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GAZA CITY - The Islamist Hamas movement was to send a delegation to Egypt on Tuesday for talks aimed at restoring Palestinian unity amid a dispute over the presidency that could sharpen internal divisions.
The delegation headed by Musa Abu Marzuk, the number two official in Hamas's Damascus headquarters, also includes Mahmud al-Zahar, Said Siyam and Khalil al-Hayya, all senior leaders of the movement in the Gaza Strip.
"We will arrive in Cairo today and tomorrow we will begin meetings with our Egyptian brothers," Zahar, who is widely considered the most influential leader in Gaza, told AFP.
The talks are expected to focus on repairing the bitter Palestinian divisions left by Hamas's violent takeover of the Gaza Strip in June 2007 that split the Palestinian territories into hostile rival camps.
Cairo plans to host a meeting on November 4 that will bring together all the major Palestinian factions, including Hamas and the Fatah party of secular Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, which was driven from Gaza in the takeover.
Zahar said his movement "will do everything to ensure the success of the dialogue" while ruling out any unilateral concessions.
"The purpose of these meetings is to return to the geographic, political, and administrative situation that prevailed (before June 2007) but not at any price," he warned.
In a sign that the divisions may be growing deeper with time, Hamas MPs announced on Monday they will no longer recognise Abbas as president after his term expires on January 8.
According to Palestinian law presidential elections must be held every four years, meaning that Abbas's term officially ends in January 2009.
Abbas's supporters, however, have pointed to another provision of the constitution that says presidential and parliamentary elections must be held at the same time, which they say extends his term to January 2010.
Hamas won parliamentary elections in 2006 and has 74 MPs in the 120-member Palestinian assembly, 30 of whom are currently jailed by Israel.
Although Abbas severed all contacts with the movement after the Gaza Strip takeover, Hamas still recognises him as the head of the Palestinian Authority.
Israel and the West consider Hamas a terror organisation and in the past have refused to have any contacts with a Palestinian government that includes the group sworn to the destruction of the Jewish state.
- AFP /ls
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