Israel announced Thursday the suspension of peace negotiations with the Palestinian Authority following the announcement of a unity agreement between Fatah and the Islamist Hamas group in Gaza.
After a 5-hour emergency meeting of the top-level inner Israeli cabinet, a statement said that ‘’the Cabinet today unanimously decided that Israel will not negotiate with a Palestinian government backed by Hamas, a terrorist organization that calls for Israel’s destruction.’’
“In addition, Israel will respond to unilateral Palestinian action with a series of measures,” it said, without outlining the measures. Israel also said it plans to introduce economic sanctions against the Palestinian Authority, which will reportedly include withholding tax revenues collected by Israel on behalf of the Palestinians.
The Fatah, led by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, on Wednesday signed an agreement with Hamas that would lead to a unity government within five weeks.
Previous Hamas-Fatah accords have collapsed, in 2007, into a civil war.
Israeli officials said the cabinet decision had been carefully worded so as not to rule out a possible resumption of peace talks if, in the next five weeks, Mahmoud Abbas fails to agree with Hamas on the composition of a unity government as scheduled.
At the same time, the wording was also designed to make plain that Israel will not negotiate with any Palestinian government that rests on Hamas support even if there are actually no Hamas ministers sitting around the cabinet table. Palestinian sources have said that Abbas intends to form a government of technocrats that might feature no Hamas or Fatah ministers.
''Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas must abandon Fatah's pact with Hamas if he wants peace'', Netanyahu said.
“Instead of choosing peace, Abu Mazen (Mahmoud Abbas] made a deal with a murderous terror organization that calls for the destruction of Israel,” Netanyahu said after Thursday’s meeting.
The announcement of the Palestinian unity deal is a “direct continuation of the Palestinian refusal to advance the talks,” Netanyahu said, citing what he said was the Palestinian rejection last month of a US framework agreement to extend negotiations, the refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, and Abbas’s appeal to UN agencies.
Netanyahu later said in US television interviews that the Israeli government “will be there, I’ll be there,” if there was a genuine partner for peace. But the unity pact showed that Israel had no such partner at present.
Hamas appeals to Muslims to kill Jews, has fired over 10,000 rockets at Israel, and “has not ceased for a moment from its terror activities against Israel,” he added. “Whoever chooses Hamas’s terror does not want peace.”
Netanyahu also denounced the timing of the Fatah-Hamas reconciliation, which occurred “at a time when Israel was making efforts to advance the negotiations.”
Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman said Israel “has no partner” to negotiate with and signified a move toward Hamas gaining greater influence in the West Bank.
Lieberman said Israel wasn’t surprised by the Fatah-Hamas pact, as Abbas had tried several times to blow up the Israeli-Palestinian talks during the last few months. He also said that he expected international pressure on Israel to continue engaging in the current US-brokered peace talks, but asserted that Washington understood Jerusalem’s position. “It is clear that as soon as Abbas chose to unite with Hamas, it is impossible to make peace with Israel,” the Israeli Foreign Minister told Israel Radio.
US Special Envoy Martin Indyk met in Ramallah on Thursday afternoon with Abbas and reportedly told him of US displeasure over the unity deal, which the State Department on Wednesday described as “disappointing.”
The US, like the European Union, lists Hamas as a terrorist group.