GAZA
A leading member of the Palestinian Fatah movement said Tuesday that the group planned to organize a "major" rally next month in the Gaza Strip to mark the passage of ten years since the death of former Palestinian Authority (PA) president Yasser Arafat.
"Fatah is preparing to hold a major rally in the Gaza Strip on November 11 to commemorate its [late] leader and symbol of the Palestinian revolution," Yahia Rabah, a leading Fatah member in the Gaza Strip, told Anadolu Agency.
He added that the Ramallah-based Fatah movement had invited representatives of rival faction Hamas – which has governed the Gaza Strip since 2007 – to attend the event.
"All Palestinian factions will participate in the rally," Rabah asserted, adding that Fatah had obtained permission for the planned rally from Palestinian Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah.
Hamdallah heads up a Palestinian unity government formed in the wake of an April reconciliation deal between Fatah and Hamas.
Rabah said Fatah was "confident" that Hamas wouldn't object to the planned rally, as opposed to last year, when Gaza's Hamas-run government prevented Fatah from holding a similar rally.
Iyad al-Bazm, however, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry in the Gaza Strip, denied having received any requests by Fatah to stage the event.
"We have no information about this issue, but security forces in the Gaza Strip are prepared to protect any gatherings," al-Bazm said.
Fatah leaders have accused Israel of assassinating Arafat in November 2004.
The Palestinian leader died at the age of 75 at a Paris hospital. His health had deteriorated markedly after Israeli forces besieged him for several months inside his presidential headquarters in Ramallah.
A joint report issued in 2013 by a Russian and a Swiss medical institute concluded that Arafat's death had been caused by exposure to polonium, a radioactive substance.
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