Local and foreign journalists walk past the gate of the Rafah crossing during a public relations tour organized by Hamas in Gaza on Monday. (AP)
"Hamas urged the world's media on Monday to publicize what its leader called the suffering of the people of Gaza under an international embargo, after a tour for journalists aimed at showing the Islamists had brought peace.
"Gaza today is better," Ismail Haniyeh, still calling himself Palestinian Authority prime minister, told dozens of foreign reporters who joined a bus tour of the coastal enclave that took in a prison, a church, border posts and security installations.....
"But the strangling siege ... has affected Gaza very much," he added. "I hope on your visit you have seen the suffering and will convey to the world the reality of the suffering."
In Gaza, the end of long months of factional conflict has brought a measure of calm to the territory of 1.5 million people and, along with the freeing of British journalist Alan Johnston, has seen many foreign correspondents return to work there....
Journalists were shown round a prison which once housed Hamas political prisoners and now, Hamas officials said, houses only common criminals who in turn spoke well of their treatment.....
Manuel Musallam, a priest, told reporters at his church that Hamas was "not a religious movement" hostile to the Christian minority but a "political movement" dedicated to the Palestinian people. "I am the best friend of Mr. Haniyeh," he added......."
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