In Tunisia, Meshaal Calls for Turning Page on Talks with Israel

Khaled Meshaal, political chief of the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas which rules the Gaza Strip, on Thursday called for turning the page on negotiations with Israel.

"We must build an Arab-Muslim strategy to liberate Palestine and turn the page on negotiations" with Israel, he said in a speech at the launch of a congress held by Tunisia's ruling Islamist party Ennahda in the Tunis suburb of Al Karm.

"The Palestinians aren't selfish, so take your time to get through this difficult transitory period -- it is your right," Meshaal said, adding: "The only way to liberate Palestine is the struggle."

The three-day meeting is Ennahda’s first congress at home in 24 years and is being held at a time of political and religious tensions.

Ennahda (Renaissance) now dominates the Tunisian government along with center-left parties the Congress for the Republic (CPR) and Ettakatol, which won 33 percent of the seats in the assembly.

Some 25,000-30,000 people are to attend the congress, the party's first since it came to power following Zine El Abidine Ben Ali's ouster in protests that touched off the 2011 Arab Spring.

About 1,100 delegates will have to determine Ennahda's position on political alliances, as the dominant partner in the government coalition.

The congress will also seek to reconcile different trends within the party, between moderates and more radical ideologues, with founding leader Ghannouchi expected to keep his post.

Established in June 1981 by Ghannouchi and a group of intellectuals inspired by Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, Ennahda was banned by Ben Ali after a major electoral success in 1989, and its leaders jailed or forced into exile.

Ghannouchi returned in January 2011 after 20 years in London.

Ennahda won Tunisia's first post-uprising poll, in October, taking 41 percent of the seats in the National Constituent Assembly, the interim body tasked with drafting a new constitution and preparing fresh elections, due in March 2013.

Ennahda said in March that Islamic sharia would not be inscribed in Tunisian basic law, much to the relief of its coalition partners which feared the Islamist majority in parliament might open the door to a theocracy.