June 2, 2015 | Policy Brief

One Year Later, A Unity Government without Palestinian Unity

June 2, 2015 | Policy Brief

One Year Later, A Unity Government without Palestinian Unity

The political reconciliation struck between the two dominant Palestinian factions on the eve of last summer’s 50-day war turns a year old on Tuesday. Then, as now, reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas exists on paper only. The two sides continue to detest each other, refusing to fulfill any of the agreement’s conditions. The Palestinian Authority (PA) “government of technocrats,” formed ahead of last year’s war, is the only lasting evidence of the agreement. The government remains intact, but only in the Fatah-controlled West Bank with neither the desire nor capability to govern the Hamas-run Gaza Strip.

The surprise reconciliation announcement effectively ended the peace talks that Washington had mediated for nine months with little progress. Having run out of diplomatic patience, Palestinian officials stated their new goals were to focus on ending the division between the two parties, holding new presidential and parliamentary elections, and resolving the crisis of unpaid civil servants in Gaza. To date, none of these goals have been accomplished. 

The election issue is a sensitive one for Fatah. The last parliamentary elections, in 2006, brought Hamas’s unexpected victory, which set the stage for the next year’s brief Palestinian civil war, during which Hamas overran the Gaza Strip. Hamas still believes it is the rightful ruler of the Palestinians after the 2006 vote. The Islamist faction was recently heartened by its surprise victory in student elections at Birzeit University – a prominent West Bank institution long considered a Fatah stronghold – suggesting that Hamas could win another national election. But polls in Gaza routinely show Fatah and Hamas as neck and neck. For now, both sides seem content with merely demanding elections in the near future and then blaming the other side when those elections fail to happen.

The issue of civil servants in Gaza remains a major problem, too. After the 2007 split, the Fatah-led PA ordered its civil servants in the Strip to stay home in an attempt to hamper the Hamas-run government. In response, Hamas hired its own cadre of civil servants to fill the gap. However, Hamas has had trouble making payroll. The region’s upheavals have strained Hamas’s relationship with its financial patrons, notably Iran. Indeed, one of Hamas’s motivations for signing the reconciliation agreement last year was to lighten the financial load of paying those employees’ salaries. With the PA refusing to ease the burden, Hamas employees continue to experience long droughts without pay.

Rather than reconciliation, the bitter internecine conflict continues in the Palestinian territories. In the West Bank, Abbas continues to elicit Israel’s help in quashing Hamas cells. Leaders from both sides regularly blast the other, from Hamas officials calling for Abbas to step down to Fatah leaders accusing Hamas of stealing millions from Gazans. As the unity government enters its second year, Palestinians in both the West Bank and Gaza remain frustrated by the persistent divisions that keep their national aspirations as distant as ever. 

Grant Rumley is a research analyst at Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Find him on Twitter: @GrantRumley 

Issues:

Palestinian Politics