Hamas-led government interested in the ceasefire, a government’s spokesman says

Monday April 30, 2007 11:49 by Rami Almeghari - IMEMC & Agencies

A spokesman of the Hamas-led government, Ghazi Hammad, told Voice of Palestine radio on Monday that his government is interested in observing a ceasefire with Israel, once Israel commits to halt attacks on both the Gaza Strip and West Bank.

spokesman of the government, Ghazi Hammad

Hammad said that the continued Israeli attacks on Gaza and the West Bank would affect calmness.

The Israeli army reinforced its presence on Gaza-Israeli border line, within Israeli plans to attack Gaza, while soldiers, mainly in the West Bank city of Nablus, took prisoners 17 Palestinian faction members, belonging to Hamas, Fatah and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.

The November2006 ceasefire between Palestinians and Israel has been undermined recently, after Israel killed 9 Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank and after Palestinian factions, including the ruling Hamas, fired a barrage of homemade shells, in response.

Israel excluded the West Bank from the ceasefire in Gaza, pushing Palestinian resistance groups in Gaza to react by firing homemade shells into nearby Israeli targets from time to time.

Hamamd believed that if Israel continues attacks on the West Bank, the Palestinians ‘will find themselves forced to reconsider their commitment to the ceasefire’.

In the meantime, representatives of the various Palestinian factions are due to hold a meeting in Gaza on Monday, in the wake of statements by the Gaza-based Egyptian security delegation, which described the homemade shells as ‘a lost gambling’.

gaza strip | palestinian politics | news report rami at imemc dot org