At last the Palestinian movements Fatah and Hamas have come to an agreement for reconciliation and the creation of a transitional government, ahead of legislative elections in a year's time. It is significant that reconciliation should come in the wake of mediation from Cairo, reflecting the continual strength of Egypt's regional role in the post-Mubarak era. Cairo has even announced that the reconciliation between the Palestinian governments in Gaza and Ramallah will be followed by that of all the other Palestinian factions, in order to start afresh struggle for building their State of Palestine. This has angered Israel, whose government has warned Mahmoud Abbas, the head of the Palestinian Authority, that he might lose the chance for peace with Israel, if he is reconciled with Hamas. Abbas is ignoring the Israeli warning, because there haven't been any peace talks for a long time between the two sides, due to Israel's brutality and its insistence on continuing to build settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Does he stand to lose anything by ignoring Israel and co-operating with his Palestinian brothers to restore unity of the Palestinians? Israel wants the differences between the Palestinian rivals to continue; it fears their unity, even if they decide to abandon armed resistance and resort to peaceful means to get back their land, so they can create their new, independent state. Israel wants to play on the differences between the Palestinian factions, because it doesn't want peace and doesn't want to withdraw from the territories it occupied in 1967. Meanwhile, the presence of Hamas gives Israel an excuse to continue attacking the Palestinians in Gaza, claiming that it is responding to Hamas rocket attacks. Hopefully, the Palestinians will put their own interests first. If they were united, this would convince the world to recognise the State of Palestine and to pressurise Israel to bow to international will and give up its colonial ambitions.
