By Jerusalem Newswire Editorial Staff
Mar 16, 2005
PLO chief Mahmoud Abbat met in Cairo Wednesday with the heads of 13 “Palestinian” terrorist organizations to discuss his proposal to declare a formal temporary cessation of their campaign of mass murder against Israel’s Jews.
Abbas opened the summit Tuesday evening with a speech praising the terror groups’ recent restraint and noting the benefits it had brought the “Palestinian” national cause.
There was no mention of the moral repugnancy of maiming and killing Israeli men, women and children.
And while Abbas continues to refuse to honor the PA’s peace obligation to disband the terror groups, it was Israel, he said, that was hindering current peace efforts by building homes in Jewish towns and taking minimal defensive measures.
“…The continuation of the settlement activities, building of the racist separation wall [Israel’s security fence], and the continuation of the siege and closures and checkpoints” are all destroying hopes of peace, Abbas claimed.
As talks got underway Wednesday, Abbas urged the terror bosses to accept a formal one-year ceasefire.
The popular Hamas terrorist organization, however, rejected the idea of a full truce until Israel surrendered to more of its demands, such as releasing all jailed “Palestinian” terrorists.
“The Hamas organization believes it is not possible to declare a full cease-fire at this stage of the talks,” group spokesman Mohammad Nazzal said.
“The movement agrees a conditional cease fire (Truce) and we will see what Israel will offer,” Hamas’s “West Bank” leader, Hassan Yousef, said.
In a statement released by his office Tuesday, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon noted, “the ceasefire that the Palestinians are working towards does not mean the renunciation of the terrorism option and is no solution; therefore, we will not agree to it.”
Sharon said that “any political agreement with the extremist Islamic bodies such as Hamas and Islamic Jihad could not lead to their disappearance,” as demanded by the Oslo Accords and Road Map peace plans.
Israeli officials have in the past accused Egypt of facilitating a terrorist truce in order to perpetuate the terror groups’ ability to slowly bleed the Jewish state, both physically and psychologically.