Is Fatah reconciliation underway ahead of local elections?
Along with a number of Arab countries, Egypt has been making recent efforts to achieve reconciliation between President Mahmoud Abbas and dismissed Fatah leader Mohammed Dahlan in conjunction with the Palestinian preparations for local elections.
News about Fatah reconciliation efforts began spreading in the past few days, as Kuwaiti newspaper al-Jarida cited Aug. 26 a prominent Egyptian source, who requested anonymity, as saying there were unremitting Egyptian efforts with Arab support to achieve reconciliation between Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Fatah leader Mohammed Dahlan and establish unity within Fatah.
Internal division has been plaguing Fatah ever since its top leadership, the Central Committee, headed by Abbas, decided back in May 2011 to dismiss Dahlan — who served as national security adviser to the Palestinian Authority (PA) — and referred his case to the Palestinian attorney general on charges of financial corruption and being involved in murder cases. Dahlan was accused by Abbas of participating in the assassination of Hamas military leader Salah Shehadeh, who was killed by Israel in Gaza in 2002. He was also accused of being involved in the assassination of Fatah leaders back in 1993 in Gaza, namely Mohammed Abu Shaaban and Asaad al-Saftawi.
In the past five years of estrangement, all Palestinian and Arab efforts to get Abbas and Dahlan to reconcile have failed.
Abdul Hamid al-Massri, a member of Fatah’s Revolutionary Council and a close associate of Dahlan in Gaza, told Al-Monitor, “Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the UAE are making efforts [to achieve unity within Fatah] as they believe the Palestinian reconciliation can only be achieved if reconciliation within Fatah succeeds, without Dahlan making any concessions to Abbas. As Fatah members, we are ready to do whatever it takes to keep Fatah united, even though Fatah’s leadership in Ramallah is yet to make any steps toward Dahlan’s associates in Gaza. These steps include bringing those dismissed members back to the Fatah movement and resuming the payment of salaries that were cut off because of [those members’] affiliation with Dahlan. Many Fatah parties had made promises that such positive steps would be taken.”
