Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh on Wednesday renewed his call for dialogue with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' rival Fatah faction a week after Abbas restarted talks with Israel .
| Still Holding Shalit |
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| Hamas: Sign of life from Shalit in exchange for hundreds of prisoners / Ali Waked |
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Islamist group leaders deny reports of progress on possible prisoner swap deal that will include kidnapped soldier, but say meeting between Shalit and neutral party may be allowed if 'Israel pays accordingly' |
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Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Abbas formally relaunched a US-sponsored peace process last week and Israel has since stepped up raids on Hamas-run Gaza to try to curb rocket fire by militants.
Hamas Islamists, who have vowed to undermine the peace effort by fighting Israel, seized control of Gaza in a brief but bloody civil war with Fatah in June, prompting Abbas to dismiss a Hamas-led government and reopen talks with Israel.
Hamas has since called for dialogue with Fatah but Abbas, who holds sway in the larger West Bank, rules out talks unless the Islamist group first gives up control of the Gaza Strip - a condition Hamas rejects.
"We believe it is necessary to immediately begin a non-conditional dialogue that will work to heal the Palestinian wounds," Ismail Haniyeh, prime minister of the government dissolved by Abbas, told Reuters in an interview on Wednesday.
Israel says dialogue between Fatah and Hamas, sidelined by the West, could torpedo the peace process.
A senior Abbas aide said on Wednesday Saudi Arabia, which brokered a previous agreement between the Palestinian factions, had relayed a message to Abbas from Hamas offering talks this week, but that the president repeated his condition on Gaza.
Meanwhile the Palestinian Authority has shut down all alms committees in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and accused some of corruption.
Minister of Religious Affairs Jamal Bawatneh said on Wednesday his ministry had appointed a seven-strong committee to oversee the collection and disbursement of funds to the poor.
Palestinian officials said the closing of the 92 alms - or Zakat - committees was likely to harm charities mainly belonging to the Islamist Hamas movement.
"Some of the committees violated the law and were corrupt," Bawatneh said.
"Some of the people heading those committees belong to Hamas but others are not from Hamas. The corrupt must be removed. Not all the Zakat committees were corrupt but we decided to close all of them to avoid finger-pointing."
Some committees had collected large amounts of money intended for the poor but only a fraction of the money had gone to its intended recipients.
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