JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel said on Thursday that a Palestinian unity deal sabotage the prospects for peace and obey the panic of Hamas and President Mahmoud Abbas by popular revolts in Syria and Egypt.
The surprising reconciliation between the Islamist group ruling Gaza and Abbas's Fatah movement, which has a limited government in the West Bank, is a new challenge for Israel, which is preparing a diplomatic offensive against the Palestinian campaign for the UN to recognize their state .
"The agreement between Fatah and Hamas terrorist organization is a fatal error that prevents the formation of a Palestinian state and sabotage the chances for peace and stability in the region, "said Israeli President Shimon Peres.
Peres, a respected statesman, said in a statement that he feared that Hamas will eventually take control of the West Bank by means of elections scheduled for the unity agreement and that as a result , strengthening the influence of Hamas ally, Iran.
peace negotiations between Israel and the Abbas government were resumed in September in Washington, but failed when Prime Minister Netanyahu Benjamain refused to extend the partial paralysis construction in Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank.
Abbas, in his first public speech since the announcement Wednesday reconciliation pact, said that negotiations with Israel were still possible during the formation of an interim government contemplated by the agreement.
The president said the Palestine Liberation Organization, which he heads and which Hamas does not belong, will remain responsible for "managing the policy and negotiations."
But Abbas said that Palestinian unity was vital.
Abbas, speaking in English, told Israeli peace activists who met with him: "I like it, agree or disagree (with Hamas) are our people .... And you, Mr. Netanyahu ( is) our partner. "
Israeli leaders have said they can not negotiate with Hamas, which has rejected Western demands to renounce violence, recognize Israel and accept existing interim peace agreements.
"This agreement (unit) (...) born of panic: a huge panic," said Israeli Foreign Minister, Avigdor Lieberman, to Army Radio.
So said Defense Minister Ehud Barak.
"(Hamas leader) Khaled Meshaal, sitting in Damascus, he sees his patron, the President (Bashar) al-Assad peppering mosques, tanks deliberately firing (civilians), and understands that the ground beneath it burns" , said Lieberman, the extreme right. DIPLOMATIC OFFENSIVE
In the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Palestinians say that the unity agreement was born of a deep-seated popular desire to overcome the division between Hamas and Fatah. Also, they say, reflected the frustration over the slow progress towards recognition of a Palestinian state.
"The signing of the agreement is very, very good and I ask God to be successful, because we are a people in a trench," said Salman al-Dairi, 50, who described himself as a supporter of Fatah in Gaza.
Lieberman added that Abbas "has relied for years" in Hosni Mubarak, the Egyptian president ousted by a pro-democracy uprising February, and now he was unsteady.
The result, said the Israeli minister, is a partnership between Palestinian factions that "crossed the red line" drawn by Israel. Lieberman
considered the possibility of withholding tax revenues that Israel transferred to the Palestinian Authority and stop key financial aid that the U.S. Congress gives the government of Abbas if it shares power with Hamas.
Abbas said he would not return to peace talks sponsored by the United States until Israel stops building settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, areas Israel captured in a 1967 war and which Palestinians claim as part of a future state.
Israel has said it is an unacceptable precondition and has urged Western governments to oppose a Palestinian plans to ask the UN General Assembly in September to recognize a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza.
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