Palestinian rivals lock horns over unity cabinet

October 29, 2006
Unitedjerusalem.org
http://www.unitedjerusalem.org/index2.asp?id=828685&Date=10/19/2006
GAZA CITY (AFP) - Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas and the ruling Hamas movement are at loggerheads over forming a unity cabinet as Israel´s offensive in the Gaza Strip claimed more lives.  
Four more Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire after Israel warned it would step up its offensive against militants in the impoverished territory. 
Hamas dismissed Abbas´s idea of forming a temporary government of independent technocrats while he and the Islamists continue their months-long efforts to agree on a coalition cabinet. 
This question is not currently the order of the day, Hamas spokesman Ghazi Hamad told AFP. We want a government that includes both political and technocrat forces. 
Abbas said Tuesday he would like to see a temporary technocratic government formed in order to give him and the Islamist movement time to sort out their differences over a national unity cabinet. 
A government of technocrats would be the simplest and most practical solution, Abbas told journalists in the West Bank city of Ramallah, adding that he still favored a coalition cabinet that would end a Western aid freeze. 
Since Hamas formed a government in March, the United States, European Union and Israel have boycotted the Palestinian Authority, cutting off financial aid and exacerbating an already catastrophic economic situation. 
Months of negotiations between Abbas´s Fatah party and Hamas have stalled over the Islamists´ refusal to renounce violence, agree to abide by past peace deals and to recognize Israel -- even implicitly. 
The moderate president said forming an administration of technocrats could permit us to get out of the impasse, because the current situation is impossible. 
It could stay in place for several months while Hamas and Fatah continue working on sorting out their differences, he said. 
If that were not possible, Abbas said he would examine other options, and did not rule out the possibility of calling a referendum. 
Meanwhile, Israel warned for a fourth consecutive day it would intensify a nearly four-month-long offensive in Gaza in order to stop rocket fire and alleged arms smuggling from Egypt. 
We have the responsibility to provide security for Israeli citizens, and that is why we have to speed up the fight against arms smuggling from Egypt, army radio quoted Defense Minister Amir Peretz as saying. 
Peretz added that the Jewish state had no intention of reconquering the Gaza Strip, from which it withdrew last year after a 38-year occupation. 
Four Palestinians, including three Hamas militants, have been killed in Gaza by Israeli fire since late Tuesday. 
Mohammed Abu Arar, 23, and Ashraf al-Muasher, 25, were killed in southern Gaza Wednesday after Israel launched an incursion with tanks. 
An Israeli army spokesman told AFP that forces had shot at armed men during an operation to uncover tunnels by which arms are smuggled in from Egypt, and to destroy terrorist infrastructure. 
Late Tuesday, two Palestinians, including one Hamas militant, were killed during an incursion into the Jabaliya area of northern Gaza.  
Israel has been pounding Gaza for months after militants, including members of Hamas´s armed wing, seized a soldier and killed two others in a cross-border raid in late June.  
More than 250 Palestinians as well as two Israeli soldiers have been killed in the territory since June 28.  
Nevertheless, militants have continued to fire rockets into the Jewish state and, according to Israel, have accumulated vast stockpiles of arms via tunnels dug to Egyptian territory.  
An army spokesman told AFP that the military had discovered five such tunnels in southern Gaza on Wednesday and was in the process of blowing them up.  
Hamas has warned it would teach the Israeli army a lesson it will not forget should the military intensify its operations in Gaza. (Copyright © 2006 Agence France Presse 10/18/06)