BICOM

A senior Hamas leader said yesterday that Gaza ceasefire talks with Israel will resume in the middle of September although no specific date had yet been set.

50 days of fighting during Operation Protective Edge came to an end on 26 August after Egypt brokered an open-ended truce which has held ever since. However, as part of the agreement the two sides said that they would reconvene within a month to move towards a longer-term agreement and discuss key issues such as Hamas’s desire to build an air and sea port and Israel’s demand to demilitarize the Gaza Strip.

Yesterday, Hamas’s deputy leader Mussa Abu Marzuq told reporters that it is “expected that the talks would resume in mid-September.” According to AFP, he added, “The Egyptians still have to give us the exact date.”

It was reported this week that Egyptian officials have been shuttling between Jerusalem and Ramallah in order to kick-start renewed ceasefire talks. Egypt has already agreed to host a donor conference in October at which the international community is expected to work towards the reconstruction of Gaza.

However, a key aspect of ceasefire talks and indeed the success of a donor conference will be the involvement of the Palestinian Authority (PA) led by President Mahmoud Abbas. Hamas has controlled Gaza since forcibly seizing power from Abbas’s Fatah faction in 2007. Earlier this week, Abbas threatened to dissolve the Palestinian unity government formed in June with Hamas backing, unless Hamas recognise “one authority, one gun, one law” in Gaza in the form of PA control.

It is doubtful whether international donors will send funds for Gaza to be supervised by any other body other the Palestinian Authority. Meanwhile, it is thought that Egypt and world leaders envisage that Abbas’s troops will man the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt under any future arrangement. As yet, Hamas has given no indication that it is prepared to relinquish any of its authority in Gaza to the PA.