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| Middle East |
| Fatah demands Hamas halt attacks inside Israel |
| 2002-11-09 |
| Palestinian groups are to meet over this weekend in Cairo to discuss ending attacks inside Israel, officials from Fatah said. A Fatah delegation is to demand from Hamas that they restrict their attacks to Jewish settlers and Israeli soldiers in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, instead of all Israelis, a senior Fatah official said. If they regard their territories as occupied, that would appear to make some kind of sense, though sense of a bloodthirsty sort. If, on the other hand, the objection is the eradication of the state and its people, then it wouldn't make any sense... Meanwhile, in response to statements made by the head of the Israeli national security council, Ephraim Halevy, in which he advocated dialogue between Hamas and Israel, the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) announced Saturday its complete rejection to dialogue with Israel. âThe movement decisively rejects dialogue with what is âcalledâ Israel because we in the movement have not and will not recognize this state,â prominent Hamas leader, Abdel Aziz al Rantisi, told Albawaba.com. He added, âthey are angry but we will not hold a dialogue with them.â Guess that settled that little bit of confusion, didn't it? The only way Israel is going to win its security is to set an official policy of wiping out Hamas (and probably Islamic Jihad as well). Hamas, like al-Qaeda, doesn't even hold out the possibility of dialogue, and won't until it's on its last legs. Even though the Israelis will feel bad about it afterward, they have to kill them. On the talks with Fatah, Rantisi told Albawaba.com âthere is no fixed agenda for the planned talks with the Authority. These are supposed to be an open dialogue that will address all the issues of interest for both sides and the Palestinian people.â He added that Hamas delegation would be headed by the movementâs politburo member Mousa Abu Marzouq. Marzouq, unlike the other four politburo members, is based in Beirut, where he can coordinate with the Syrians and Iranians... Hamas leader confirmed that Cairo played a major role in getting the two sides to agree on the meetings, adding that the outcome of these contacts would depend on the intentions of the Palestinian Authority. It's always an indication that a government has lost control when militia formations negotiate with them as equals. The same situation applies to MILF in the Philippines, to the Philippine government's disadvantage. |
| Posted by:Fred Pruitt |