Hamas dissolves Gaza administration in Palestinian unity bid

Palestine's Hamas group has dissolved its administration that runs Gaza and agrees to hold general elections in order to end a long-running feud with President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah movement, the group said on Sunday.

The last Palestinian legislative election was held in 2006 when Hamas scored a surprise victory, which laid the ground for a political rupture. 

Hamas said in a statement on Sunday that it has dissolved its government, that it will allow the reconciliation government to operate in Gaza and that it agrees to hold elections and enter talks with Fatah.

Mahmoud Aloul, a senior Fatah official welcomed cautiously Hamas's position. 

"If this is Hamas statement, then this is a positive sign," he said. 

"We in Fatah movement are ready to implement reconciliation."

TRT World's Denee Savoia has more on the story.    

Hamas took over the Gaza Strip in 2007 from the forces loyal to Abbas and the Palestine Authority.          

Numerous attempts since 2011 to reconcile the two movements and form a power-sharing unity government in Gaza and the West Bank have so far failed. 

Hamas and Fatah agreed in 2014 to form a national reconciliation government, but despite that agreement, Hamas's government has continued to rule the Gaza Strip.

Egypt has been brokering talks with Abbas' Fatah group to implement a deal signed in 2011 in Cairo with Hamas to end their dispute and form an interim government before elections.

With the prospect of a Middle East peace initiative by the US Trump administration more sympathetic to Israel, Abbas has put pressure on Hamas, including not paying Israel for electricity for Gaza territory and cutting salaries for civil servants there.

The Gaza Strip has faced deteriorating humanitarian conditions, with a severe electricity crisis and a lack of clean water, among other issues.

It has been under an Israeli blockade for around a decade, while its border with Egypt has also remained largely closed in recent years.

The coastal enclave of some two million people also has one of the world's highest unemployment rates.