The Prime Minister of the Palestinian Autonomous Government and his government resigned

(CNN) — The Prime Minister of the Palestinian Autonomous Government, Mohammed Shtayyeh, and his government have submitted their resignation, he announced on Monday.

“I would like to inform the Honorable Council and our great people that I provided the resignation of the government to Mr. President (Mahmoud Abbas) last Tuesday and today I am presenting it in writing,” Shtayyeh said in a Facebook post. Am.”

The resignation comes at a time when the Palestinian Autonomous Government, considered corrupt, is under intense pressure from the United States to reform and reform its governance in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

The Palestinian Self-Government was established in the mid-1990s by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) as a temporary government awaiting Palestinian independence following the signing of the Oslo Accords with Israel. It is based in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah and exercises nominal self-rule in parts of the region.

The government, dominated by the Fatah political party, maintained administrative control over Gaza until 2007, when Hamas won the 2006 legislative elections in the occupied territories and expelled it from the enclave. Israel has rejected the possibility of a Palestinian autonomous government returning to Gaza after the war and has rejected the idea of ​​establishing a Palestinian state in the territories.

However, the United States supports a reformed Palestinian autonomous government that controls both the West Bank and Gaza as part of a future independent state.

Shtayyeh, who was appointed prime minister in 2019, told CNN in October that there can be no solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict without the United States, but said the current US administration does not have the political will to end the conflict. . “They are handling it,” he said.

In favor of a government of national unity

In his statement, Mohammed Shtayyeh opened the door to a national unity government, including Hamas in his resignation statement, without explicitly naming the terrorist group that rules Gaza and the West Bank. Is gaining popularity.

“The next phase and its challenges require new governmental and political arrangements, taking into account the evolving situation in Gaza, discussion on national unity, the urgent need for Palestinian-Palestinian consensus based on national unity, broad participation, solidarity and expansion ” Palestinian autonomous government for all territories,” Shtayyeh said in a televised government meeting.

He said the government was resigning in view of the “aggression against our people in Gaza, the unprecedented escalation in the West Bank and Jerusalem, the serious and unprecedented attacks on our people, our Palestinian cause and the challenges it poses to our political system”. Examples” by Israel.

Palestinian Autonomous Government President Mahmoud Abbas did not immediately react to the resignation and it was unclear when it would take effect or who would be in the new government.

This is a developing story and will be updated.

—CNN’s Abir Salman contributed to this report.