Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was invited to visit Egypt for the first time since the resignation of former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, a Palestinian newspaper reported Friday.

Abbas will go to Cairo Wednesday on the invitation he received from the Egyptian foreign minister Nabil Al-Arabi during a phone conversation between the pair, Yasser Othman, Egyptian ambassador to the West Bank, told the Ramallah-based al-Ayyam Daily.

Abbas will meet the head of Egypt's military council Hussein Tantawi and senior Egyptian officials, including members of caretaker Prime Minister Essam Sharaf's government. They will discuss the stalled peace talks between the Palestinians and Israel and internal Palestinian schism, according to Othman.

"The two sides need to emphasize the strength of their relations, especially in this transitional phase that followed the revolution," Othman said, referring to his country and the Palestinian National Authority.

Egypt seems to be restarting its efforts to reconcile Abbas' Fatah party and Islamic Hamas movement, which has been controlling Gaza since it routed pro-Abbas forces in 2007.

In recent weeks, senior leaders of Hamas and Fatah held separate meetings with Egyptian officials. It was the first time that senior members of Hamas met Egyptian officials since October 2009, when Hamas rejected an Egyptian proposal for national reconciliation.

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