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ARAB TIMES, FRIDAY, MAY 6, 2011

9

MIDEAST

Palestinian children hold balloons during a rally celebrating the sign-

ing of a reconciliation agreement between Fatah and Hamas, in the

West Bank city of Jenin, May 4. (AP)

No clarity on Palestinian deal

‘Hard work’ yet

to start on unity

RAMALLAH,

West

Bank,

May

5,

(RTRS):

The

Palestinians’ path to unity is

strewn with obstacles that have

thwarted past efforts at recon-

ciliation between rival groups

Hamas and Fatah and could do

so again.

Whether the groups can

overcome the challenges this

time will likely depend on the

course of regional upheaval

that brought them this far,

leading to what one analyst

said was a deal forged out of

“necessity rather than convic-

tion”.

The deal endorsed in Cairo

on Wednesday presents a unit-

ed front as the Palestinians

seek UN recognition as an

independent

state

in

September. But it offers no

clear solutions to some of the

toughest problems faced by

Fatah

and

Hamas.

Their

con-

flict has result-

ed

in

rival

administrations

governing the

West Bank and

the Gaza Strip

and

has

set

back

the

Palestinians’

quest for statehood.

Early signs do not bode

well. Hamas says PA security

forces that have suppressed its

activists in the West Bank have

detained

six

sympathisers

since

its

leader

Khaled

Meshaal met Fatah chief and

PA

President

Mahmoud

Abbas

in Egypt.

Managing security in the

West Bank and the Gaza Strip

is seen as one of the potential

pitfalls in “the understandings”

reached under the mediation of

Egypt’s new military rulers

who took power from Hosni

Mubarak in February.

Security will not be on the

agenda of a new, technocratic

government envisioned under

the agreement. Its main tasks

will be Gaza reconstruction and

holding elections within a year.

For now, the sides appear to

have shelved the question of

exactly how internal security

forces operated by the rival

administrations can be united.

De facto, that means Hamas

will continue to control the

Gaza Strip.

“You will have a govern-

ment governing two different

situations,” said Hani al-Masri,

a Palestinian political com-

mentator closely involved in

the reconciliation efforts.

“This landmine will mean

the new government will man-

age rather than end the divi-

sion,” he said.

The sides have agreed to the

formation of a “supreme secu-

rity council”, though the Cairo

understandings do not state

what it will do.

With the help of its Western

allies,

the

Palestinian

Authority has built new securi-

ty forces trained to keep law

and order in West Bank cities

and prevent any repeat of what

happened in Gaza in 2007,

when Hamas seized control

there.

Hamas, in turn, has devel-

oped its own security forces in

Gaza, while also maintaining a

military wing designed for

armed conflict with Israel —

an objective openly opposed

by Abbas who believes in

negotiations over combat.

The Cairo agreement does

not indicate how the rivals will

reconcile that fundamental dif-

ference in approach to Israel

that lies at the heart of their

division, though Masri said the

deal indicated Hamas had de

facto decided to a ceasefire for

now.

The understandings are also

not clear on the role of a new

Palestinian leadership body

designed to run affairs until the

reform

of

the

Palestine

Liberation Organisation (PLO)

— another issue that has long

thwarted attempts to forge

unity.

The PLO is the umbrella

organisation led by Abbas

which has led negotiations with

Israel

over

the

past

two

decades. Hamas is not a mem-

ber. The Cairo agreement talks

of a temporary leadership body

whose decisions “cannot be

obstructed”. Hamas will be part

of it, but it is not clear what

power it will have. It could take

months for the rivals to agree

on the make-up of the techno-

cratic government of independ-

ents outlined in the deal,

though this is seen as doable.

By keeping Hamas out of

the government and keeping it

out of politics, the Palestinians

hope to avoid a repeat of the

Western boycott faced by the

Palestinian Authority when

Hamas won legislative elec-

tions in 2006. It may not be

that simple.

The PA’s Western donors,

including the United States,

have said the new government

must commit to conditions

including recognition of Israel

and the renunciation of vio-

lence — terms Hamas will not

accept.

Islamists may take power in elections

Tunisian ex-minister raises coup fears

TUNIS, May 5, (RTRS): A former Tunisian interior minister

said on Thursday that loyalists of ousted president Zine al-

Abidine Ben Ali will mount a coup if Islamists take power in

democratic elections.

Tunisia’s main Islamist group, Ennahda, led by moderate

Muslim scholar Rachid Ghannouchi and banned under Ben

Ali, says it will contest an election slated for July after 23

years of one-man rule. Experts say it could poll well, partic-

ularly in the conservative south, where there is deep frustra-

tion over poverty and unemployment.

“If Ennahda takes power, there will be a coup d’etat,”

Farhat Rajhi, who took over as Tunisian interior minister

soon after the revolution, said in a video shared on Facebook.

“The people of the coast are not disposed to give up power

and, if the elections go against them, there will be a coup d’etat.”

“People of the coast” is a reference to Ben Ali loyalists

who have their power base in and around his hometown, the

coastal city of Sousse. Ben Ali himself fled to Saudi Arabia

in January. His overthrow in January in the first of the upris-

ings to rock the Arab world has awoken tensions between

pro- and anti-Islamists.

A common thread running through the revolts has been

unease among secularists and in the West about whether

democracy will open the door to Islamic rule. Egypt, where

the popular Muslim Brotherhood will contest elections in

September, will be watching developments in Tunisia close-

ly.

Rajhi is considered relatively independent, and a shrewd

observer of Tunisian politics. But Ennahda officials said they

did not believe a coup was likely.

“We do not yet have an official position on the declaration

by Mr Rajhi, but I can tell you that we have faith in all the

elements of the state and in the people to respect the will of

the people,” said Nourdine Bhiri, a senior Ennahda official.

The July 23 vote is for an assembly that will draft a new

constitution.

Rajhi was made interior minister soon after the revolution

and replaced in March in the latest shakeup of a caretaker

government struggling to keep Tunisia’s shaky transition to

democracy on track.

Incident occurred between Jan 15 and 16

Tunisia’s ousted leader charged over shooting deaths

TUNIS, May 5, (RTRS): Tunisian authorities have filed

new charges against ousted leader Zine al-Abidine Ben

Ali and his wife over the killing of protesters during the

revolt against his rule, the official TAP news agency

reported on Wednesday.

Quoting a judicial source, TAP said the charges

stemmed from the shooting dead of several protesters

by security forces in the central Tunisian town of

Ouardanine, when protesters tried to stop Ben Ali’s

nephew, Kais Ben Ali, from fleeing the city.

The incident occurred on the night between Jan 15

and 16, a day after month-long street protests forced

Ben Ali to flee to Saudi Arabia, ending his 23-year rein.

The Tunisian uprising was the first of many to sweep

the Arab world.

The new charges accuse Ben Ali and his wife, Leila

Trabelsi, of “plotting against the internal security of the

state” and “instigating disorder, murder and looting,”

TAP reported.

Caretaker authorities in Tunisia, in an apparent

attempt to assert their authority and gain legitimacy in

the eyes of protesters who forced the transition, have

set about attacking the vestiges of Ben Ali’s long rule.

Several members of his family and security appara-

tus, and some of his closest allies, were detained short-

ly after the president’s ouster.

TAP said charges had also been filed against 14

members of the security forces for their role in the

Ouardanine incident, in which at least four protesters

were killed.

Palestinian unity accord

blow to peace: Netanyahu

‘What happened in Cairo is great victory for terrorism’

LONDON, May 5, (RTRS): Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin

Netanyahu condemned a Palestinian unity pact on Wednesday as

a “tremendous blow to peace”.

The Palestinian Fatah movement, which backs negotiated peace with Israel, and

the Islamist Hamas, whose founding charter calls for the Jewish state’s destruction,

ended a four-year rift on Wednesday by signing a reconciliation agreement in Egypt.

“What happened today in Cairo is a tremendous blow to peace and a great victory for ter-

rorism,” Netanyahu told reporters during a visit to London.

He criticised Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas for striking a deal with Hamas, which

receives support from Iran and Syria and has fired rockets at Israeli cities from Gaza.

“The only way we can make peace is with our neighbours who want peace. Those who

want to eliminate us, those who practise terror against us, are not partners for peace,”

Netanyahu said, before evening talks with British Prime Minister David Cameron.

Cameron told Netanyahu he believed there was a moment of opportunity in the Middle East

which strengthened the case for meaningful Israeli engagement in the peace process, a

spokesman for Cameron said after the talks. Cameron said any new Palestinian government

must reject violence, recognise Israel’s right to exist and engage in the peace process, “and

that Britain would judge it by its actions,” according to the spokesman.

Cameron said Britain would “continue to work closely with Israel to prevent Iran acquir-

ing a nuclear weapon”, he said.

Cameron and Netanyahu also

discussed plans for wider eco-

nomic and security cooperation

between their countries.

An Israeli spokesman could

not immediately be reached for

comment after the talks, held

over dinner.

US.-backed Israeli-Palestinian

talks on a permanent peace

agreement

were

revived

in

September but quickly collapsed

when Netanyahu refused to

extend a limited moratorium on

new building in Jewish settle-

ments in the occupied West

Bank, captured by Israel in the

1967 Arab-Israeli War and want-

ed by Palestinians as part of a

future state.

Standing

beside

Cameron

before their talks, Netanyahu

said a great struggle was under

way in the Middle East “between

the forces of democracy and

moderation and the forces of

tyranny and terror”.

“I think the fate of the Middle

East and the fate of peace hangs

in the balance (depending on)

which force wins out,” said

Netanyahu, who is due to hold

talks

with

French

President

Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris on

Thursday.

Former British prime minister

Tony Blair, the representative of

the quartet of Middle East peace

brokers — the United States,

Russia, the European Union and

the United Nations — said

Hamas’s anti-Israel stance had to

change.

In an interview with Israel’s

Channel 2 television, he said the

example of Ismail Haniyeh,

Hamas’s leader in Gaza, who

condemned the U.S. killing of

Osama bin Laden and described

him as an Arab holy warrior,

exposed the problems that lay

ahead.

Blair said the international

community continued to offer

Hamas a place in the peace

process, but only if it recognised

Israel, forswore violence and

abided by signed agreements.

Israeli

reporters

travelling

with Netanyahu said his aide-de-

camp,

Brigadier-General

Yohanan Locker, an air force

officer who held a top role during

Israel’s offensive in Gaza in

2008-2009, had stayed home

because he feared arrest in

Britain.

Security force members seen just after suspected Kurdish rebels killed one policeman and wounded another in an armed attack on a police

vehicle following an election rally by Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Kastamonu province in central Turkey, May 4. (AP)

Assailants hurled hand grenade

Kurd rebels suspected in attack

ANKARA, May 5, (AFP): Kurdish rebels are

the prime suspect in a deadly attack on a rul-

ing party convoy in northern Turkey after an

election rally addressed by the prime minister,

newspapers said Thursday.

A group of six militants from the separatist

Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) are believed

to be behind Wednesday’s ambush on a

mountain road near the city of Kastamonu,

the Taraf newspaper quoted unnamed police

officials as saying.

The assailants hurled a hand grenade and

opened cross-fire on a police car escorting a

bus of the Justice and Development Party

(AKP), killing an officer and wounding

another, before fleeing into the forest.

The bus was taking AKP officials back to

Ankara, while Prime Minister Recep Tayyip

Erdogan had left Kastamonu by helicopter for

another rally in nearby Amasya.

Erdogan also appeared to point an accusing

finger at the PKK when he condemned the

attack as the work of “associates of the sepa-

ratist terrorist organisation” in remarks car-

ried by Anatolia news agency late Wednesday.

Turkey holds parliamentary elections on

June 12, in which the Islamist-rooted AKP

will seek a third straight term in office.

The attack might have been a retaliation to

the killing of seven PKK militants in clashes

with the army in eastern Turkey last week, a

senior police official told the mass-selling

Hurriyet daily.

“We were expecting such attacks... We had

issued warnings that the PKK would step up

attacks in the election period,” the unnamed

official said.

The PKK, listed as a terrorist group by

Turkey and much of the international commu-

nity, took up arms for self-rule in the Kurdish-

majority southeast in 1984, sparking a con-

flict that has claimed some 45,000 lives.

Northern Turkey is not a region where the

PKK is usually active, but officials have pre-

viously said that several attacks in the area in

recent years show the group is seeking a

foothold there.

In February, the rebels threatened to end a

unilateral truce, declared in August last year,

while saying they would defend themselves

“more effectively” against military operations.

A radical splinter group, which the PKK

says acts outside its control, has contested

the truce, and in November claimed respon-

sibility for a suicide attack on a police patrol

in central Istanbul that left 32 people wound-

ed.

Palestinians ride a motorcycle-taxi, called Toktok, waving their

national flag as others waving yellow Fatah flags during a rally cele-

brating the planned signing of a reconciliation agreement between

Fatah and Hamas, in Gaza City, May 4. (AP)

Turkey may raise fees

Fewer ships seen in Bosporus

ANKARA, Turkey, May 5, (AP):

Turkey indicated Thursday that it

may raise the fees it charges com-

mercial ships to use the heavily con-

gested Bosporus Strait once it finish-

es building a canal designed as an

alternative route.

Turkey wants to reduce the ship-

ment of oil, liquefied gas and chem-

icals through the Bosporus and

reduce the risk of accidents in the

narrow

waterway

that

bisects

Istanbul, a city of more than 12 mil-

lion people.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip

Erdogan recently announced a new

canal project that would create a sec-

ond

waterway

linking

the

Mediterranean Sea with the Black

Sea.

The Montreux Convention of

1936 requires Turkey to allow com-

mercial ships through the strait,

dividing Europe and Asia, while

restricting the passage of military

ships. But Transportation Minister

Mehmet Habib Soluk said Turkey

could reconsider its policy of charg-

ing discounted fees for transit

through the Bosporus Strait once the

canal is operational.

The plan is to complete the canal

by 2023, the year Turkey will be cel-

ebrating the centenary of the found-

ing of the Turkish republic after the

fall of the Ottoman Empire.

Meshaal slams

bin Laden ‘kill’

CAIRO,

May

5,

(AFP):

Khaled Meshaal, head of the

Palestinian Islamist move-

ment Hamas, criticised on

Thursday the way in which al-

Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden

was killed by US commandos

and then buried at sea.

Meshaal called on the West

to “recognise the atrocity of

the American raid and the

burial of (bin Laden’s body)

at sea,” in remarks to AFP.

“Arabs and Muslims are

human beings and the West

should treat them as such,

regardless of whether they are

partisans or opponents of

Osama bin Laden.”

News in Brief

Uprisings have impact:

The pro-democracy risings

shaking the Middle East may

have a greater impact than the

recent recession or the Sept 11,

2001 terrorist attacks, Britain’s

Foreign Secretary said.

Speaking to a white-tie audi-

ence at an Easter banquet in

London’s luxurious Mansion

House, William Hague said that

2011 had seen a confluence of

events that would change the

course of history.

“The eruption of democracy

movements across the Middle

East and North Africa is, even

in its early stages, the most

important development of the

early 21st century, with poten-

tial consequences, in my view,

greater than either 9/11 or the

global financial crisis in 2008,”

Hague said.

Hague predicted that the

forces which led to what he

called “the Arab Spring” would

sweep across the globe — com-

paring it to the collapse of the

Iron Curtain and saying that, if

successful, it would lead to “the

greatest advance for human

rights and freedom since the end

of the Cold War.”

But he said that challenges

remained, and argued for strong

action to help support Arabs try-

ing to emerge from under the

shadow of authoritarian rule.

In particular, Hague called

for the more aggressive use of

economic incentives to nudge

countries in the Middle East and

North Africa toward more open

government, saying that Europe

should be ready to rope the

region into a free-trade area, or

even a customs union, in return

for political progress.

He said the policy would

have at its heart a simple pro-

posal: “That the European

Union will share its prosperity

and open up markets in return

for real progress on political and

economic reform.”

Britain has taken a lead role

in shaping Europe’s to the Arab

uprisings — David Cameron

was the first European leader to

visit Egypt after the overthrow

of dictator Hosni Mubarak and

he was among the strongest

backers of a NATO no-fly zone

over Libya — and Hague said

his country would apply

increasing pressure to

Moammar Gadhafi’s regime.

He also said that Britain was

mustering international diplo-

matic action to push President

Bashar Assad to stop killing

demonstrators and take what he

called “the path of genuine

reform.”

Hague said Britain’s diplo-

mats at the United Nations were

seeking a condemnation of the

situation in Syria, and that

London was working with its

European partners on sanctions

against “those responsible for

the violence.” (AP)

Abbas