The Times of Israel reports: Fatah and Hamas, the two leading Palestinian factions, are to hold another round of reconciliation talks in the coming weeks in a bid to mend fences after nearly a decade of hostility, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas (pictured) said.
In an interview with a Sudanese television station, Abbas said the two parties will hold a new round of negotiations to discuss measures for general elections to select a president and members of parliament, and the establishment of a unity government.
“We are in need of national reconciliation as soon as possible, because without unity between the land and people of the West Bank and Gaza, there will not be a Palestinian state,” Abbas said, according to the Palestinian news site Shasha.
Palestinian parliamentary elections were last held in 2006, in the aftermath of which Hamas violently ousted Fatah from the Gaza Strip. Abbas’s Fatah party controls the West Bank, where it has fended off Hamas attempts to increase influence.
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