Palestinian Minister of Information and the official spokesperson of the Unity Government, Dr. Mustafa Barghouthi, stated on Monday at night that president Mahmoud Abbas met with government representatives and informed them that he supports the decisions of the unity government regarding ending chaos and implementing the security plan.Abbas met with representatives of Fateh and Hamas movements, including Prime Minister Ismail Haniyya. Abbas and the government officials issued direct orders to withdraw all gunmen from the street, and decided to form a joint operations room that includes all security factions in order to immediately start the implementation of the security plan under the direct supervision of the Prime Minister and the Interior Minister.
Dr. Barghouthi said that Abbas confirmed his moral and financial support to the Prime Minister, the ministers and the government, and issued order s to all security devices to implement the decisions of the Prime Minister. The decisions will be made through direct cooperation with the Operations Committee which will coordinate with all factions.
Dr. Barghouthi added that the president and the government appealed all media outlets to stop all forms of incitement and to remain unbiased towards any faction. He called on all parties to implement these decisions in order to protect the Palestinian unity and to stop the blood spill.
Also on Monday, the government accepted the resignation of the Minster of Interior Hani Qawasmi and appointed Haniyya to fill his position until further notice besides his duty as a prime minister.
In a press release on Tuesday, Barghouthi said that these unfortunate clashes in the Gaza Strip are a huge loss to the Palestinian people, and sent his condolences to the families of the casualties and wished fast recovery to the wounded.
He stated that the Palestinian people have no option but to protect their unity, protect the unity agreement, or “they will have no future”.
“We all face the same enemy, we are telling all factions, without exceptions, every Palestinian everywhere, support the government, help it in breaking the siege”, Barghouthi said, “we must break the siege, Israel is withholding 800 Million dollars, this money is enough to pay all of the late salaries”.
Barghouthi also said that the Palestinian Authority will not accept to see the Gaza Strip turning into a new Somalia, and that the government will not tolerate any further clashes and destruction.
He called on the Palestinian people to support the government in order to help it in maintaining law and order, and in maintaining the internal situation.
Furthermore, Dr. Barghouthi stated that Finance Minister, Dr. Salaam Fayyad, presented a full report to the government, containing the outcome of his visit to several Arab countries.
The Ministerial council thanked the Arab government for its intentions to send urgent financial aid to the government within the coming two weeks. Dr. Barghouthi said that Qatar, Egypt and Kuwait will transfer the late payments estimated by 1.400.000.000 which were supposed to have been transferred earlier.
Dr. Barghouthi also said that Qatar will transfer further financial aid to the teacher and the educational sector and will transfer 22 Million US Dollars by the end of this month; this amount is the third out of five payments vowed by Qatar.
Qatar also vowed to speed that transfer of the fifth and sixth payments. If the amounts are transferred, the government will be able to pay the late salaries of the teachers. Dr. Barghouthi said that the government wants to pay all late salaries of every government employee but the current 22 million were allocated by Qatar to the education sector.
Several Arab counties, including Saudi Arabia vowed to transfer urgent aid to the Palestinian government in order to increase the salaries of government employees and pay the late salaries.
