Gaza held hostage by Fayad Government

While everybody was under the impression that Gaza electricity was cut off because of Israeli security concerns. Ynet has published a report pointing out that the diesel for the Gaza power plant was supposed to be requested by the Fayyad government in Ramallah. As I indicated in my previous post all of the diesel for the plant is supplied to Gaza via the European Temporary International Mechanism. It seems that Ramallah has not requested the fuel from the Europeans. Ultimately the Gaza Power plant, that supplies only 25 percent of the power needs of the Gaza Strip, has closed down completely. There are a number of reasons for this, first of all it is feasible that the Fatah government wants to intentionally deprive Gaza those 25 percent of the power needs and induce pressure on Hamas. This of course would be counterproductive, Gazans lived without electricity for months last year following an Israeli air assault on the power plant. On the other hand it is possible, as implied yesterday by Fatah officials, that that was in fact enough fuel in the reserves to last until Monday or Tuesday and therefor there was no rush. Whatever the reason there are now approximately 600,000 Palestinians disconnected from power as a result of internal "power" squabbling between the parties.