Halting Raids, Releasing Prisoners Key for Truce: Hamas

“Hamas would neither make concessions nor give up the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people,” Mohamed Nezal, a leading Hamas figure, said in a seminar organized Monday, March14 , by IslamOnline.net in Cairo.

Hamas pledged on February 12 to maintain a de facto truce and not to immediately retaliate any Israeli aggression, while it weighs a formal ceasefire with Tel Aviv.

Nezal said the Cairo talks are primarily aimed at comparing notes among the factions and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen).

The new round of the Palestinian dialogue is expected to kick off later on Tuesday.

It groups leaders of the resistance groups such as Khaled Meshal; the Hamas politburo chief, Ramadan Shallah; the secretary general of the Islamic Jihad, and leader of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) Naef Hawatma, who attends the meeting for the first time.

The Palestinian Authority and the mainstream Fatah movement will be represented by Abu Mazen and his Prime Minister Ahmad Qurei.

Restructuring

Nezal said that restructuring the “Palestinian home” is also high on the agenda.

“Media propagate that the Palestinian dialogue mainly aims at reaching a long-term ceasefire with Israel, ignoring the Palestinian unity which is in no way less important than the truce thing,” he said.

Earlier on Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon rejected any truce with the resistance factions, demanding Abu Mazen to dismantle what he termed “terrorist groups.”

“The ceasefire the Palestinians are working for does not give up the terror option, and is not a solution, and to this we cannot agree,” Reuters quoted the hawkish premier as saying during a meeting with visiting Dutch Prime Minister Jan Pieter Balkenende.

Joint Political Program

Nezal said the Cairo meeting will also probe tools of establishing a joint Palestinian political program.

“We want to know where we (Hamas) stand with the Palestinian Authority on forming a joint political program,” he told the well-attended seminar.

An Egyptian source close to the talks told IOL on Monday that participants in the dialogue have already reached an agreement on several issues tabled on the meeting's agenda, including holding a long-term ceasefire with Israel.

The source, however, stressed that the meeting will only discuss guarantees for stabilizing such a truce, chiefly halting Israeli incursions and assassination of resistance leaders.

Egyptian and Palestinian sources further said that the dialogue will not tackle final-status issues like the return of the Palestinian refugees.

Israeli Threats

But Israel threatened on Tuesday to call off peacemaking moves with the Palestinians if Abu Mazen released Ahmad Saadat, the DFLP leader, from his prison in Jericho.

“We will weigh carefully if there is any way of continuing the process when the message from Abu Mazen's side is becoming so negative and so contrary to the new spirit we would like to see,” Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom told Israel Radio.

Abu Mazen told Reuters that Saadat will be released from prison in Jericho when Jericho is handed over to the Palestinians.

Saadat and three others are accused of involvement in the killing of Israeli Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi.

Zeevi's killing was claimed by the DFLP which said it was in retaliation for the Israeli assassination of its leader Abu Ali Mustafa.

An Israeli security source, nevertheless, told Reuters on Tuesday that Israel will hand Jericho to Palestinian control as planned on Wednesday, March16 , despite Abu Mazen’s pledge to free Saadat.

Palestinian estimates put at some 7600 the number of the Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.

Following Sharm El-Sheikh summit between Abbas and Sharon, the Israeli government pledged to release 900 Palestinian prisoners.

But few days later, Israel backed down on its promise, setting free only 500 prisoners, most of whom were administrative detainees who had nothing to do with resistance activities.

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