RAMALLAH, West Bank - The Palestinians' surprise agreement to unite their dueling governments was supposed to have boosted their efforts to unilaterally declare a state. But Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas Abbas will head to the United Nations alone next month to submit a statehood bid, his unity deal with the Iranian-backed Hamas stalled ��" in part because Western leaders weren't eager to see this union happen. “President Abbas was surprised by the international opposition to the reconciliation with Hamas, so he decided to slow down at least until September,” a senior Fatah official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to discuss official policy. “Now, with all efforts focused on September, we want all voices to be with us,” he said. “We are not giving the Americans or anyone else a reason to shun us because of the reconciliation or anything else.” The unity deal was struck in May after Palestinian youth, inspired by the revolts against entrenched Arab autocracies, took to the streets calling for unification of the dueling governments in the West Bank and Gaza. Unity would let Abbas project to the world that his Palestinian Authority represents not only his West Bank base but also the Gaza Strip, which Hamas violently overran four years ago. Because peace talks with Israel were going nowhere, unity with Gaza, it seemed, could be a key building block of his case for statehood at the United Nations. But the pact papered over long-standing disputes that had undermined previous reconciliation efforts, such as who would control the Palestinians' powerful security forces, and how to deal with Israel, whose very existence Hamas rejects. Unity talks quickly snagged ��" most publicly over possible international fallout over the prospective government's makeup. Abbas insisted on retaining the internationally respected prime minister, Salam Fayyad, thinking that would ease donors' fears that their money would fall into the hands of Hamas, which the West, like Israel, considers a terrorist group. But Hamas resisted, viewing the US-educated prime minister as a tool of the West. And because Hamas clung to its violent ideology, which inspired the killing of hundreds of Israelis, the international response to the unity deal was cool. Israel declared immediately that it would have nothing to do with a government backed by Hamas and called on Abbas to rip up the deal. The US and European powers demanded that a unified Palestinian government renounce violence against Israel and recognize the Jewish state. While Abbas knew he could count on the UN General Assembly, with its pro-Palestinian majority, to support his statehood bid, the endorsement would never be diplomatically significant without the backing of key Western nations with strong ties to Israel. The reconciliation pact was therefore set aside, Palestinian officials said.
