Hamas cancels Fatah reconciliation meeting

Hamas cancels Fatah reconciliation meeting Hamas cancelled a planned reconciliation meeting with rival Palestinian faction Fatah over the weekend over the recently accounted direct Mideast peace think talks, the Palestinian Ma'an news agency reported on Sunday.

The meeting was meant to be another attempt at ending divisions going back to the militant Hamas group's violent takeover of the Gaza Strip in June 2007, which left the more moderate Fatah movement in charge only of the West Bank.

According to the Sunday report, the meeting, which was to take place Saturday evening, was indefinitely postponed with Hamas official Salah Bardawil telling Ma'an that Fatah had "made it too difficult" for the meeting to take place. Last week, Palestinians officials estimated that a recent failure by some Arab states to hand over promised donations to the Palestinian Authority was prompted by an attempt to Fatah and Hamas toward reconciliation.