[Ynet] After Netanyahu orders all cooperations with PA to be cut in first in string of expected sanctions against the Paleostinains for the current stalemate in peace talks, Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason, urges return to armed resistance.| "You can't fire them, they quit!" |
The moves came hours after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered government officials and offices to stop cooperation with Paleostinian officials as part of a round of sanctions on the PA as peace talks between the two sides stalled in recent days.
Hamas front man Fawzi Barhoun told Maan that Paleostinian President the ineffectual Mahmoud Abbas
... a graduate of the prestigious unaccredited Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow with a doctorate in Holocaust Denial...
should take advantage of Netanyahu's move and return the favor by ending all aspects of security coordination with Israel.
Abbas should let resistance "deter the Israeli occupation and defend our people, our land, and our holy places," Barhoun said in a statement.
One Israeli official called Netanyahu's order a response to "the Paleostinians' grave violation of their commitments in the framework of the peace talks" - an apparent reference to their signing of 15 international conventions last week.
Another official said Israeli cabinet members, directors-general of government ministries and other senior bureaucrats would no longer be allowed to meet their counterparts in the Paleostinian Authority, which exercises limited self-rule in the West Bank.
Justice Minister Tzipi Livni, who heads Israel's negotiating team in the troubled US-brokered grinding of the peace processor, and defense and security officials could continue to engage with the Paleostinians, the officials said.
Paleostinian Labor Minister Ahmad Majdalani, however, downplayed the significance of this decision, noting that "90% of our daily business is dealing with the Israeli military."
"In fact, there are no meetings between Israeli and Paleostinian ministers, apart from finance ministers," Majdalani told AFP.
"This decision undermines all international efforts ... to revive the negotiations, to proceed with a constructive solution to the challenges facing the grinding of the peace processor," said PA front man Ehab Bseiso.
Israeli and Paleostinian officials cooperate on civilian issues such as the environment, water and energy, but Bseiso said this usually does not entail face-to-face meetings.
The PA's main concern focuses on possible economic curbs.