Palestinian Authority
ORG
Palestinian Authority
Hamas, the quartet said that one must be committed to nonviolence, recognize Israel and accept the previous agreements and commitments, like the Oslo accords that set up the Palestinian Authority and the ''road map'' peace plan, which calls for the dismantling of armed groups like Hamas. The Palestinian Authority is on the verge of collapse, with large debts, great unease about Hamas and little ability to pay Feb. 1 salaries for 135,000 people, 58,000 of them in the security services, many of them armed. The Palestinian Authority is on the verge of collapse, with large debts, great unease about Hamas, and little ability to pay salaries for 135,000 people, 58,000 of them in the security services, many of them armed. Some $60 million in direct aid, two-thirds of it from Europe, was frozen by donor countries in December, in response to what they saw as the Palestinian Authority's violation of a pledge of fiscal responsibility when it raised salaries by nearly 50 percent last summer. Once a Hamas-dominated government is formed, that will still leave the Palestinian Authority with a major fiscal crisis, probably dependent on more money coming from Arab states.