Top Palestinian negotiator Ahmed Qureia on Monday said Fatah signed a proposal outlining a path to reconciliation with Hamas because of a mixup.
Under the Yemeni plan, Fatah and Hamas agreed on the goal of uniting in a single Palestinian government. The proposal was signed Sunday by a representative from Hamas and by a senior Fatah official, former Palestinian Prime Minister Azzam al-Ahmed.
Qureia, who heads the Palestinian team in the negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, on Monday suggested that al-Ahmed was hasty. He said al-Ahmed called before the signing to get guidance from Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, but that Abbas was busy hosting U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney.
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The senior Palestinian official added that there was a misunderstanding involved in the signing. Other Abbas aides say al-Ahmed should not have signed.
Also Monday, an Israeli official that a reconciliation between rival Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas would mean an end to peace talks with the Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority.
"The Fatah leadership has to make a choice," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
"They can have a peace process and dialogue with Israel or a coalition with Hamas. But it's clear that you can't have them both.
The two factions on Sunday signed a Yemeni-sponsored reconciliation deal, promising to revive direct talks after months of hostilities. In June last year, Hamas sezied power in the Gaza Strip after days of bllody fighting between the two sides.
Earlier Sunday, the two factions reconvened in Sanaa in a last ditch effort to hammer out a compromise over the future of the Gaza Strip and West Bank.
"We, the representatives of Fatah and Hamas, agree to the Yemeni initiative as a framework to resume dialogue between the two movements to return the Palestinian situation to what it was before the Gaza incidents," the Sanaa Declaration read.
A senior Hamas official said on Sunday that the rival groups will hold the new direct talks on April 5, in accordance with the Yemeni initiative.
The deal, which was signed by top Hamas negotiator Moussa Abu Marzouk and senior Fatah official Azzam al-Ahmed, also affirmed the "unity of the Palestinian people, territory and authority".
The talks, launched last week by Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh, had come close to collapse several times.
Saleh had pressed the two sides to agree to hold direct talks in early April on the plan that calls for a return to the previous status quo in the Gaza Strip, before Hamas seized the area in June 2007 after routing Fatah forces.
The issue of the future of Gaza has been a main point of contention, with Fatah demanding that Hamas Islamists give up control of the territory.
A Hamas official said on Saturday the group asked that the same principle should apply to the West Bank, where the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority has dismissed a Hamas-led government and arrested some Hamas supporters.
The Yemeni plan also envisages Palestinian elections, the creation of another unity government and the reform of Palestinian security forces along national rather than factional lines.
Fatah had said it would agree to direct reconciliation talks with Hamas only if the Islamic group first agreed to relinquish its hold on Gaza, home to 1.5 million Palestinians.
It was not immediately clear when talks would resume and at what level.
Sunday's deal came after Senior Palestinian sources on Saturday denied reports of a breakthrough in reconciliation talks between Hamas and Fatah in Yemen's capital Sanaa.
On Saturday, Yemeni Foreign Minister Abubakr al-Qirbi told reporters that Fatah had already agreed to the final version of a draft accord, and that Hamas had asked for time to consult their leadership. However, Hamas now seems to be delaying its response to the Yemeni demand that Hamas give up control of Gaza.
Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh said Saturday that Hamas had agreed only that the initiative could serve as a basis for talks and not as a precondition for immediate implementation.
On Thursday, amid mutual recriminations, Fatah announced its people were
leaving Yemen. However, both sides subsequently acceded to a request of
Yemen's president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, to continue the talks through
Saturday.
Also on Saturday, Hamas and Islamic Jihad representatives met in El Arish with senior Egyptian security officials to discuss the gradual opening of the Rafah crossing. The parties discussed the release of 50 Hamas men being held by the Egyptians, following reports that the Egyptians tortured Hamas men taken into custody in Sinai.
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