Battles make Palestinian government seem irrelevant

By Mohammed Assadi

RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - Escalating faction fighting in the Gaza Strip has rendered the Palestinian unity government all but irrelevant and it is the gunmen on the streets who are now in charge.

The unity coalition involving President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah group and the Hamas Islamists of Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, formed in March, has not prevented clashes that have killed more than 60 Palestinians since Saturday.

"It is a kind of absurdity to have a unity government whose members are fighting each other," said Palestinian political analyst Samir Awad from Bir Zeit University in the West Bank.

The fighting may also harden a division of the territories where Palestinians have hoped to found their state into a Gaza controlled by Hamas and a West Bank dominated by Fatah, though analysts questioned how far such an outcome would be stable.

Fatah threatened on Tuesday to quit the unity government, which has taken little clear action in its three months of existence, if the fighting in Gaza did not end.

It has not, but Fatah has yet to make good on its threat, hesitating to formalize what the fighters appear to have made inevitable. "If Hamas does not end the fighting, then all participation is pointless," Abbas aide Azzam al-Ahmad said.

"The government now is ineffective, irrelevant. It is not one that is capable of solving problems. The government is a manifestation of those problems," said analyst Bassem Izbeidi.

"The government will remain, but it does not govern. It will be there, but is incapable of doing its job. The situation will be completely paralyzed," said another analyst, Ali al-Jarbawi.

Over 600 Palestinians have been killed in factional fighting since Hamas came to power in March 2006 after defeating Fatah in a parliamentary election, according to one local estimate.

HESITATION

Abbas enjoys backing from Western powers as a bulwark against Hamas, which has ties to Iran and Syria. He has the power to pull Fatah out of the coalition, declare a state of emergency and rule by decree temporarily.

But such a step could pour oil on an already raging fire.

Hamas blames the unity government's problems on Israel and on militants within Fatah: "There is a group within Fatah who are trying to make the government fail. We in Hamas are just on the defensive," said Fawzi Barhoum, a Hamas spokesman.

Hamas appears to have had the upper hand in this week's fighting in Gaza, its power base, and many see the collapse of any semblance of unity government as leaving Hamas in control of Gaza and Fatah running the occupied West Bank.

"It is clear that the military situation on the ground is in Hamas's favor, this is a golden opportunity to impose its will by force to improve its position in any deal," said Izbeidi.