Barhoum: Abbas’s priority is talks with Israel not with Hamas

Fawzi Barhoum, the spokesman of Hamas Movement in Gaza Strip, has asserted Sunday that Mahmoud Abbas’s main concern was to talk to the Israelis and not to Hamas.

“He (Abbas) is keen on returning to the negotiations with the Israeli occupation rather than opening new chapter with his fellow Palestinians in Hamas Movement and other Palestinian factions”, said Barhoum in a press release he issued Sunday.

Barhoum also charged that Abbas reneged on all his previous conditions to resume the futile negotiations with the Israelis as he was busy now in finding a way out of the dilemma that he put himself in with those conditions.

“Indeed, it is his personal aspiration to return back to the negotiation table with the Israeli enemy, but he tried to picture that wish as if it was an Arab wish in order to justify his return to the negotiation table”, Barhoum explained.

As far as the visit of Fatah official Nabil Sha’ath to the Gaza Strip and his meetings with Hamas leaders in the Strip, Barhoum said, “The visit moved the stagnant waters and shortened the distance between Hamas and Fatah and broke the standstill between the factions”.

Yet, he pointed out that renegade figures in Fatah faction, who are happy with the Palestinian political rift, started to move against any efforts aiming at achieving the Palestinian national unity. “They (Fatah hooligans) were surprised by the visit and the warm welcome accorded to Sha’ath by Hamas leaders”, he underlined.

In this regard, Barhoum underscored that Hamas had showed its good intention in achieving the reconciliation, and that it was the turn of Fatah to reciprocate Hamas’s goodwill, urging Egypt to exploit those positive indicators and to start playing its role towards concluding the reconciliation project.

Another Hamas official, Dr. Sami Abu Zuhri called on Fatah faction to immediately sit with Hamas Movement at the reconciliation table to discuss the Palestinian affairs.

“We don’t need Fatah to send a delegation of 1,000 officials to Gaza Strip, which is open for all Palestinians, but what we indeed want Fatah to do is to sit with its fellow Palestinians for the good of the Palestinian people and the future of the Palestinian issue”, said Abu Zuhri in reaction to statements issued by Fatah figures that the Movement would send a delegation of 1,000 figures to Gaza.

“Gaza wants those who are sincere in their intention to achieve the reconciliation not those who are known for their black records”, he added, describing Fatah plan to send the delegation without sitting first with Hamas as an attempt to escape its national duties and obligations.

In the West Bank, forces of Abbas stormed the home of Palestinian captive Ahmad Nabhan Saqar and arrested his wife in the Askar refugee camp, east of Nablus city, Sunday morning.

The wife “Um Baseer” had refused to heed orders from Abbas’s security forces to come to the interrogation center without her husband who is still detained in Israeli jails for more than 10 years now.

Members of the PLC from Hamas Movement described the arrest of the Palestinian woman as a “serious crime” and a flagrant violation of the Palestinian values and ethics.

“Arresting and humiliating Palestinian women is abhorred and rejected in the Palestinian society, and such a step would be recorded in the black history of the PA security forces in the West Bank”, a statement issued by the Islamic lawmakers asserted.

“The PA should take care of the captives’ families and not to double their agonies, this is indeed the peak of the tragedy”, the lawmakers’ statement confirmed, warning that such practices could harm the national reconciliation.

No one knows the whereabouts of Um Baseer after her detention, prompting the lawmakers to hold Abbas fully responsible for her safety and demanded her immediate return to her children.