Hamas prime minister Ismail Haniya has said in an interview that he saw no need for a referendum planned by Mahmud Abbas and warned the Palestinian president not to force a ballot against the government’s wishes. In the interview with Israel’s Yediot Aharonot newspaper, published on the eve of an expected announcement by Abbas for the referendum next month, Haniya reiterated that differences between the governing Islamists and Abbas’s Fatah faction should be resolved through negotiations rather than via the ballot box. Full Story