Gaza/Tel Aviv - Ismail Haniya, the leader of the Palestinian
group Hamas, said Friday his movement remained interested in its
informal truce with Israel, which had held for nearly five months,
but has been jeopardized by renewed violence over the past two weeks
and more.
Israel meanwhile kept up a near-total closure of the Gaza Strip
Friday for the 17th consecutive day, as Gaza militants continued
their rocket and mortar attacks from the strip, albeit on a smaller
scale for the past two days.
Since November 5, Israel has all but completely shut its border
crossings with the strip, allowing in only one truck convoy of basic
humanitarian supplies this week, and a limited amount of fuel for
Gaza's power plant late last week.
Haniya, who continues to serve as the de facto prime minister in
Gaza despite his dismissal by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud
Abbas in June 2007 following Hamas' takeover of the strip, said his
radical Islamic movement met with other armed factions active in the
strip over the past two days, who he said wanted to maintain the
truce.
'They had a very clear stand and that is commitment to the calm as
long as the Occupation (Israel) is committed to it,' he said after
Friday prayers in Gaza City.
'The Occupation is not committed, particularly concerning the
closure of the crossings and the siege of Gaza,' he added however.
Israel has vowed to keep its crossings closed to all but essential
humanitarian supplies, so long as Gaza militants continue to fire
rockets and mortars at it. No other goods nor people, including
journalists and diplomats have been allowed entry since at least
November 9.
Militants from the strip fired one locally-made rocket toward the
Israeli town of Sderot, just north-east of Gaza, on Thursday. They
fired another rocket which landed south of the Israeli coastal city
of Ashkelon on Friday, as well as two mortar shells at Israeli
soldiers patrolling near Israel's border crossing with the southern
Gaza Strip of Kissufim, an Israeli military spokesman said.
The armed wings of the Popular Front for the Liberation of
Palestine (PFLP) and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of
Palestine (DFLP), two radical left-wing factions, claimed
responsibility.
Israeli caretaker Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Defence Minister
Ehud Barak meanwhile reassured Jordan's King Abdullah in an
unannounced meeting held in Amman earlier this week that Israel does
not intend to launch a major offensive in the Gaza Strip to bring
down the Hamas regime there, the Jerusalem Post reported Friday,
quoting Jordanian officials.
Abdullah had called Tuesday's meeting after receiving information
according to which Israel was planning a major military operation in
the Gaza Strip, not only to stop the rocket attacks, but also to
topple the Hamas regime, the officials said.
The Gaza Strip has been split from the West Bank since Hamas
violently overpowered security forces loyal to President Abbas of the
rival Fatah movement in June 2007. The Gaza takeover was the
culmination of a power struggle which had developed since Hamas
unexpectedly beat the secular, establishment Fatah movement in
January 2006 parliamentary elections.
Egypt has tried to broker new reconciliation talks between the two
Palestinian groups, but Hamas called of its attendance following an
ongoing arrest campaign against its members in the Abbas-ruled West
Bank.
Haniya urged Egypt and other Arab nations to allow his movement to
attend the upcoming Arab foreign ministers in Cairo on Wednesday.
'If the Arabs want a balanced picture of what is going on in the
Palestinian arena then they should listen to both sides,' he said.
Only Riad Malki, the Palestinian foreign minister of Abbas'
Ramallah-based administration, has been invited to the Cairo meeting,
while Hamas' de facto foreign minister in Gaza, Mahmoud al-Zahar has
not.
While a minority of Arab governments, including Qatar, favour
Hamas speaking at the meeting as well, others do not, including
Egypt, which reportedly continues to be furious with Hamas for
calling off the reconciliation talks that had been scheduled to be
held in Cairo earlier this month.
Abbas meanwhile has also threatened to stay away from Wednesday's
meeting over Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa's failure to
declare Hamas responsible for the failure of the planned Fatah-Hamas
dialogue.
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