Launched after a national conference in the camp. These are the justifications for Hamas and Islamic Jihad in boycotting the "Jenin Document"

Ramallah – Under the slogan of national unity and "developing new mechanisms to confront the Zionist conflict resolution government", a group of Palestinian figures and representatives of local institutions launched a document to achieve Palestinian unity called the "Jenin Document".

After figures from Jenin city and refugee camp announced the document during a press conference held in Ramallah on Thursday, its text was published for signature by the largest number of citizens, activists and leaders, hoping to reach half a million signatures and put greater pressure on Palestinian parties and politicians to move seriously towards reconciliation, said Nidal Ngangeh, one of the authors of the document.

Ngange explained to Al Jazeera Net, "This document emerged from the field in an effort to agree on the minimum nationally to confront the hardline occupation government." It derives its strength from being "without a party sponsor", as it is "a popular document and from the Palestinian street".

Reconciliation and internal reforms

The document, whose content was reviewed by the document's spokesman, Palestinian activist Fathi Khazem, the father of two martyrs and a well-known national figure from Jenin camp, included:

• Rehabilitate the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in its National Charter and as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people.
• Call for a meeting of the secretaries-general of the Palestinian factions.
• Activating a unified political leadership for all factions and forces in the field.
• Consolidating the concept of political, geographical and popular unity.
• Raising the slogan "People, power and resistance in one trench".
• Declaring "a state of political and legal clash with the racist Zionist project and the racist discharge regime" in all national arenas, international forums and legal bodies.
• Call for the formation of a national unity government.

The document touched on supporting the Gaza Strip to withstand the siege imposed on it, through the launch of the social, national and economic solidarity initiative.

The document also seeks to expose the occupation's policies of killing, racism, siege, closures, settlement and Judaization, and to call for the formation of an official international force in the face of the occupation, in addition to moving forward with the relevant international institutions, and strengthening the role of human rights organizations in exposing racist Israeli violations, while stressing that resisting the occupier in all its forms is a legitimate right guaranteed by all international conventions and norms.

All this is in addition to guaranteeing freedom of expression for all Palestinians, and stopping all forms of media incitement and political arrests. In the event that national and political unity cannot be achieved, the document stresses that the alternative is "popular unity on the ground", i.e. resistance together in the field.

"Not applicable"

The document carries a theoretical line to achieve unity, but in practice, will it succeed where dozens of meetings and reconciliation sessions have failed to achieve since the Palestinian split in 2007, especially in light of the boycott by Hamas and Islamic Jihad of the conference held in the Jenin refugee camp a few days ago?

Hamas expressed its approval of the content of the document at the beginning of its publication last week, but announced its boycott after the PA security services attacked the funeral of the martyr Abdel Fattah Khrousha in Nablus on March 8, who was a well-known member of the movement and who carried out an armed attack that killed two settlers in the town of Huwwara two weeks ago.

Hamas leader Sheikh Hussein Abu Kweik explains to Al Jazeera Net the movement's position, saying that "it had no reservation to participate out of respect for those in charge of the document and trust them and their patriotism, especially as it emanates from the city of Jenin, which applies national unity on the ground."

According to Abu Kweik, Hamas had demanded goodwill measures by releasing its detainees in PA prisons, "so that we can justify our participation in the document to our cadres." But what happened was the opposite, as "we have witnessed attacks on members of the movement and the arrests of 25 of them so far, which made participation impossible."

Abu Kweik questioned the ability to implement the document, which mainly calls for national unity and an end to the division that has continued since the Palestinian fighting between Fatah and Hamas in the summer of 2007.

The Hamas official said it had become impossible to implement them "after the PA announced that it would participate in a new US and Israeli summit in Sharm el-Sheikh."

"Not exhaustive"

As for Islamic Jihad, although it agreed with Hamas to boycott the meeting from which the document emerged, its reasons differed. According to Tariq Qadan, one of the movement's leaders in Jenin, this document did not carry anything to end the division and restore unity. It is also "non-inclusive, focusing only on the social aspect, while the Palestinian divide is political par excellence."

In Ka'dan's view, the document's authors focused on mobilizing citizens around it without providing strong content that can be built upon to achieve unity.

But the Hamas and Islamic Jihad's boycott of the document is not seen by Nidal Ngange, one of its sponsors, as an obstacle to achieving its goals. He said that it is presented to all parties who attended and boycotted, and to all Palestinian political decision-makers, "as it is a document that came out of the heart of the confrontation and the unified field in confronting and resisting the occupation."