RIYADH - Saudi King Abdullah has told Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas that the split within the Palestinians' ranks is more damaging to their cause of an independent state than the Israeli "enemy."
In a letter to Abbas marking his Fatah party's first congress in 20 years, the Saudi king stressed that all Palestinian factions need to come together to make an independent Palestinian state possible.
"The arrogant and criminal enemy was not able, during years of continued aggression, to hurt the Palestinian cause as much as the Palestinians hurt their cause themselves in the past few months," Abdullah said in the letter released through the official SPA news agency late Tuesday.
"I can honestly tell you, brothers, that even if the whole world joins to found a Palestinian independent state, and if we have full support for that, this state would not be established as long as the Palestinians are divided.
"This letter from the holy land does not represent my sentiments alone but the sentiments of one thousand million Arabs and Muslims who see their greatest issue is the Palestinian issue."
Saudi Arabia, which has in recent weeks criticised Tel Aviv, maintains that Israel's refusal to halt settlement expansion and evictions of Palestinians is the primary barrier to getting talks underway.
Israel, which wants to crush any Palestinian liberation movement, responded to Hamas's win in the elections with sanctions, and almost completely blockaded the impoverished coastal strip after Hamas seized power in 2007, although a ‘lighter’ siege had already existed before.
Human rights groups, both international and Israeli, slammed Israel’s siege of Gaza, branding it “collective punishment.”
Gaza is still considered under Israeli occupation as Israel controls air, sea and land access to the Strip.
The Rafah crossing with Egypt, Gaza's sole border crossing that bypasses Israel, rarely opens as Egypt is under immense US and Israeli pressure to keep the crossing shut.
Fatah has little administrative say in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, and has no power in Arab east Jerusalem, both of which were illegally occupied by Israel in 1967.
Israel also currently occupies the Lebanese Shabaa Farms and the Syrian Golan Heights.
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