Abbas plans Palestinian elections

By Wafa Amr

RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said on Wednesday he will order early parliamentary and presidential elections in response to what he called last month's "coup" by Hamas Islamists in the Gaza Strip.

His fiery speech in the West Bank city of Ramallah underlined the bitterness of the rift between the two territories. Aides said he had no firm timetable for a vote -- it could be in months, or even not for a year or more.

Elections are not due until 2010.

"We will call ... for early legislative and presidential elections and we will not wait for approval from those sitting over there in Gaza or from those sitting abroad," Abbas told a key forum of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO).

Hamas, which won a parliamentary majority in elections last year and routed Abbas's secular, Western-backed Fatah faction in fighting in Gaza a month ago, said it still runs the legitimate Palestinian government and that there could be no new elections if Abbas refuses to negotiate a new national consensus.

Abbas, using uncharacteristically harsh language, said there could be no dialogue with those who staged the "coup" in Gaza unless Hamas first agreed to help organise elections. He first raised the possibility of an early vote last month.

"Hamas dug their grave with their own nails as a result of the crimes they carried out in Gaza," Abbas said. "They have brought upon themselves their loss of legitimacy."

His move came on the eve of a meeting in Lisbon of the Quartet of international powers mediating in the Palestinians' conflict with Israel, their first since the Gaza violence.