Here's one that hasn't been picked up by any Western Media yet:
Hamas Promotes Israel Truce in Europe
CAIRO — A delegation from the ruling Palestinian movement has recently embarked on a European tour, including London and Belfast, to market a long-term truce with Israel in return for its withdrawal to the 1967 borders, recognition of the right of refugees to return to their homeland and the release of detainees in its jail, a top aid to Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniya said.
"We visited London recently and are scheduled to visit a number of other European capitals to promote this truce, which is similar to the one championed by Hamas founder Sheikh Ahmad Yassin before Israel assassinated him in March 2004," Ahmad Yusuf told IslamOnline.net.
He was accompanied by Hams MP Sayed Abu Masameh on a ten-day unannounced visit to London.
Yusuf, who leads the delegation in its multi-leg tour, said the proposal has appealed to British officials who pledged to help market it.
"We told the Europeans that Muslims have been known for honoring their promises throughout the centuries and that the truce is a religious commitment and a political vision to resolve the conflict," he said.
The Hams official said the delegation has also met with European Union officials and "American figures".
"They promised us to reconsider their position on Hamas and start a dialogue in a prelude to remove the resistance movement in the future from the EU terror list."
Yusuf declined to name the European officials who met the Hamas delegation but said they are close to the quartet committee for Middle East peace, which comprises the United States, the European Union, the United Nations and Russia.
"American dignitaries have also talked wit us about the truce as a mechanism to stabilize the region for the time being until we reach final and just settlement to the conflict," he added.
Yusuf expected that the Hamas-European dialogue would expand to include several EU countries.
"This dialogue could pave the way for in-depth talks with the US administration," he said.
EU officials could not be reached for comment on the Hamas talks.Israel's Recognition
Yusuf said the delegation told the Europeans that Hamas cannot recognize Israel under such international circumstances, which deny the Palestinians their inalienable rights.
"Israel does not recognize our right to exist and our basic rights have not been fulfilled, not to mention other pending issues like the holy city of Al-Quds and the refugees," he added.
"We told them that Palestinian rights must be addressed first before reaching a settlement with Israel."
British officials, according to Yusuf, vowed to work on lifting the international blockade on the Palestinians and enhance dialogue with Hamas following the formation of a national unity government.
"The Europeans told us to prepare a list of Hamas cadres who can travel to EU countries to talk with clerics, MPs and politicians about the Palestinian cause and Hamas's platform," Yusuf said.
Talks between rival Palestinian factions on forming a unity government hit new snags on Monday.
An advisor to Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas announced that talks between the parties had been suspended.
On the delegation's visit to Belfast, Northern Ireland, Yusuf said they met with a group of British negotiators to make use of their expertise in mediating between the Catholics and the Protestants.
"The talks with leaders from the Irish Republican Army were very much useful," he said, adding that the delegation invited Irish officials to visit the occupied Palestinian territories to have a first-hand experience.
He continued: "I think the European officials who visited the region have realized the Islamists can be a partner and that's why they had talks with some of Islamist figures."
Yusuf categorically denied Israeli reports that the delegation had met with Jewish figures in London.
"We met only Members of Parliament and peers during the London visit," he said.
Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Zapatero announced last week that France, Italy and Spain were seeking a ceasefire, an exchange of Israeli and Palestinian prisoners, a Palestinian national unity government and the dispatch of a fact-finding mission to the Palestinian territories.
The peace initiative, however, was snubbed by Israel, which called the Spanish endeavor "hasty."
5 comments:
Israel will never settle with the Palestinians. The plan has always been to take ALL of Palestine and more...why should they stop now before the job is done?!
Israel will never settle with terrorists who launch rockets into their cities, indiscriminately murder civilians and use their own civilians as bombs.
Anon, did you ever ask yourself WHY Palestinians are so angry at Israel? Here's a clue...you're going to have to go back more than a week, or a month, or year, or a decade...try 58 years!
58 years ago half of Palestine was taken away and was used to create a 'Jewish state' despite Jewish Palestinians being only about 30% of the actual population (and the majority of them were recent immigrants from Europe). And believe it or not, this was entirely decided without actually consulting the Palestinians! Non-Jewish Palestinians were escorted by the point of a gun, off of what had been there land, what had been their homes and lives. Entire villages (up to 500 villages) were bulldozed into the ground, names of geographic locations throughout Palestine were changed from Arabic to Hebrew names...thus completing the ethnic cleansing of Palestine. Those that survived still live in refugee camps with their children and grandchildren waiting for the world to come to it's senses...or at least for their legal right to return to their homes, their lands, their lives...to be granted.
It has been only in recent years that Palestinians started retaliating with rocket attacks and suicide bombings. Mind you I don't condone those acts but how long is long enough before the people who made this decision for the Palestinians realize the error of creating a Jewish state in Palestine?!?!
Educate yourself before you make an ignorant comment like that on this blog...and pick a name for f**ks sake!!
Abu-Issa
Abu, 5500 square miles went to Israel with about 60% of it desert. 4500 square miles for a people that were immigrants to the land from Syria, Transjordan and Egypt. The entire area was called Palestine and Jews also referred to themselves as Palestinian. The Ottoman Empire had control of the land before the British. It was not "Palestinian" land. There's a lot more history you obviously don't know. Israel actually begged the ARabs to stay, but their idiotic leadership told them if they left that they would knock the Jews into the sea and grab it all back. Tough luck, you lost.
Anon,
First of all, Palestinian's are Muslims, Christians and Jews...I have never stated otherwise in any of my posts. In fact my lament has always been why the immigrating European Jewish population felt they we so superior to the indigenous population that they should have the land all for themselves...that being the problem which got us to where we are today.
Secondly, what's obvious by your comment is that you've fallen for what we call 'revisionist history'. The area was known around the workd as Palestine for hundreds of years. It was occupied by Turkey during the reign of the Ottoman Empire and it was still referred to as Palestine. Even when the first Zionist congress convened in 1897 when it was decided on the goal of "creating a Jewish state in Palestine".
In your dilusional comment you state that both "it was not Palestinian land" yet and the same time that the Jews living in Palestine referrred to themselves as Palestinian! Pick one...not both.
Revisionist historians like to describe the population growth in Palestine after the great depression and the second World War as being due to immigrants coming from other Arab countries...nonsense! While I don't completely discount the idea of immigration...the whole world was having a population boom. Here in North America we call those who were born during those years the 'baby boom generation'. I suggest you get an education on the real history of Palestine before you try challenging me again.
One final shot in your direction, that Israel begged the indigenous Palestinian population to stay after 1948. I'm guessing that the 450 or so villages that were invited to be evacuated on threat of being shot didn't come up in your history class? That those same villages where then bulldozed into the ground to try and erase their very existence...oh yeah, that sounds like them begging for them to stay! (*sarcasm*) Israel needed to cleanse the new Jewish state of it's previous tennants because after all...how can the Middle East's 'only democracy' expect to function properly if the majority of it's population don't think like they do.
Abu-Issa
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