GAZA CITY, July 8: Palestinian prime minister Mahmud Abbas offered to resign on Tuesday from a key leadership post and called off a meeting with his Israeli counterpart Ariel Sharon in a dispute over prisoner releases which plunged the peace process into a new crisis.

The peace process had already suffered a blow earlier when a local branch of Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for a deadly bombing in northern Israel, in the most significant breach of a truce declared by several Palestinian militant groups.

Abbas submitted his resignation from the central committee of Yasser Arafat’s mainstream Fatah party in a letter to the veteran Palestinian leader, a senior Fatah official and committee member said, but it was unanimously rejected.

In a separate letter to the central committee, the prime minister challenged the organization to outline a different policy toward the Israeli government and said he was ready to step down if his own line was at fault.

The resignation offer followed a stormy meeting of the Palestinian leadership in the West Bank town of Ramallah late Monday at which Abbas came under fire over his contacts with Israel.—AFP