Report: Hamas to sign reconciliation pact on Tuesday

Cairo/Gaza City - The Palestinian Islamist group Hamas will sign an Egyptian-brokered reconciliation deal with rival faction Fatah, Egyptian media reports said. The official al-Ahram daily quoted a source close to the Hamas movement as saying that a representative of the group would arrive in Cairo Thursday to inform Egypt about Hamas' decision.

"The movement will send a representative to Cairo Thursday to inform Egypt that Hamas accepts the Egyptian-drafted pact and will sign on it on Tuesday," said the source, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Hamas and Fatah have fought over political control of the Palestinian territories since the former took over the Gaza Strip in 2007.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement announced on Wednesday that it would sign the pact.

Senior West Bank Fatah leader Azzam al-Ahmad headed a delegation earlier on Thursday to Cairo to hold talks with the Egyptian officials.

Meanwhile, Gaza-based Hamas lawmaker Mushir el-Masri said in a statement that Hamas has accepted reconciliation pact "for the sake of the highest Palestinian national interests."

"If the Hamas movement accepts the Egyptian offer for reconciliation, it will be only because Hamas wants the Egyptian efforts to succeed and reach a reconciliation deal that gains a national consensus," said al-Masri.

The Egyptian proposal focuses on forming a high-ranking joint committee to end the political rift between the two sides. Egyptian mediators formed the committee after Hamas and Fatah failed to reach an agreement on forming a unity government.

The committee will coordinate between the Hamas government in Gaza and the Palestinian Authority (PA) government in the West Bank until elections are held next year. The committee will be supervised by President Abbas.

The first item in the proposal entitled "The Palestinian National Accord Agreement - Cairo 2009," said that "an Egyptian-presided Arab committee will supervise and follow the implementation of this deal."

Abbas is authorized to decree the formation of a 16-member committee to pave the way for Hamas and Fatah to hold the elections on June 28, 2010.

Fatah and Hamas will have eight seats in the committee while the rest would go to other smaller factions and independents.

The 25-page document says the committee's mandate will start as soon as the agreement is signed by the concerned parties and will end when the elections are completed.

Next June, Palestinians will vote for a new president, parliament and the Palestinian Liberation Organization's Palestinian National Council which represents Palestinians inside the territories and in the diaspora.

The committee will supervise reopening Palestinian public institutions that were closed as a result of the fighting, as well as supervise the reconstruction of buildings destroyed during Israel's December-January offensive on Gaza.