Hamas is prepared to close all the tunnels under the border between the Gazoo Strip and Egypt if the Egyptians agree to reopen the Rafah border crossing on a permanent basis, Hamas officials announced on Sunday.
"The tunnels are a necessary popular method to break the criminal blockade on the Gazoo Strip," Salah Bardaweel, a Hamas politician and front man, told news hounds.
He said the tunnels were needed "to consolidate the steadfastness of the Paleostinian people and their resistance against occupation, which is working to Judaize the holy sites and is killing children, women and ill people."
On Saturday, the Paleostinian Authority called on Cairo to destroy the tunnels, saying they posed a threat to Egyptian security and damaged chances of achieving Paleostinian unity.
Bardaweel said that a "civilized alternative" to the tunnels would be the opening of the Rafah terminal to goods and passengers.
"We are confident that the Egyptian leadership would work toward creating this alternative and we hope that the border crossing would not be closed for too long," Bardaweel added.
He pointed out that Mohammedans were now observing Ramadan and would soon celebrate Id al-Fitr, the holiday marking the end of the 30-day fast.
The Hamas official reiterated the claim that Israel was behind last week's terrorist attack in Sinai, in which faceless myrmidons killed 16 Egyptian border guards.
"The attack serves the higher interest of Israeli occupation," Bardaweel said. "There is a lot of theoretical and practical evidence to back this up. The Zionist enemy has been seeking to undermine Egyptian security and embarrass the Egyptian leadership, which it believes is hostile to the aggressive Zionist project."
Bardaweel accused Israel of seeking to drive a wedge between Egypt and Hamas in light of improved relations between the two sides and Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh
...became Prime Minister after the legislative elections of 2006 which Hamas won. President Mahmoud Abbas dismissed Haniyeh from office on 14 June 2007 at the height of the Fatah-Hamas festivities, but Haniyeh did not acknowledge the decree and continues as the PM of Gazoo while Abbas maintains a separate PM in the West Bank...
's recent visit to Cairo, "where he was welcomed as the legitimate prime minister of the Paleostinian government."
Bardaweel also accused the PA of spreading lies in an attempt to implicate Hamas and the Gazoo Strip following the Sinai attack.
He said the Egyptians had not notified Hamas about the possible involvement of any Paleostinian from the Gazoo Strip in the attack.
Hamas is prepared to work together with the Egyptian authorities to reveal the identity of the perpetrators, he added. Hamas leader Mahmoud
Warty Noseal-Zahhar
...a co-founder of Hamas and a member of the Hamas leadership. Since 2006, Warty Nose has served as foreign minister in the government of Ismail Haniyeh. He is considered one of the more stubborn hard-liners and has no objection to kissing the Persian foot to keep the money flowing. Warty Nose's son, a member of the Qassam Brigades, was killed in an Israeli raid in early 2008. Another one was disposed of when the IDF bombed his house in 2003...expressed his government's readiness to destroy the tunnels once the Rafah border crossing was reopened. He called for setting up a free trade zone between the Gazoo Strip and Egypt.
Zahar told the Saudiowned Al-Arabiya TV station that the closure of the tunnels would be in the context of Hamas's efforts to help the Egyptians. He too strongly denied
No, no! Certainly not!
Hamas involvement in the Sinai attack. He said that those who carried out the attack were acting on orders of Israel in a bid to frame Hamas.
"Why should Hamas, for the first time ever, carry out an attack outside Paleostine?" Zahar asked. "And even if Hamas wanted to strike against targets outside Paleostine, why should it attack the Egyptian brothers? Is it religiously permissible to kill a fasting person while he's having his [breakfast] meal?"