Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was forced earlier this week to call off plans to deploy PA security personnel in the northern Gaza Strip when several armed groups, including militias from his own Fatah movement, threatened to attack these forces, PA officials here told The Jerusalem Post on Monday.

Abbas had planned to deploy several hundred PA policemen and security officers in an attempt to stop the armed organizations from firing rockets at Israel, the officials said, noting that the proposed move had won the backing of the US and Israel.

"Those who are firing Kassam rockets at Israel from the northern Gaza Strip are acting against the interests of the Palestinian people and are providing Israel with an excuse to continue its aggression in the Gaza Strip," said one official. "President Abbas has a serious plan aimed at stopping the rocket attacks, but the armed groups are refusing to cooperate."

Last week, Abbas announced that the Palestinian factions in the Gaza Strip had accepted his call for a unilateral cease-fire with Israel. The announcement came after a series of meetings Abbas held in Gaza City with PA Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh and a number of Hamas officials.

Another PA official told the Post that Hamas was the only group that had accepted Abbas's proposal to halt rocket attacks. "The main problem we have is with Fatah's armed wing, the Aksa Martyrs Brigades, and with Islamic Jihad, which have rejected the cease-fire proposal," he said.

According to the official, Abbas and the rest of the Fatah leadership have almost no control over the various Fatah militias operating in the Gaza Strip. "Fatah has at least seven or eight armed groups in the Gaza Strip and some of them are receiving financial aid from Hizbullah, Syria and Iran," he said. "The situation in the Gaza Strip is very problematic."...