{"id":1361,"date":"2006-02-01T23:46:42","date_gmt":"2006-02-02T05:46:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/?p=1361"},"modified":"2006-02-01T23:50:10","modified_gmt":"2006-02-02T05:50:10","slug":"hamas-in-charge-link-dump","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/?p=1361","title":{"rendered":"Hamas-in-Charge Link Dump"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bush: Hamas Jeopardizes Palestinian State<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

In an interview with The Associated Press, Bush also addressed oil’s future, offering a more ambitious hope than in his State of the Union speech for cutting imports from the volatile Mideast.<\/p>\n

However, he said his oft-stated goal of a Palestinian state in the region cannot be realized if a Hamas-led government refuses to renounce its desire to destroy Israel.<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

On the international front, Bush talked about trouble in Iran and in the Palestinian territory.<\/p>\n

He said it was too early to tell what path Hamas would choose in dealing with Israel. “The conditions for peace and the conditions for a settlement will be up to Hamas to make the right decisions,” he said.<\/p>\n

Bush was the first U.S. president to espouse a Palestinian state living side by side in peace with Israel. Those prospects have dimmed with the triumph of Hamas in Palestinian parliamentary elections last week.<\/p>\n

“I made the position of this government very clear,” Bush said. “Hamas must renounce its desire to destroy Israel; it must recognize Israel’s right to exist and it must get rid of the armed wing of its party.”<\/p>\n

“In order for there to be democracy and in order for there to be two states living side by side with peace, you can’t have the party of one state intending to destroy the other state,” he said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Hamas rejects Bush’s call to disarm<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Hamas rejected on Wednesday U.S. President George W. Bush’s latest call to disarm following the Islamic militant group’s crushing victory over the long-dominant Fatah faction in last week’s Palestinian parliamentary election.<\/p>\n

“Our resistance is legitimate self-defence in the face of aggression,” said Sami Abu Zuhri, a Hamas leader in Gaza, referring to Israeli military action.<\/p>\n

In Washington, Bush demanded in his State of the Union address on Tuesday that Hamas “recognise Israel, disarm, reject terrorism and work for lasting peace”.<\/p>\n

Hamas is sworn to Israel’s destruction and has carried out nearly 60 suicide bombings since a Palestinian uprising began in 2000.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Arabs pressure Hamas to renounce violence<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Egypt and Jordan joined the West in pressuring the militant group Hamas Wednesday, declaring it must recognize Israel and renounce violence if it wants to lead the Palestinians. Hamas held fast to its militant platform but suggested it might extend its cease-fire with the Israelis.<\/p>\n

The message from the two key American allies in the Arab world – both nations have signed peace treaties with Israel – was the strongest yet to the militant group, which calls for Israel’s destruction, opposes peace talks, refuses to lay down its arms and had carried out dozens of deadly suicide bombings against Israelis.<\/p>\n

Rumors had swirled through the Arab world over the past several days that moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, whose Fatah faction was defeated in the vote, would meet by week’s end with Hamas leaders in Gaza to talk about forming a government.<\/p>\n

But all sides have subsequently played down that possibility, with Fatah members saying Abbas was in no hurry, viewing the passage of time as a tool for winning concessions from Hamas.<\/p>\n

In Cairo, however, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit spoke bluntly as he emerging from separate talks between President Hosni Mubarak with Abbas and Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni.<\/p>\n

“When you (Hamas) sit in the (Palestinian) parliament, you talk with your tongue and not with a gun. …(Hamas) should not run away from the reality,” he said.<\/p>\n

Omar Suleiman, Egypt’s intelligence chief and point man on Palestinian issues, was even more emphatic: “Nobody will talk to them before they stop violence, recognize Israel and accept (peace) agreements.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Egypt predicts Iran will fill Palestinian cash gap<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Egypt predicted on Wednesday that Iran would step in to fill the finance gap if the United States and Europe stop their aid to the Palestinian Authority.<\/p>\n

“Iran will give them the money, I think,” intelligence chief Omar Suleiman told reporters after talks between Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.<\/p>\n

Suleiman was answering a question on what would happen if the Palestinians lose financial support from the West after the militant Hamas movement won parliamentary elections.<\/p>\n

The United States and the European Union, main donors to the Palestinian Authority, have threatened to suspend aid to a Hamas government unless it recognizes Israel and renounces violence.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Hamas says Israel has opened ‘gates of hell’<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

The first step towards a major financial crisis came yesterday when Israel made good on a threat to suspend the transfer of about \u00c2\u00a330 million in customs payments which it collects every month on behalf of the authority. The money is used to pay many of the authority’s 135,000 employees. Saudi Arabia and Qatar promised to give \u00c2\u00a318.5 million to help keep up payments.<\/p>\n

Farhat As’ad, a Hamas spokesman in the West Bank, said Israel was “opening the gates of hell” by suspending the money transfers and that it would lead to greater extremism and fuel violence.<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

Hamas has consistently rejected the Oslo Agreement as a sell-out of Palestinian rights.<\/p>\n

It is thought that both the failure of Oslo and Mr Abbas’s path of negotiations to bring tangible improvements to Palestinian life contributed greatly to Hamas’s electoral rout of Mr Abbas’s Fatah movement last week.<\/p>\n

Hamas’s electoral platform specifies that it continues to claim rights not only to all of the West Bank and Gaza Strip but also to the territory that comprises Israel within its 1967 borders.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Fun times ahead, y’all. Note: definition of fun may vary.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bush: Hamas Jeopardizes Palestinian State In an interview with The Associated Press, Bush also addressed oil’s future, offering a more ambitious hope than in his State of the Union speech for cutting imports from the volatile Mideast. However, he said his oft-stated goal of a Palestinian state in the region cannot be realized if a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1361","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-middle-east"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1361","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1361"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1361\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1361"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1361"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/targetcentermass.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1361"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}