Hamas warns PLO against returning to negotiations

Hamas warned the PLO’s executive committee of returning to “absurd negotiations” with the Israeli occupation authority (IOA) that would grant a cover for committing more crimes against the Palestinian people.

The movement in a statement on Friday urged the executive committee to stop “selling illusions to the Palestinian people and announce the failure of their gambling on absurd talks”.

It said that the Oslo team was seeking indirect talks with the IOA despite the latter’s rabid judaization campaign, siege of Gaza, and banishment of Palestinians from the West Bank. It also pointed out that the talks were approved at a time the American administration was incapable of committing the IOA to stop settlement activity especially in occupied Jerusalem.

Hamas called on the executive committee, which meets later on Saturday to discuss the resumption of talks with the IOA, to head to national unity on the basis of a united Palestinian program that would preserve constants and national rights.

Meanwhile, Sylvan Shalom, the Israeli first deputy premier, ruled out the success of those indirect talks.

Shalom told English-language Israeli daily Jerusalem Post published on Friday that he expected the indirect negotiators to hit a dead-end.

He explained that no Palestinian leader would accept less than what late PA chief Yasser Arafat had refused in Campo David ten years ago and no Israeli premier would propose more than what was proposed in Camp David.