Fatah official slams US, Israel

The US and Israel do not want Palestinians to be united, said Azzam Al-Ahmad, the commissioner of national relations in the Central Committee of the Fatah Movement and the head of its delegation in the national dialogue. "The US and Israel have used the Palestinian unity as an excuse to evade the peace process, and to justify not implementing the resolutions of international law or even the terms of the road map," Al-Ahmad told London's Arabic paper Al-Hayat in its Tuesday edition. “Mahmoud Abbas’s heading of the government will not allow these two countries to object to any government because of its policies...there is no justification for them now to talk about the Quartet's conditions,” said Al-Ahmad. Hamas is the party that nominated Abbas to head the consensus government in the Doha meeting, according to Al-Ahmed. No other candidate was named in the tripartite meeting. Abbas agreed immediately to take over the presidency of the government, pointing out that this was the first time Abbas agreed to the proposal. "The idea of ??Abbas heading the government is old but Abbas used to reject it constantly, and I personally discussed the idea earlier with Hamas movement, who had been reluctant to accept it, but then they said they do not mind,” Al-Ahmad said. "The president will brief the Palestinian factions on the Doha agreement after his return and consult them on the names chosen for the members of the Government, on the sidelines of the PLO committee meeting to be held in Cairo on February 18,” he explained.