Senior Hamas leader Salah al-Bardaweel said on Wednesday that a delegation headed by Khaled Mashaal, the head of Hamas's political bureau, will head to Cairo next week to follow up on the issue of Palestinian reconciliation with Egyptian officials.
Bardaweel told the state-run news agency MENA in Gaza that he hopes Egypt would press the Palestinian Authority to realize the reconciliation it and the Fatah movement froze.
He also referred to American and Israeli pressure on Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to not finalize the reconciliation issue with Hamas.
Hamas, according to Bardaweel, offered everything toward reconciliation, and it had accepted that Abbas leads the new government, although his platform doesn’t conform with Hamas.
He blamed delays in forming the government agreed on in Doha on the Palestinian Authority and the Fatah movement.
Bardaweel criticized security coordination in the West Bank between the Palestinian Authority and the Israeli occupation.
On Wednesday, Hamas said that Palestinian security forces in the occupied West Bank are still continuing the daily violations and political detentions against supporters of Hamas. Security forces also put several freed prisoners in Hebron under house arrest, south of the West Bank.
Meanwhile, Yasser al-Wadia, of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, declared new Arab communication between Fatah and Hamas to agree on overcoming the consequences of the reconciliation and formation of the government presided by Abbas, according to the Doha declaration, announced in February.
Edited translation from MENA
