Palestinian plan says no to attacks on civilians

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/413442.html


Last Update: 08/04/2004 04:36
Palestinian plan says no to attacks on civilians
By Arnon Regular, Haaretz Correspondent

The Hamas, Fatah and Islamic Jihad leaderships in Gaza have prepared a 
draft "National Plan" that "emphasizes the right to use violence to oppose 
the occupation and the settlements, while avoiding turning civilians from 
either side into targets for attack."
The document, which summarizes the outcome of meetings between Abdel Aziz 
Rantisi of Hamas, Ahmed Halas of Fatah, and representatives from the 
Islamic Jihad and other, smaller armed political factions, is regarded as a 
basis for negotiations between the PA and all the armed factions for a 
mutually agreed leadership to control Gaza after Israel withdraws.

The document sums up meetings that have been underway between the faction 
leaders in recent weeks, climaxing on Saturday at a meeting of the 
"Monitoring Committee of the National and Islamic Organizations."

At this stage, the document is a draft that binds nobody, but it is being 
called a National Plan. It is the first such document prepared by the 
Palestinians in response to the disengagement from Gaza, and broadly deals 
with the issues raised during the hudna talks last year between the PA, 
Hamas, Fatah and other armed groups.

The plan that emerges from the document is in effect a new hudna between 
the Palestinian groups, in which the PA plays the main role but the Hamas 
and other organizations are committed to the cease-fire. The document does 
not yet detail any division of labor or forces between Hamas and Fatah in 
the territories.

"The national and Islamic forces," says the document, "regard the 
withdrawal of the occupation forces and the settlers from any part of 
occupied Palestinian land as an achievement for our people's struggle and 
its intifada.

"The forces support acceptance of security and administrative 
responsibility by the PA in evacuated territories in the context of `an 
agreed national plan,' but they vehemently oppose, and warn against, any 
attempt to pay Israel for the withdrawal or to turn [the withdrawal] into 
an alternative to the fulfillment of Israel's international obligations, or 
granting false legitimacy to the separation fence, or to the annexation or 
expansion of Israel's presence in the West Bank, or avoiding full 
withdrawal from all the territories occupied in 1967."

According to the document, the Palestinians won't cease their armed 
struggle after the withdrawal. "Any unilateral withdrawal won't bring about 
stability so long as it is not part of an overall process of ending the 
occupation and evacuating the settlements," says the paper.

The document calls on the Arab states and international community not to 
negotiate with Israel over the disengagement plan and to avoid discussing 
its details "since it is completely contradictory to international 
legitimacy and its foundations."

The National Plan is described by the sides as "a unification of all the 
forces, to translate the achievements of the intifada into political facts 
and to deal with the unilateral steps of the Israeli government."

The document defines the joint strategic goals of the organizations as 
"ending the Israeli occupation of the territories captured on June 5, 1967 
and evacuation of the settlements and settlers from those territories, the 
establishment of an independent state with full sovereignty and its capital 
in Jerusalem on the areas of the aggression of June 5, and full sovereignty 
in Arab Jerusalem's neighborhoods and over the Christian and Islamic holy 
sites."

In addition, the document refers to the right of return as "preservation of 
the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes according to UN 
resolution 194."

According to the document, the Hamas accepts the PA's supreme authority as 
representing the Palestinians. The document calls the PLO the sole 
legitimate representative of the Palestinian people and "the national 
framework unifying the Palestinians in their homeland and outside it."

In addition the document details the organizations' joint tactical goals 
for the Palestinians in the coming period. These include halting 
construction of the separation fence and removing those sections already 
built; Israeli redeployment to pre-intifada lines; lifting of closures on 
the Palestinian cities and villages; dismantling the checkpoints; ending 
the siege on Yasser Arafat; freeing Popular Front leader Ahmed Sa'adat and 
Karin A treasurer Fuad Shubeiki from detention in Jericho; ending 
settlement activity and dismantling the illegal outposts; reopening the 
Palestinian institutions in Jerusalem; and seeking international protection 
for the Palestinians.


-- 
Macdonald Stainsby
http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green
In the contradiction lies the hope
		--Brecht.


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