Ramallah: The situation in the Gaza Strip is becoming unbearable, with a senior Hamas official warning that living conditions in the coastal enclave are contriving to create a time bomb.
According to Dr Ahmad Bahr, the Acting Head of the Palestinian Legislative Council, which is dominated by Hamas, Gaza is on the verge of instability because of the delay in the rehabilitation of the enclave and because of the stifling blockade imposed on it.
“Conditions in the Gaza Strip are fast moving towards explosion - heat is seen all over the strip due to increasing Israeli hindrances,” Bahr said. “We urge all the international concerned parties to intervene with immediate effect to prevent the situation reaching the stage of explosion.”
Bahr was speaking after he received the Jordanian Member of Parliament Mohammad Al Dawaymah in Gaza.
Gazans living under the siege face extremely harsh conditions and the delay of Gazan rehabilitation only adds fuel to the deteriorating conditions, he said. “The tightening siege, the delay in the rehabilitation, the closure of the crossings and the escalating problem of electricity are daily problems which need to be addressed and tackled immediately,” he said.
Bahr urged the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to pay more attention to efforts to rehabilitate Gaza and take part in solving the problems the enclave faces, including the issue of the unpaid salaries of public servants.
Hamas has publicly been holding the Palestinian consensus government solely accountable for the failure to pay 40,000 public workers in the Gaza Strip.
Sami Abu Zuhri, Hamas spokesperson, said that the matter of unpaid public employees has been the key issue which has annoyed every household in the Gaza Strip. Addressing a syndicate conference in Gaza, Abu Zuhri categorically rejected the grounds the Palestinian consensus government has been citing to justify the failure to pay the public sector employees their salaries - the claim that the articles of the reconciliation deal were not clear.
“This is a silly excuse. Why had the articles of the deal been clear in line with the West Bank public workers but not clear in line with the Gaza public workers?” asked Abu Zuhri. “The Palestinian consensus government had inherited both governments and it was the duty of this consensus government, which represents the Palestinian whole which is located in the West Bank and Gaza, to handle both areas of the Palestinian territories equally and fairly,” he added referring to the Fatah government in Ramallah and the Hamas government in Gaza.
“The failure to pay the salaries of the public workers in Gaza is a real crime, which the consensus government commits against the Palestinian public in Gaza,” he said. “The failure to pay the salaries of Gaza public workers is a mere political blackmail and punishment.”
He said that Hamas had secured the support of the various Palestinian factions on the issue of the workers’ pay. Abu Zuhri announced that Hamas will stand by Fatah public workers who were sacked and whose names were suspended from the Palestinian National Authority payroll.
