Abbas Calls for a Referendum on Statehood

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas called Thursday for a referendum on creating a Palestinian state in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem.

The bold and unexpected move by Abbas, a leader considered colorless and cautious by many, was an apparent bid to force Hamas to moderate its views on Israel.

Hamas, which won the Palestinian parliamentary elections in January, advocates the destruction of Israel and creation of an Islamic state in all of historical Palestine.

But Abbas, who was elected separately a year ago, said a state encompassing lands conquered by Israel in 1967 was a far more realistic aspiration.

“What we have to ask is what is possible, what is facing us and what do we want,” he said. “We cannot say no to everything -- what can we say yes to?”

Abbas said he would give Hamas 10 days to accept the idea of statehood within the 1967 borders, a move that would amount to at least implicit recognition of the Jewish state, a position opposed by the militant Islamist group since its founding. If Hamas did not agree, the referendum would be held within 40 days, Abbas said. It would be the first vote on the issue.

Since Hamas took power, direct international aid to the Palestinian Authority has fallen off dramatically, and the Palestinian territories are in the grip of an economic crisis.

Hamas has rejected calls for it to renounce violence or acknowledge past agreements between the Palestinian Authority and Israel. Such steps, as well as recognition of Israel, have been demanded by Western nations as conditions for direct aid.

The announcement by Abbas came at a Palestinian political conference Thursday in the West Bank town of Ramallah. The meeting was linked to the Gaza Strip by live video, as are all Palestinian parliamentary sessions and Cabinet meetings because most Hamas representatives are based in Gaza and Israel prohibits them from traveling to the West Bank.

The Palestinian referendum would be based on an unusual jailhouse document drawn up by Palestinians in Israeli custody. The prisoners, including members of both Hamas and Abbas’ Fatah faction, proposed the popular vote as a way of ending the political stalemate between the two groups.

Prisoners wield considerable moral authority in Palestinian society, because they are seen as heroes in the struggle against Israel.

Among the framers of the five-page document was Marwan Barghouti, who is serving a life sentence for playing a role in the killings of five people during the Palestinian uprising. He is among the most popular Palestinian politicians and was once considered the likeliest heir to longtime leader Yasser Arafat.

The Hamas-led government reacted cautiously to Abbas’ idea, but did not voice immediate objections to holding a popular vote.

“We are not against a referendum, and we will respect the choice of the Palestinian people,” said government spokesman Ghazi Hamad, a Hamas member.

Sami abu Zuhri, a spokesman for the Hamas movement, was more negative, saying that “there is no need to exert pressure” on Hamas. But he did not reject the idea either.

A referendum could offer a face-saving way for Hamas to change its views without appearing to have bowed to pressure from the United States and Israel. Public opinion polls have indicated a substantial majority of Palestinians support the idea of a state of their own alongside Israel.

Yet in some ways, putting the statehood question to a referendum would be a step backward for the Palestinian Authority, which has long since formally accepted Israel and pledged itself to a series of accords with the Jewish state.

The vote would give Abbas a much-needed mandate to proffer to Israel, which has expressed strong doubts about his ability to implement any agreement reached in currently stalled peace negotiations.

Israel had no official response to Abbas’ referendum call. Officials described it as an internal Palestinian affair.

But some Israeli commentators said the plan could be a way to break the deadlock between the Islamist group and Abbas, who is known as Abu Mazen.

“On the diplomatic level, the gaps between Hamas and Abu Mazen are not that large,” Danny Rubenstein, who writes about Israeli-Palestinian affairs for the Haaretz daily newspaper, told Israel Radio.

“The direction [of talks] seems to be the 1967 borders, and the ideological gap concerning the recognition of Israel can be bridged,” he said.

Palestinians have held only three territory-wide elections in the last 10 years, and the mechanics of a referendum are unclear.

Palestinian election officials said that Abbas would have to issue a presidential decree for the vote, or the Hamas-dominated parliament would need to endorse the balloting.

Abbas’ move may have been spurred by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s visit this week to Washington, where he secured conditional American approval for a plan to uproot remote Jewish settlements in the West Bank and consolidate them into several large blocks within the disputed territory.

Palestinians have denounced Olmert’s plan as a land grab.

Israel promised to attempt negotiations with Abbas before moving ahead, but Olmert told Bush that Israel would proceed unilaterally if it could not secure an agreement with the Palestinians.

The Palestinian conference was convened not only to try to agree on a joint political program, but also to quell growing violence in the Gaza Strip between rival Hamas and Fatah security forces.

But even as Abbas and the Palestinian prime minister, Ismail Haniyeh, were urging that weapons not be used to resolve disputes, a policeman with a Fatah-allied force was killed in new fighting Thursday.

Special correspondents Maher Abukhater in Ramallah and Fayed abu Shammalah in Gaza City contributed to this report.