The ongoing conflict between Mohammed Dahlan, the former head of Fatah, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has soured relations between the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Egypt. A senior Palestinian source in the Gaza Strip told Al-Monitor that as long as the crisis between the two is not resolved, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi is unwilling to deal with Abbas.
In November 2015, Abbas met with Sisi in Cairo. At the end of the meeting, an official announcement was made that they had discussed “the humanitarian and security situation in the occupied territories and the growing crisis as a result of the security violation at the religious sites [in Jerusalem] and the ongoing settlement construction.” But the reason for Abbas' invitation to Cairo was something else entirely. The Palestinian president discovered, to his surprise, that Sisi had prepared a plan, a sort of “road map,” intended to “clean up” the Palestinian political arena. The plan demands, among other things, reconciliation between Abbas and Dahlan, who is now considered a close ally of Sisi.
