Unity committee strapped for cash, not meeting

A committee tasked with implementing reconciliation in the Gaza Strip says it has not met because it is awaiting funds from the Hamas government or Palestinian Authority. The committee was set up to resolve community disputes between families relating from the violence that split the occupied territories under two governments in the summer of 2007. But one of the committee members, Ramzi Rabah, told Ma'an on Saturday that it has not received some $60 million it needs for damages being paid to families who lost loved ones in the fighting. He said the families of about 300 people killed in the fighting in Gaza were to be compensated, but neither President Mahmoud Abbas nor Ismail Haniyeh, the premier in Gaza, have allocated the funds. Rabah added that his committee requested $300,000 from Abbas and the Hamas-run government but received nothing so far. In addition to the financial problems, Rabah added, the committee has not made much progress as there is little momentum in general in the other committees set up as part of the reconciliation deal in Cairo. Hamas, he said, is in no rush to complete reconciliation because it is awaiting the outcome of elections in Egypt, as Hamas hopes the Muslim Brotherhood takes power and uses its influence in Palestine.