Hamas authorities on Sunday cut the last circle of mutual cooperation with the West Bank-based Palestinian government by deciding to start the school year in the Gaza Strip unilaterally.

On Sunday, 250,000 students in the Hamas-controlled Gaza headed for their schools a week earlier than their counterparts in the West Bank.

Observers say the new differences over the beginning of the new year, which usually launches at the beginning of September, could boost political split between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.

Since Hamas routed security forces of Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas in 2007 and seized control of Gaza, Abbas fired a Hamas-led unity government and formed a Western backed administration in the West Bank where his Fatah movement holds sway.

Islamic Hamas rejected Abbas's decision and continued ruling the coastal Strip with nearly fully isolation except for some sorts of cooperation involving education, health and religious affairs.

Yousef Ibrahim, deputy education minister in the Hamas administration, denied that his ministry has unilaterally stopped coordination with its counterpart in Ramallah.

"We have agreed to start the school year on August 23 but the Ramallah government bottled out at the last minute due to pressures by some sides unrelated to the education family," Ibrahim said.

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) has also opened its schools for more than 200,000 students from the refugee families who take benefits from the international agency's services.

Meanwhile, Hamas government has not officially ordered female students to maintain Islamic-style clothing when they go to school.

But at Basheer al-Rayyes secondary school, a female principle stood on the gate, allowing only the girls who wore a black robe and a white headscarf into the school and keeping those who wore the traditional jeans dress outside even if they have put a head cover.

Islam Saa'd was one of the students who were banned from their school. "We reject that the Jilbab (the long, loose Islamic dress)be imposed on us."

Her friend, Salwa, 16, said in tears: "We can accept to wear everything except the Jilbab because it extorts our childhood and make us look old women."

A third student, who asked for anonymity, said she has agreed with a group of her classmates to move to a private school to avoid clothing restrictions.

But Hanin Musallam, said she supports "any decision imposing the Islamic uniform because it secures our purity."

The school principle, who refused to give her name, admitted that there was no official or written decision authorizing her to impose a specific type of clothing on her students, but she said that the girls "have to wear a dress that is acceptable to the Muslim community."

Her remarks reflects the vagueness of Hamas government's decisions which observers say it gradually spreads Islamic lifestyle but denies it officially to avoid international criticism. The education minister, Mohammed Askool, refused to comment on the issue.

(Xinhua News Agency August 24, 2009)