Abbas: Minor obstacles hinder unity government

President Mahmoud Abbas said Friday that formation of a technocrat government faced minor obstacles. During a meeting with the speaker of the Jordanian parliament Abdul-Karim Ad-Dughmi, in his office in Ramallah, Abbas highlighted that he and Hamas chief Khaled Mashaal agreed in Doha on creating a technocrat government to operate for a few months until elections are held. “When elections take place, the interim government will have finished its task, and thus we resume national unity as before,” Abbas added. “We highly appreciate this blessed visit, as we applaud our Jordanian brothers coming from Jordan to visit their brothers in Palestine and check up on them,” Abbas told reporters, according to the official Palestinian Authority news agency Wafa. “We know we are close to each other, but such face-to-face communication is important as it enables them (Jordanians) to feel the Palestinian situation and suffering on the ground,” Abbas added. Asked about Sheikh Qaradawi’s fatwa which urged non-Palestinians to avoid visiting Jerusalem while the city is under occupation, Abbas said, “we responded to his eminence Sheikh Qaradawi during the Jerusalem conference in Doha. "We highlighted that Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, had urged Muslims to visit Jerusalem when he said, 'Do not set out on a journey except for three mosques: Al-Masjid al-Haram, the Mosque of Allah's Apostle (Prophet Muhammad’s Mosque in Medina), and the Mosque of Al-Aqsa.' Sheikh Qaradawi was there, and I don’t know if he changed his mind or not." The speaker of the Jordanian parliament, for his part, said his visit was part of Jordan’s efforts to support the Palestinian people, help them remain steadfast and support their struggle to establish an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as capital of that state. “Both the Palestinians and the Jordanians are on the same page in this regard. “The Palestinian cause can only be solved on the Palestinian land when occupation comes to an end, settlement stops and a sovereign independent Palestinian state is established and it has geographic contiguity.”