Hamas-led cabinet has made intensive contact with the office of the
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the past few hours in a bid to ease the
ongoing financial crisis, Palestinian sources revealed yesterday.
Abbas is currently in Jordan to coordinate the financial assistance from Arab
countries in order to pay salaries owed to the government employees as soon as
possible.
The cabinet and the presidential office were trying to solve their disputes
over the competences on finance, security and border crossings, the sources
said.
Both sides also discussed the formation of a joint delegation headed by Abbas
to make a tour to the Arab world to raise funds for the cash-strapped
Palestinian National Authority (PNA).
Minister of Telecommunications and Information Technology Jamal al-Khudari,
who is in UAE for talks on financial aid, said that he telephoned President
Abbas and briefed him on the results of the talks he held during his current
tour.
Al-Khudari urged Abbas to assist the government by releasing funds from the
Palestinian Investment Fund.
Minister of Planning Samir Abu Eisheh on Saturday also met with Abbas in
Jordanian capital of Amman for the same purpose.
Meanwhile, the first deputy to the parliament Speaker Ahmad Bahar affirmed
that the cabinet had received big financial support from Iran, saying that the
size of support would be announced later.
The Hamas-led cabinet, which took office on March 29, delayed payment of
about 120 million U.S. dollars of monthly salaries to about 140,000 government
employees due to the halt of financial aid by donor countries, mainly the United
States and the European Union.
Israel has also halted the monthly transfer of about 50 million dollars of
tax revenues it collects on behalf of the PNA since Hamas won the parliamentary
elections in January.