The ministers were nominally independent, but overwhelmingly seen as loyal to President Abbas and his Fatah movement or to smaller leftist factions, none of whom were believed to have close ties to Hamas.

On 3 May 2011, Fatah and Hamas signed the 2011 Cairo agreement,[14] which promised the formation of a consensus government with the aim to prepare Presidential, Legislative and Palestinian National Council elections to be held in May 2012.

[15] In the Fatah–Hamas Doha Agreement of 7 February 2012, both parties again agreed to form an interim national consensus government composed of independent technocrats, to prepare for upcoming elections.

On 23 April 2014, Fatah and Hamas concluded the 2014 Fatah–Hamas Gaza Agreement to form a national unity government within five weeks, to be followed by presidential and parliamentary elections to be held on the same day by December.

[16] Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah considered the formation of this government as the first step toward ending the division, uniting the Palestinian homeland and institutions and bringing about national reconciliation.

He said that the government's tasks included addressing division, reuniting state institutions, commencing Gaza reconstruction and paving the way for facilitating presidential and parliamentary elections.

[20] The agreement that led to the formation of the consensus government also calls for reforming the PLO, that ostensibly represents all Palestinians inside and outside the occupied territories.

[21] Hours before the swearing-in ceremony on 2 June, Hamas threatened not to recognize the unity government if it did not include a Minister for Prisoner Affairs.

[31] Abu Ein died on 10 December 2014, during protest in the West Bank "after inhaling tear gas and being shoved and struck in the chest by a member of the Israeli security forces".

It refused to allow the passage of four prospective ministers from the Gaza Strip to the occupied West Bank,[17] while it called on the international community to shun the new Palestinian government.

[6] Although initially the primary task of the national consensus government was to prepare for legislative and presidential elections to be held after six months, its focus soon shifted to more urgent issues.

On 8 July, Israel launched a military operation against Gaza which resulted in over 2,100 Palestinian deaths and wide-scale destruction of civilian property and infrastructure.

In response to the July 2015 reshuffle, Hamas said it was not consulted and opposed the process as unilateral, arguing that any unity government should be a non-political entity, carrying out tasks agreed upon by all factions.

[42] In the meantime, there had been indirect talks between Hamas and Israel on ways to firm up an informal ceasefire agreement concluded after the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict,[4][5] which some commentators have argued prompted Abbas to move to dissolve the unity government.

[47] Hamas was not consulted about the move and opposed the unilateral forming process, arguing that any unity government should be a non-political entity, carrying out tasks agreed upon by all factions.

Palestinian officials accused the President of abusing his powers to settle scores with political rivals in the PLO and his own Fatah faction.

Earlier, Abbas had fired Yasser Abed Rabbo as PLO secretary-general on 30 June 2015 and dismissed as head of the Darwish Foundation in December.

Abbas also dismissed by presidential decree 25 members of the board of directors of a foundation created to preserve the cultural, literal and intellectual heritage of Mahmoud Darwish[20] and declared the Union of Public Employees illegal in 2014.