By Manal Abdel Fattah
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas gave confidence to the new government headed by Muhammad Mustafa, making it the 19th Palestinian government.
Mustafa presented the work program of the government, which consisted of 23 ministers, through a ministerial statement that reviewed many areas and was based on the program of the Palestine Liberation Organization.
The formation was devoid of partisan ministers, and included 6 ministers from the Gaza Strip. The new ministers were also dominated by the academic and specialist character, while Armenian Farsen Agbekian was appointed Minister of State for Foreign Affairs and Immigration.
The President issued a decree-law granting confidence to the nineteenth government, and a decree approving its composition, which retained Interior Minister Ziad Hab Al-Rih from the eighteenth government of Dr. Muhammad Shtayyeh, while a Ministry of Industry and a Minister of Relief were created.
Mustafa said in the statement addressed to Abbas, “The first national priority is an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and a complete Israeli withdrawal from the Strip, in addition to allowing humanitarian aid to enter in large quantities and reach all regions.”
The names of the ministers of the nineteenth government included 23 ministers of experts and technocrats, headed by Muhammad Mustafa, who retained the foreign ministry, while the academy granted Farsin Ohans Vartan Aghabekian the position of minister of state for the affairs of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates.
She is a Jerusalemite academic who worked at Al-Quds Abu Dis University and held many political positions, including The Jerusalem file, and she is a member of the Supreme Presidential Committee to follow up on church affairs in Palestine.
In another context, a plane loaded with more than 30 tons of humanitarian aid from the Republic of Armenia to the residents of Gaza arrived at Al-Arish Airport in Egypt.
Ambassador Hrachia Poladian, Ambassador of Armenia to Egypt, received the aid at the airport and handed it over with the plane crew to the Egyptian Red Crescent Society, which will organize the transfer of humanitarian aid to the suffering residents of Gaza within a day or two.
The aid includes food, medicine and medical supplies.
The decision of the Government of the Republic of Armenia to provide assistance was announced by Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan during his meeting with President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi during his official visit to Egypt on March 5-6.
Armenia sends humanitarian aid to the displaced residents of Gaza who are settled at the Rafah checkpoint and who suffer from a difficult social and economic situation.
The project was presented at the government meeting by Deputy Minister of the Interior Arbineh Sargsyan. Armenia will provide food and medicine to the displaced within the framework of humanitarian aid, ensuring their basic social and economic needs.
