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| Israel-Palestine-Jordan |
| Hamas delays motion against Abbas referendum |
| 2006-06-21 |
| GAZA: The ruling Hamas militant group on Tuesday delayed a parliamentary showdown with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas over his call for a referendum on statehood, saying it wanted to allow more time for dialogue. Tensions have escalated between Abbas's Fatah movement and Hamas since the president set a referendum for July 26 on a proposal for statehood that implicitly recognises Israel. Some fear their violent power struggle could lead to civil war. Hamas had said it would submit a motion in parliament on Tuesday seeking to declare the referendum illegal. But senior Hamas lawmaker Mushir al-Masri said negotiators from Hamas and Fatah should be given more time to reach a deal on changes to the proposal. Abbas has said the vote would be cancelled if the rivals agreed on the document. "We want to give the ongoing dialogue a chance to succeed," Masri said, without saying if Hamas had set a deadline for lodging the parliamentary motion. Spokesmen for both Hamas and Fatah have expressed optimism that recent days of talks would resolve the impasse over the manifesto drawn up by Palestinian prisoners in an Israel jail. But key sticking points remain. Hamas has said it wants the proposal to explicitly reject recognition of Israel. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #1 Israel needs to announce that explicit rejection of recognizing its existence will be considered a declaration of war... because of course it is. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-06-21 07:43 |