On Monday morning the national press proclaimed that the first "Palestinian dialogue meetings" had begun in Cairo with the aim of "removing" the discord between Fatah and Hamas. The papers cited other points on the agenda: devising a unified stand on the Palestinian question, supporting the tahdia (state of calm) agreement between Israel and the Palestinians in Gaza, and activating efforts to finalise a prisoner exchange deal. All well and good except that the two key players, Fatah and Hamas, were not present. They weren't invited to the talks. Previous Cairo-hosted and mediated "dialogues" -- those that materialised into "agreements" and those that did not -- were either short-lived, due to Israeli violations, or amounted to nothing. The process goes back to 2004, when Egypt sponsored a dialogue between the various factions that resulted in the Cairo Agreement for a mutual ceasefire, signed in November 2005 by all the Palestinian factions, Israel and Egypt. The carefully worded agreement recognised the right to resist the occupation and reflected a general consensus over rebuilding the Palestine Liberation Organisation, historically led by Fatah, so that it would become truly representative of all the Palestinian factions. Three months later, in January 2006, Hamas won the first general elections in the Palestinian occupied territories, kicking off an unfortunate chapter in the Palestinian cause. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, previously disregarded as a peace partner by the Israelis, suddenly became palatable now that the resistance group Hamas had come to power. (The abduction of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit in June 2006 by three Palestinian militant groups, including one affiliated to Hamas, didn't help). Meanwhile the Bush administration gave financial and political support to Abbas. The gap between Hamas and Fatah widened and in June 2007 Hamas seized Gaza. (A Vanity Fair article would later reveal that the Bush administration had been secretly plotting an armed overthrow of the movement in Gaza). Thus began another phase of "faction dialogues" which Cairo pursued in a bid to perform the "role" it used to play in the Arab-Israeli conflict. As a mediator Cairo was obviously not happy with being unfairly criticised for ostensibly siding with Fatah while continuing to pressure Hamas to release Shalit without guarantees that there would be a reciprocal release of Palestinians held in Israeli prisons. The situation has reached the point where any Egyptian initiative, including last June's ceasefire agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, will ultimately be blocked by Israel's intransigence and non- compliance with its part of the deal. Equally, such endeavours are not helped by Hamas's refusal to give away its only card, Shalit, without getting the price it was promised -- an easing of the Israeli blockade on Gaza, extension of the ceasefire agreement from Gaza to the West Bank and a serious prisoner exchange. Egyptian officials announced Cairo will host another dialogue between factions two weeks ago only to declare a week later that Egypt would not sponsor any further dialogues that were doomed to fail. Now the first meetings between Egypt's General Intelligence Chief Omar Suleiman and the Islamic Jihad resistance group has just ended. Talks with the Democratic and Popular Fronts for the Liberation of Palestinian will follow. Yet in the absence of both Hamas and Fatah, let alone a commitment towards a fruitful outcome to the never-ending dialogue, many might wonder if there is any point to these meetings at all.
