A Hamas Hardliner

[Economist-UK] Hamas' foreign minister, Mahmoud Zahhar, denies that the accord between Fatah and Hamas in Mecca last year entailed accepting the PLO's previous agreements with Israel - though other Hamas people have so implied. He said Hamas might accept a two-state offer if most Palestinians agreed. But it was entirely "fantastical." He certainly would not now "accept the reality" of Israel, looking ahead to a distant future when, "like your European Union," the Arab nation will form one state across its historic lands, joining up with other Muslim nations such as Turkey. "We [Palestinians] were never an independent state in history," he notes. "We were part of an Arab state and an Islamic state."


2008-02-04 01:00:00

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