About 200 unpaid Palestinian security servants rallied on Wednesday in front of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) building in Gaza, blaming Prime Minister Salam Fayyad for freezing their salaries.
The protestors said Fayyad, appointed by President Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah after Hamas took over the Gaza Strip in June, has eventually cut their monthly payments.
The demonstrators called their rally "the revolution of starved, " threatening to escalate their activities and continue marching in front of the PLO building where Fatah Gaza leadership, selected following the Gaza takeover, is based.
They appealed to the Ramallah-based government in a statement " to pay attention to them as they suffer from two hard things: being in Gaza under Hamas rule and being excluded from salary."
The demonstrators are part of 16,000 security employees hired by Fatah in 2005, a few months before rival Hamas movement won parliamentary elections.
Sources from Abbas' Fatah, defending the demonstrators' right, said that the European Union had asked Fayyad to reduce 16,000 members out of the 165,000 Palestinian National Authority (PNA) employees for financial crisis.
Fayyad decided to fire only the security members and excluded the public servants to punish the security members for their failure to fight Hamas which routed forces loyal to Abbas, according to the sources.
Meanwhile, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine ( PFLP) called on Fayyad to resume the payments for "all security members without distinguishing motivated by factional backgrounds. "
The PFLP also urged Abbas to end "this humanitarian crisis that harmed thousands of the people."
Source: Xinhua
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