Last month, Hamas militants in Gaza fired rockets toward Israel, a first since the ceasefire. Mashaal and other Hamas leaders have threatened a third Palestinian uprising if the international community does not lift sanctions on the Palestinian government imposed after Hamas came to power last year.
The Hamas-Fatah coalition has been unable to break the embargo.
Abbas told Fatah after a return from Europe this week that he has made no progress toward lifting the sanctions. Most countries maintain the boycott because Hamas refuses to renounce violence and recognize Israel.
On Saturday, Palestinian Foreign Minister Ziad Abu Amr and Finance Minister Salam Fayyad urged visiting German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier to work toward ending the boycott.
"We asked his excellency to exert his utmost efforts, as the German foreign minister and president of the EU, to end the siege on the Palestinian people," Abu Amr said in a joint news conference with Steinmeier.
Abu Amr also asked the visitor to appeal to Israeli leaders, whom he is meeting today, to release hundreds of millions of dollars in Palestinian tax rebates that Israel has frozen in the past year.
Steinmeier, who also met with Abbas, was noncommittal, saying only that Germany would continue to be engaged in the region.
He noted that Europe sent more aid to the Palestinians last year than in the years before. However, most development projects have been stopped, and the money is going largely for humanitarian aid.
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