ANALYSIS-No Western aid gush for Palestinian unity cabinet
Source: Reuters
By Alistair Lyon, Special Correspondent JERUSALEM, March 7 (Reuters) - Jolted by fears of civil war, Palestinians may forge a unity cabinet this month, but this alone will not end international sanctions that denied aid to a Hamas government and punished an already crippled economy. Four weeks after their Saudi-brokered agreement to form a coalition, President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah faction and its Islamist Hamas opponents are still arguing over the details. Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas has said the cabinet line-up will not be ready before the end of next week. Much is at stake beyond a simple struggle for ministerial posts, including control of chaotic security forces, public funds, the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) and the future of peacemaking with Israel. "The devil is in the details," Palestinian political analyst Ali Jarbawi said of efforts to implement the power-sharing deal -- which skips over key issues like integrating Hamas into the PLO and disbanding militias. Jarbawi said he expected the two sides to resolve their disputes over cabinet portfolios, especially the powerful post of interior minister, who commands the security forces, now divided into factions that answer to Fatah or Hamas. Their bloody street battles killed more than 90 people before the unity accord. Militant groups, armed clans and criminal gangs operate with impunity in the occupied West Bank and in the Gaza Strip. Abbas wants to absorb Hamas's 6,000-strong Executive Force into the otherwise Fatah-dominated security services, an idea the Islamist group resists without reform of the whole sector. "We have no problem integrating the Executive Force in the framework of restructuring the security services" to make them professional and independent, Hamas spokesman Ghazi Hamad said. WAIT-AND-SEE For now, the big powers are suspending judgment on any unity government, but the United States will be in no rush to end a political and financial boycott it imposed on the Palestinian Authority after Hamas won power in elections in January 2006. Less clear are the attitudes of its partners in the Quartet of Middle East mediators -- Russia, the United Nations and the European Union, which is the main aid donor to the Palestinians. For the past year, the Quartet has insisted any Palestinian government recognise Israel, renounce violence and accept past peace deals -- conditions Hamas has refused to meet. "I have no expectation of a change in U.S. policy," said Mouin Rabbani, an International Crisis Group analyst. "The Europeans, despite what they might think or feel, are probably not going to get into a conflict with Washington over this." Saudi Arabia, due to host an Arab summit at the end of the month, has made clear it wants an end to the boycott after the Hamas-Fatah accord reached in Mecca on Feb. 8. "The Mecca agreement represents the turning point for the future of relations between the Palestinian Authority and international community," Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal told a meeting of Gulf Arab states this week. The Mecca agreement enjoins "respect" for previous peace deals, but does not commit a unity cabinet to repudiate violence or recognise Israel, which Hamas's 1988 charter vows to destroy. Hamas leaders say they will never recognise the Jewish state, but have offered a long-term truce with it in return for a viable Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. SAUDI CASH Rabbani said the international aid embargo could lose relevance if the Saudis began injecting significant amounts of cash into the Palestinian treasury, even if the Quartet maintained its diplomatic isolation of any new government. So far the risk of U.S. penalties has effectively deterred banks from transferring money to the Hamas-led administration. Foreign donors, who once insisted that aid money go to a single Palestinian treasury account to counter corruption in former President Yasser Arafat's day, now funnel it to Abbas. "Don't expect an immediate turning on of the tap of Western aid if a unity government is formed," a European diplomat said, adding that it might take six months for the designated finance minister, Salam Fayyad, to bring donors a credible proposal. A recent International Crisis Group report urged the world to judge any new government on how it acts once in office. One proposed scenario would see the release of a captive Israeli soldier, a halt to rocket attacks on Israel from the Gaza Strip and a mandate for Abbas to pursue peace talks. This would be accompanied by reciprocal Israeli steps to free Palestinian prisoners, observe a ceasefire, ease travel curbs and hand over frozen revenue to the Palestinian Authority. Clues to whether any of this is feasible may emerge from an expected meeting between Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in the next few days. They achieved little in three-way talks with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice last month.
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