Reuters / July 13, 2024
RAMALLAH – Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said Israel and the United States were responsible for an attack that killed dozens in the Gaza Strip on Saturday, but the Western-backed leader also blamed Hamas for the continuing war in Gaza.
His comments signal rising tension between Abbas’s Fatah faction and the Islamist Hamas group, which accused the Palestinian president of taking Israel’s side.
Israel said the attack was aimed at killing the Hamas military chief Mohammad Deif and his aide. It remained unclear whether Deif or his deputy were killed in the strike that left at least 90 Palestinians dead and 300 wounded, according to Gaza health ministry.
“The Palestinian presidency condemns the slaughter and holds the Israeli government fully responsible, also the U.S. administration that provides all kinds of support to the occupation and its crimes,” said Abbas in a statement published by his office.
But Abbas, whose authority maintains a limited self-rule in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, assigned some blame to Hamas, whose Oct 7 attack inside Israel, in which 1,200 people were killed and around 250 others were abducted, kicked off the nine-month war in Gaza.
“The presidency sees that by escaping national unity, and providing free pretexts to the occupation state, the Hamas movement is a partner in bearing legal, moral and political responsibility for the continuation of the Israeli war of genocide in Gaza Strip,” the statement said.
Hamas has run Gaza since its 2007 takeover of the coastal territory from Abbas loyalists.
Senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri told Reuters Abbas’s statement meant the Palestinian Authority “has chosen to be in the same trench with the occupation”.
“Such an attitude will not succeed in blackmailing the resistance or pressuring it,” said Abu Zuhri.
Efforts by Arab mediators, led by Egypt, have so far failed to reconcile power struggles between the two sides.
Another Hamas leader, Basem Naim, who took part in previous reconciliation talks with Abbas’s Fatah faction, said Abbas was to blame for the failure to reach a unity deal.
Naim said Abbas’s comments made him and his authority “partner to the Zioinist enemy and its crimes not only in Gaza but also in all of the Palestinian land.”
Reporting by Ali Sawafta and Nidal al-Mughrabi; writing by Nidal al-Mughrabi; editing by Christina Fincher
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Palestinians abroad slam PA’s defence of Israel’s extermination of Gaza
Middle East Monitor / July 15, 2024
The Popular Conference for Palestinians Abroad has denounced statements issued by Palestinian parties including the Palestinian Authority presidency which aims to justify the extermination of Palestinian people and hold the Palestinian resistance responsible for Israel’s crimes.
In a statement issued on Saturday, the PA accused Hamas of being “a partner in bearing responsibility for the tragedies and calamities befalling the Palestinian people at the hands of the [Israeli] occupation forces,” while leader of the Fatah movement, Munir al-Jaghoub, demanded the Al-Qassam Brigades “stop hiding behind civilians in Gaza.”
These positions and statements came hours after the Israeli occupation committed a massacre in Mawasi Khan Yunis, south of Gaza, killing 90 civilians, half of them women and children, and wounding 300 others.
The Popular Conference affirmed in a statement received by Quds Press yesterday that “the [Israeli] occupation and its supporters bear full responsibility for the Palestinians’ tragedy and the ongoing massacres and crimes committed against them.”
It considered holding the Palestinian resistance responsible for the Israeli occupation’s massacres “shameful and unacceptable in any way”, adding that such statements are “consistent with the [Israeli] occupation’s propaganda”.
“The criminal occupation does not need any pretexts to carry out its aggression, and its crimes are continuing on a daily basis in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank and have not stopped, and they do not distinguish between one Palestinian and another,” it added.
The Popular Conference for Palestinians Abroad is a forum co-founded by Palestinians across the world.
