Ruling Hamas government endangers the people: Fatah official

A spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement strongly criticized the governing Hamas movement on Monday, saying it endangers the people.

"I think the government is no more able to keep imposing its sovereignty on the Palestinian people or serve their interests, because it moves from failure to failure and from crisis to another crisis," Ahmed Abdel Rahman told reporters.

"In fact, the Hamas government is now endangering the Palestinian people," he added in commenting the killing of nine Palestinians in clashes between Hamas-controlled forces and security members loyal to President Abbas in Gaza Strip.

Abdel Rahman held Interior Minister Said Siam responsible for the violence because he "ordered his troops to take to the streets and open fire at demonstrators."

He asserted that Hamas is asked to review its accounts to get out of the crisis or, otherwise, "there will be another way to force it step down democratically."

Lawmaker Mustafa al-Barghouti, chief of leftist National Initiative party, said the violence in Gaza was a result of " failing to form a national unity government or solving internal crisis by peaceful means."

"It's not a matter of who is responsible and who should be brought to account, the most important thing is how to stop continuing bloodshed in Gaza Strip and West Bank," al-Barghouti told Voice of Palestine radio.

Al-Barghouti also stopped short of holding the Interior Minister responsible or firing him, saying "the important thing is to change the whole government."

"We need a new government even if it was provisionally to reunite the Palestinian spectrum and avoid external interventions, " he added.

Source: Xinhua