Thursday, June 28, 2007

"Picture coming into focus"

"Hamas described the Israeli attacks that killed 13 in Gaza yesterday as the result of an unannounced agreement between Olmert and Abbas, and Al-Akhbar spells this out, as follows:

As each day goes by, a little more is revealed about the "agreements" that weren't announced at the Sharm el-Sheikh summit. The day after Mahmoud Abbas announced the ban on [non-"government"] weapons in the West Bank, yesterday it was Israel's turn to carry out its part of the bargain, targeting the resistance in the Gaza Strip, leading to the martyrdom of 13 Palestinians and the wounding of a large number of others.

With this Israeli operation, the shape of the what went down at Sharm el-Sheikh starts to become clearer little by little: The West Bank and its resistance was handed over to the jurisdiction of Abbas, to issue his "presidential orders" at will, as long as he adds the expression "criminal" to the qualification "armed". Meanwhile, Olmert will focus his attention on Gaza....And as Hamas said: This marked the start of implementation of the secret agreements that were reached at Sharm el-Sheikh between Abbas and his coterie on the one side, and Olmert and his retinue on the other.

The Palestinian resistance factions in the West Bank joined in rejecting the "Abbas decree" and they said he should first remove the occupation from the streets of the West Bank, accusing him of putting the weapons of the resistance on the same footing as weapons of celebration or of disorder....
Even within the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, which is part of Fatah, only part of the group agreed with the order, while the majority rejected it. There were other signs that the post Sharm el-Sheikh battle for the hearts and minds of Palestinians was not going well...... Hani al-Hassan, a member of the PLO central committee and a top Abbas adviser, had to be fired from the latter position for saying that the events in Gaza were the result of what was being attempted by US General Keith Dayton and his ally Dahlan. So it goes....."

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