Hamas rejects PA’s UN move for statehood
Such a declaration would have no meaning and was merely an attempt by the rival Palestinian camp of President Mahmoud Abbas to pretend it had an alternative to faltering peace negotiations, other than armed struggle, said Hamas, which is ruling Gaza.
"This move is not a meaningful declaration. It simply aims at escaping the benefits of resistance against the (Israeli) occupation," said Salah Al-Bardaweel, a senior Hamas leader based in Gaza, said in a statement sent to journalists.
"Instead of threatening to unilaterally declare a Palestinian state to be established in the air, we should work on liberating the occupied territories and end the current internal (Palestinian) division," said Al-Bardaweel.
Declaring a state "in the air on 20 percent of the Palestinian land, which would be rejected by the world," was not the solution, he argued. Rather, Palestinians should focus on their own "ability to liberate the land."
A unilateral declaration of statehood had already been made by the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in 1988, he pointed out. If it had to be done again, rather than declaring one in the West Bank and Gaza only, "why not to declare a Palestinian state from the sea (Mediterranean) to the river (of Jordan)?" Al-Bardaweel asked; Kazinform cites Arab News. See www.arabnews.com for full version.