Palestinian Factions Agree in Cairo to Postpone Elections to Facilitate Comprehensive National Dialogue

Four major Palestinian factions, including Fatah and Hamas, agreed during a meeting in Cairo on the necessity of holding a “comprehensive national dialogue” involving all Palestinian forces ahead of the legislative elections, which have submitted a petition to postpone them, a Fatah official and a source familiar with the matter told AFP on Thursday.

The secretary-general of the Executive Committee of Fatah and head of the Fatah delegation to the national dialogue, Brigadier General Jibril Rajoub, told AFP that he “met with our brothers in Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and the Popular Front” the day before yesterday.

He added, “During the coming week, there will be a dialogue that will continue and evolve into a comprehensive national dialogue to reach common ground on the political issue concerning the full sovereignty of the Palestinian state over the territories occupied in 1967.”

Rajoub did not specify the date of next week’s meeting or whether additional factions would be included.

A source familiar with the factional meeting told AFP that “the four factions agreed on the necessity and importance of holding a comprehensive national dialogue session involving all factions and forces.”

He added that “an agreement was reached to submit a recommendation to President Mahmoud Abbas and the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization to postpone the elections, scheduled for November 28 next year, to allow for national dialogue and Palestinian consensus.”

Rajoub said the upcoming meetings aim to reach a “unified understanding of the future state’s structure, ensuring political pluralism while maintaining a single authority, one law, one army, and one police force.”

He added that “the agreement reached during the meeting with the factions is that elections remain the strategic choice for all to build a political system and foster political and national partnership.”

Holding elections is part of the reforms demanded by the international community, including the European Union, which provides financial support to the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority.

On another front, Israel announced that the British Consulate in occupied Jerusalem had suspended its operations, noting that seven British diplomats would be allowed to remain, while the United Kingdom confirmed it would continue to provide “essential services.” Israel had ordered the closure of the consulate last September in response to Western sanctions led by the UK against settler violence in the occupied West Bank.

According to Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar, the decision announced yesterday came after dialogue with the British government to avoid any escalation of tensions between the two sides.

The Foreign Minister said in a statement yesterday: “The British Consulate in Jerusalem has suspended its operations. The Consul General and twenty diplomats have completed their missions and will leave Israel.”

Sa’ar noted that a “team of seven diplomats will remain, with a very limited scope of activity,” a month after Israel announced the closure of the British Consulate in response to London’s sanctions on Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

According to the minister, Israel and Britain “agreed to continue dialogue between the governments, enabling both sides to raise important issues for them.”

For its part, the British government pledged to continue providing “essential services” in Jerusalem, stating that the Consulate General building in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of occupied East Jerusalem would remain open and be known as the “British Mission in Jerusalem.”

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband said in a statement: “The British Mission in Jerusalem is independent and fully operational, and will continue to provide essential services and our work with the Palestinian people.”