economic aid, but would instead wait for effective controls to be put in place.

There are already concerns that Gaza's 1.3 million residents could face shortages of food and other essential supplies in coming weeks because of an Israeli blockade of routes into and out of the territory.

PLO rejects offer for talks by Hamas

The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) headed by president rejected an offer for dialogue with Hamas on Saturday.

PLO executive committee secretary general Yasser Abed Rabbo issued a blunt rejection of the olive branch offered by Hamas political leader, Khaled Meshaal.

"I tell Meshaal that there can not be dialogue with those who commit massacres in Gaza," he said.

Meshaal said on Friday that Hamas still recognized Abbas's authority and called for renewed talks under Arab auspices to recreate a united administration for the Palestinian territories.

He said his movement's violent takeover of the Gaza Strip was only a bid to resolve a conflict over security powers between the rival factions, which formed a unity government earlier this year.

Hamas gunmen overran the mainstream security forces loyal to Abbas's secular Fatah faction in the Gaza Strip on Friday after a week of bitter internecine fighting that killed more than 110 people.

Abed Rabbo said the PLO has also rejected an Arab League decision to dispatch a commission to investigate Hamas's seizure of power in Gaza.

"We reject the Arab inquiry commission. This is a flagrant intervention in our affairs," he said.

The PLO, which unites the main Palestinian national movements led by the secular Fatah movement, is the central body of the Palestinian Authority and is headed by President Abbas.

Arab foreign ministers decided following crisis talks on Friday to set up a commission to investigate the deadly factional dispute which left Hamas in full control of the Gaza Strip, after routing Fatah forces.

The commission, which includes key regional power players Egypt and Saudi Arabia, will "submit a report on the situation in less than a month," according to a statement issued after their meeting.

MS/PA

END

MNA