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| Israel-Palestine-Jordan |
| Hamas vows to share Gaza if Haniya reinstated PM |
| 2008-03-20 |
| Hamas' number two Mussa Abu Marzuk said on Wednesday the Islamists would share control of the Gaza Strip if Hamas' Ismail Haniya was reappointed prime minister by Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas. Abu Marzuk said Hamas would accept a "return to the situation which existed before June 13 including a return of the government of Ismail Haniya in its capacity as a government of national unity." Hamas seized control of Gaza in June after routing forces loyal to Abbas in a week of deadly street battles. Abbas then dismissed Haniya from his role as prime minister and suspended talks with Hamas, which he has refused to reopen until the Islamists relinquish control of Gaza. Abu Marzuk made the proposal during a visit to Sanaa at the same time as a delegation from the Palestine Liberation Organisation was also in Yemen's capital for separate talks with Yemeni officials on Palestinian reconciliation. Yemeni Foreign Minister Abu Bakr al-Kurbi said both Hamas and PLO delegations appeared to back the Yemeni reconciliation initiative "completely and without condition." "The discussions which have taken place in Sanaa have focused on the mechanisms to allow the implementation of this initiative," he said. In addition to a return to the pre-June situation, the Yemeni initiative involves elections in the Palestinian territories, resumption of talks based on the Cairo (2005) and Mecca (2007) agreements, and Palestinian Authority security forces returning to Gaza. "We want to see a situation where the West Bank and Gaza Strip are reunited under one government, one security force and one authority," Abu Marzuk said. He added Hamas wanted an "open dialogue without condition" with Abbas's Fatah party based on the seven points of the Yemeni plan. However, he stressed that talks must take place with Fatah and not with the PLO delegation. "The Yemeni plan is for a dialogue between Fatah and Hamas, the two groups which are in conflict." |
| Posted by:Fred |