Special to WorldTribune.com

GAZA CITY — Hamas has been considering an alternative to a Palestinian Authority government in the Gaza Strip.

Palestinian sources said Hamas was consulting with allies to form an emergency government in the Gaza Strip. They said Hamas and Islamic Jihad have determined that the PA, despite an agreement for a unity government, was not capable of restoring order.

“There is a political vacuum in the Gaza Strip which creates the
atmosphere for security chaos, taking into account that the national
consensus government has not taken even a single step toward ending
political disagreement,” Hamas leader Ahmed Yusef said.

In an interview with the Palestinian news agency Maan, Yusef said Hamas
was meeting with other factions in the Gaza Strip. He said the new PA
government led by Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah, sworn in on June 2, has
failed to take over responsibilities for Hamas, which seized the Gaza Strip
in 2007.

“In Gaza there are ministries without budgets as well as ministers and
employees who don’t receive salaries,” Yusef said on July 5. “From a moral
and national point of view everybody should work to end this state.”

Hamas has accused Fatah and the PA of exploiting the reconciliation
agreement to sow unrest in the Gaza Strip. The Islamist movement said the PA
unilaterally ended salaries to some 50,000 Hamas civil servants and replaced
them with 70,000 who had worked until 2007.

The unrest in the Gaza Strip has been accompanied by intense Palestinian
missile and rocket fire into Israel. Hamas, which lost seven fighters in an
Israeli air strike on July 7, has disavowed responsibility for the
Palestinian attacks.

“From a political point of view, Rami Hamdallah is responsible and he
can give orders to security services to intervene,” Yusef said. “Hamas is
not ruling the Gaza Strip and so it’s not responsible for protecting
borders.”

“The head of Hamas foreign relations bureau, Osama Hamdan, went further.
Hamdan said Hamas would not agree to any ceasefire unless Israel lifts its
siege from the Gaza Strip and ruled out an Israeli invasion.

“So far, Egypt has not intervened to broker a new calm arrangement or
stabilize the old arrangement,” Hamdan told Al Resala television.

  Ahmed Yusef, Hamas threatens emergency solution for Gaza as Palestinian Authority has failed to fill ‘political vacuum’, Osama Hamdan, Rami Hamdallah