Plo Legislative Committee Meets İn Ramallah

The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO)'s top legislative body will meet in Ramallah on Wednesday to discuss – among other issues – proposals for suspending security coordination with Israel, Palestinian officials have said.



At its 27th session, members of the PLO's Central Council will discuss 13 issues, Qais Abdel-Karim of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) told The Anadolu Agency.



"The meeting will discuss [proposals for] halting security coordination with Israel; a fresh bid by the Palestinian Authority (PA) to join the International Criminal Court; and a reexamination of our economic agreements with Israel," he said.



"On the internal level, the council will discuss the reconstruction of Gaza, means of supporting Palestinians in East Jerusalem, and reconciliation between [rival Palestinian factions] Fatah and Hamas," Abdel-Karim said.



On Tuesday, jailed Palestinian leader Marwan Barghouti urged the council to forge a new national strategy based on the rejection of negotiations with Israel.



The meeting will include representatives of all PLO factions, along with a number of independent figures.



However, neither of the two main Palestinian resistance factions – Hamas and Islamic Jihad, neither of which is a component of the PLO – will attend the meeting.



Leading Hamas member Moussa Abu Marzouq, for his part, called on PA President Mahmoud Abbas to set a date for Palestinian legislative elections.



The PLO's Central Council is responsible for setting policy when the Palestinian National Council – the legislative body that brings together all Palestinians, including those in the occupied territories and Israel – isn't in session.



Palestinian political analyst Abdel-Mejid Sweilam believes Wednesday's Central Council session will be critical to the Palestinian cause.



"The meeting is being held amid the total collapse of peace talks [with Israel], as Israel continues to withhold Palestinian tax revenues, and in the total absence of a U.S. role," Sweilam told AA.



"The Palestinian leadership shouldn't simply await the outcome of Israel's Knesset elections in hopes that [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu will be replaced," he said.



"It should take crucial decisions aimed at advancing the current situation of the Palestinian cause," he added.



Last December, the Israeli government began withholding millions of dollars of Palestinian tax revenue, which it collects on behalf of the PA.



The move came shortly after Abbas applied for Palestinian membership in the International Criminal Court and a handful of other international treaties.



Abbas' decision to apply for Palestinian membership in the international court came after the UN Security Council had rejected a Palestinian draft resolution that would have set a deadline for ending Israel's decades-long occupation of Palestinian land.



www.aa.com.tr/en - İsrail