‘Internal Palestinian dispute should not become aggression against Gaza’

Internal Palestinian disputes should not turn into “aggression and tyranny that mirror the criminal procedures of the Israeli occupation against the Gaza Strip”, the head of the Popular International Committee to Support Gaza, Essam Youssef, said.

His comments come after the Palestinian Authority forces 6,000 Fatah members in the Gaza Strip into early retirement.

“The only solution is to agree on radical solutions that bring the different parties closer and that do not increase the division and the impoverishment of the Palestinian people,” Youssef said in a press release issued on Thursday.

He called on the Palestinian factions to stand firm against the punitive measures of the PA against the people of the Gaza Strip, warning that it will be their turn soon in the “deal of the century”.

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Youssef pointed out that starving Palestinians in Gaza weakens the foundations of the steadfastness of the Palestinian nation as a whole.

Seventy years of the policy of collective punishment by the occupation has not succeeded in subjugating the Palestinian people, and this is a source of pride for the people and the various resistance forces.

He called on all parties to put the interests of Palestine and its citizens above any dispute because everyone will lose in this conflict.

“This means lifting the punitive measures and at the same time dissolving the administrative committee. The unity government will assume its functions within the framework of a joint national programme. The government will call for holding the presidential and legislative elections, which will be binding on all parties and then reconstitute the National Council and the Palestine Liberation Organisation to include all factions inside Palestine and abroad.”