Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas called today for new elections to be held on January 24th after rival factions failed to reach a unity deal in Egyptian-brokered talks.
The Western-backed Mr Abbas issued the decree for presidential and parliamentary elections to be held in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip.
The election call came after Mr Abbas's secular Fatah faction was unable to reach a unity deal with the Islamist group Hamas which controls the Gaza Strip.
Mr Abbas, who has no clear successor, would be expected to lead his party and seek re-election.
"All concerned parties, the head and members of the election commission ... must execute the terms of this decree," a presidential statement said.
The Islamist movement, which challenges the legitimacy of Mr Abbas's presidency, has threatened to defy any unilateral election call by Mr Abbas.
"This is a fatal blow to reconciliation efforts and a prolonging of the divisions," Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said.
"Abbas has succumbed to American pressures not to reconcile with Hamas unless we recognised the Quartet conditions," he said.
The so-called Quartet of Middle East envoys - from the United States, the United Nations, the European Union and Russia - insist that Hamas recognise Israel's right to exist and renounce violence.
A senior Hamas lawmaker, Mushir Al-Masri, said Abbas's election call was "unlawful". He called the decision "a lethal stab at reconciliation efforts".
The president's secular Fatah faction has been unable to reach a unity deal with the Islamist group despite over a year of negotiations, and the two movements remain bitter rivals.
Fatah signed on to Egyptian proposals but Hamas, which drove Fatah out of the Gaza enclave in 2007, has so far refused.
An official close to Mr Abbas said there was still time to avoid an open clash that would wreck efforts to patch up the split between the factions.
"If we reach an agreement, the election date can be rescheduled," he said.
Hamas has the power to prevent a credible election taking place on its territory, home to 1.5 million Palestinians. A vote without the full participation of Gaza could effectively create two rival Palestinian powers in separate territories.
About 2.5 million Palestinians live in the West Bank.
An opinion poll earlier this month showed Abbas losing popular support after a series of policy breakdowns over the stalled Middle East peace process and a U.N. report criticising Israel for alleged war crimes in Gaza last January.
The poll indicated that Mr Abbas and Gaza's Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh were about even in popular support, but put support for the president's Fatah party ahead of the Islamists.
Reuters