The Palestinian leader, Nasser Al-Kidwa, sparked widespread controversy when he criticized what he called "political Islam", a day after he announced that he headed a separate list from Fatah to run in the legislative elections.
During an interview with the French channel "France 24" (France24), Al-Kidwa said, "All of us, all (Fatah) parties that have problems with political Islam in general or political Islamism in general."
Al-Kidwa opposes the reconciliation agreement between Fatah and Hamas, upon which elections will be held.
Hamas considered that the role model is trying to solve his organizational problem and achieve personal achievements "at the expense of our national unity."
"Instead of calling for unity, closing the ranks, and making the main contradiction with the occupation, (example) directs his arrows at our internal national front," said the leader of the movement, Bassem Naeem.
For his part, the spokesman for the Islamic Jihad Movement, Daoud Shehab, described the statements of the example as a fall and exposure to the project of employing political work to reinforce internal contradictions and differences, instead of uniting the ranks in the liberation project and reclaiming the land from the occupation.
He said that Al-Qudwa must know that "Gaza is not occupied until it thinks about its restoration, and the Islamic national trend is not a threat, a strange, or an emergency until it and others depict it with the problem."
The circle of criticism of the example to his partners in the Freedom List expanded, as former prisoner Fakhri Al-Barghouti expressed his strong rejection of these statements.
Al-Barghouti stressed the need for internal reviews of Al-Model’s statements, calling for respect for national forces, which carry one goal of ending the occupation.
Cover on failure
As for the Fatah Revolutionary Council member, Hatem Abdel Qader, who is affiliated with the prisoner Marwan Barghouti’s movement, he said that the example’s statements about (political Islam) express his point of view only, and do not express the viewpoint of the leader Marwan Barghouti.
For his part, writer and political analyst Mustafa Al-Sawaf commented on Al-Qudwa’s statements, saying it is not strange that Nasser talked about regaining Gaza geographically and politically.
Al-Sawaf added, "The example that Abbas expelled from Fatah clearly expresses a mentality raised on hatred, domination and acceptance of the Zionist occupation."
In turn, political analyst Naji Al-Zaza said that Al-Kidwa attacks political Islam through an international media platform, to cover up the failure of his political project.