Dahlan, Abbas feud pushes Fatah to brink of crisis
Fatah supporters of Mohammed Dahlan in the West Bank are bracing for a crackdown by President Mahmoud Abbas.
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — On March 5, most of the 77,000 Palestinian Authority (PA) employees located in Gaza received their February salaries, but about a hundred returned from their banks empty-handed. They weren’t paid because of an official decision by the PA against supporters of Mohammed Dahlan, a member of the Legislative Council and a dismissed leader from Fatah, who differs with the PA’s general policy. The decision to stop payment on the salaries has worsened the crisis between Dahlan and President Mahmoud Abbas.
Al-Monitor obtained the names of those affected by this decision, and all of them are employed in the Preventive Security Service, which was led by Dahlan. From a security source in Gaza, Al-Monitor learned that a number of those who didn’t receive their salaries are wanted by Hamas and fled from Gaza to Egypt and the West Bank after the takeover in mid-2007, while the rest are still in Gaza.
