MIDDLE EAST:The PM's adviser tells Michael Jansenin Gaza the Irish in particular understand the struggle of the Palestinian people.
Hamas yesterday castigated Fatah's military wing for handing in weapons and renouncing resistance to Israeli occupation in exchange for an amnesty of 178 wanted fighters in the movement's military wing, al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades.
Hamas also rejected the reappointment by President Abbas on Saturday of Salam Fayyad to head an interim government. Ahmad Bahar, acting speaker of the Palestinian parliament, who is from Hamas, convened the legislature to invalidate the move, but Israel's detention of a majority of Hamas members and a boycott by Fatah ensured that only 30 of the 132 members attended.
The legislative council last achieved a quorum in March to confirm the national unity Hamas-Fatah coalition.
Shawan Jabarin, head of al-Haq - Law in the Service of Man - ruled that "legally speaking, any government should get parliamentary approval before being sworn in . . . Abbas is playing around with the constitution".
The rift between the rival movements is being exacerbated by the actions of Israel and the international community. Dr Ahmed Yousef, political adviser of dismissed prime minister Ismail Haniyeh, said Hamas is taking very seriously Israel's latest threat to assassinate him, particularly since "there are people in Ramallah who want to see him eliminated" because "[ Mr Haniyeh] can rally the Palestinian people behind him".
Speaking at the prime minister's office in central Gaza City, Mr Yousef said Mr Haniyeh's antagonists understand that he is a "charismatic" personality to whom people become "easily attached". A death threat has hung over him before, but "this time it is more serious".
Nevertheless, it was business as usual at the prime ministry. A handful of black-clad armed members of Hamas's military wing, the Izzedin al-Qassam brigades, constituted the security detail. Cars of employees were parked in a roped-off part of the street. Several women in headscarves and long coats were waiting to present petitions to Mr Haniyeh, who makes himself available to people and attends public prayers on Fridays.
Dr Yousef began his career as a mechanical engineer but then earned a master's degree in journalism at Columbia University in New York before studying for a PhD in political science.
He is the author of 28 books, most in Arabic, and recently contributed articles on Hamas's political positions to leading US and British newspapers. In spite of many years in the US, he con- tinues to carry a Palestinian travel document. "I refuse to lose my identity. I am a proud Palestinian."
He dismissed the accusation levelled by Mr Abbas that Hamas is harbouring al-Qaeda in Gaza. The "ideology and practice of Hamas are totally different from [ those] of al-Qaeda", said Dr Yousef. Thousands of Gazans flock to the beach these days, he said, and this shows that "the culture of Hamas" is not the repressive conservatism of al-Qaeda or the Afghan Taliban.
"Also, we never attacked any foreign interests . . . because all the time we concentrate on resistance to the occupation. I think the people in Ramallah are trying to associate Hamas with al-Qaeda to mobilise the Americans, the Israelis and some Europeans to stand behind [ Abbas and Fatah] and to encourage western intervention here in Gaza."
Some of these players believe Hamas is a "terrorist organisation and want to act against it as part of the war on terrorism." He said, however, that Europeans are "more balanced" than the US and Israel and observed that positive statements from the European Parliament indicate it wants to engage with Hamas and to promote dialogue between Hamas and Fatah.
In spite of the harsh stance Mr Abbas is taking against Hamas, the movement continues to respect his "legitimacy" as the elected president of the Palestinians and is ready to reconcile. "Everything can easily be fixed" through dialogue. "We are ready to co-operate with the Arab League, Egyptians and Saudis who want to mediate. Most of the Arab countries do not like to see the Palestinians divided."
He insisted that Hamas does "not have any problem with the majority of Fatah, the problems are with those people who have foreign agendas like the Dahlan group and others who have their own interests" to pursue.
Muhammad Dahlan was the former head of Preventive Security in Gaza who attempted to crush Hamas in the mid-90s.
Dr Yousef said anti-Hamas groups in Fatah "do not like to see Hamas and Fatah working hand-in-hand". But he observed that "Fatah and Hamas represent 80 per cent of the Palestinian people so one group cannot be isolated or distanced from the other. They must work together to strengthen the Palestinian cause".
Commenting on Ramallah's decision to tell police and civil servants in Gaza they will lose their salaries if they go to work while Hamas is in charge, he said: "This is a way to get people to exert pressure on Hamas." But he did not think it would succeed. Many people who work in these services must be counted as "hidden unemployment" because they are on the payroll without working.
"There may be 500 on the list but only 50 are doing their jobs . . . Before Hamas took over in Gaza, the security service had 40,000 but you don't need more than about 4,000 to control Gaza. With this number we will be able to cleanse Gaza of all those people who create trouble and chaos. Hamas's executive force [ police], some 4,000 to 5,000-strong, is sufficient."
He said there are no checkpoints from Beit Hanoun in the north to Rafah in the south. People leaving their homes no longer have to fear they will be "stalked and targeted. There are no gunmen [ in the streets], except law enforcement".
Dr Yousef said Hamas will reactivate the established civil court system and make certain it is operating properly so no one can take the law into their own hands or evade punishment, as was the case before. "Now justice will prevail." The movement is also trying to reconcile feuding families responsible for much of the violence in the Gaza Strip.
He praised Irishman John Ging, who is head of Gaza operations of the UN Relief and Works Agency which provides relief to 1.1 million of the 1.5 million Palestinian residents of the Strip. Dr Yousef said: "When I listened to him the first time, I understood he is someone who is very knowledgeable" about the Palestinian situation. "He has a better understanding of our struggle than anybody else. Then I figured out he must be Irish . . . Irish people know because we have a similar struggle, a very similar story . . . We are learning from their experience on how to come to negotiations, how to deal with Israel."
Mr Ging has repeatedly warned that if Israel does not open the major crossing into Gaza, the agency will not be able to provide the volume of food and medical supplies needed to sustain Gaza.
"Unfortunately that's true, said Dr Yousef. "If they continue to put restrictions [ on goods entering the strip], this will become a way to starve the Palestinian people to death, another way to pressure the Palestinians . . . But I do believe that since Israel has the moral and political responsibility for the Palestinians [ in Gaza] because we are still under occupation, it will be a big blow to Israeli face if Palestinians cry from hunger.
"We are people who have been living in refugee camps for more than 60 years, so we are accustomed to a hard life. We can accommodate ourselves with the minimum food available.
"Our dignity and our struggle for self-determination mean we can endure more hardship. So, we will defy all kinds of pressure they will exert on us."