Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas announced Monday that a new Palestinian government will be declared within 48 hours - but did not say whether it would be headed by current acting Prime Minister Salam Fayyad. "We have decided to restructure the government, and within the next 48 hours the government will be formed," Abbas told activists from his Fatah movement at his Ramallah headquarters.
Fayyad resigned in March, stating that he wants to pave the way for Abbas to form a new national unity government under reconciliation talks between the secular Fatah and its rival, the Islamist Hamas movement. But the failure of those talks so far has forced the Palestinian president to announce that he will form an expanded government, most likely under Fayyad.
Hamas has already criticised Abbas' plans to restructure the current government in the West Bank, stressing that this step undermines reconciliation talks taking place in Cairo. Fayyad, meanwhile, has thanked his current cabinet ministers for their work. Addressing Monday what is believed to be the last session for his current caretaker government, which he formed in June 2007, Fayyad told his ministers that some of them will be leaving while others will continue in their posts. He said the new government will continue working on the reform and development plan his cabinet has approved last year.
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