Palestinian Authority: Israeli aggression a prelude for passing Trump's plan
Netanyahu is seeking to consolidate the divide between the West Bank and Gaza Strip and “blackmail” the Palestinians as part of the “deal of the century.”
By KHALED ABU TOAMEH‘THIS IS not a child’s game’ reads a sign at a protest this past November against the incendiary kites and rockets being launched from Gaza.(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM)
The Palestinian Authority claimed on Sunday that the Israeli “aggression” on the Gaza Strip was a “prelude” for passing US President Donald Trump’s upcoming plan for peace in the Middle East, also known as the “deal of the century.”In his first comment on the current flare-up of violence between Israel and the Palestinian terrorist groups in the Gaza Strip, PA President Mahmoud Abbas said what was happening there was “regrettable and condemnable.” The PA, he said, has called on the world to “stop the Israeli aggression against our people. I hope that those governing the Gaza Strip understand that the issue of calm here or there is worthless and useless.”Abbas repeated his call for Palestinian unity so that Palestinians would be able to “confront all conspiracies against the Palestinian cause, including the deal of the century and the war on the families of martyrs and prisoners.”Ignoring the launching of more than 600 rockets and mortars from the Gaza Strip towards Israel in the past 48 hours, the PA Foreign Ministry said that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Trump were seeking to “create conditions suitable for the introduction of the so-called deal of the century.”The PA Foreign Ministry said that Netanyahu was continuing to “escalate his brutal aggression against our people in the Gaza Strip, leaving many unarmed civilians dead and wounded, and causing massive destruction of homes, facilities and infrastructure.”According to the ministry, Netanyahu is seeking to consolidate the divide between the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and “blackmail” the Palestinians as part of the “deal of the century.”Netanyahu, the ministry added, was acting in accordance with Israeli and American interests. “On the one hand, Netanyahu has given a green light to carry out a powerful strike against the Gaza Strip,” the PA ministry said. “On the other hand, however, he’s talking about Israel’s readiness to allow the delivery of funds into the Gaza Strip. He’s in a race against time to reshuffle the deck and commit all the Palestinian parties in the Gaza Strip to understandings with Israel.”The PA repeated its condemnation of the Israeli “aggression” on the Gaza Strip and praised Egypt and its president, Abdel Fattah Sisi, for their efforts to end the violence and lift the blockade imposed on the Hamas-ruled coastal enclave. “The silence towards the ongoing crimes against our people constitutes complicity with the crimes,” the ministry cautioned, repeating its call for providing international protection for the Palestinians.The PA also accused Hamas of refusing to allow its cabinet ministers to visit wounded Palestinians in hospitals in the Gaza Strip.PA Minister of Public Works and Housing, Mohammed Zayyarah, condemned Hamas’s ban and urged it to rescind its decision. He said that the director-general of Shifa Hospital in Gaza City notified him of the Hamas decision to bar PA ministers from entering the hospital and other medical institutions in the Gaza Strip.
In Ramallah, dozens of Palestinian activists took to the streets to protest Israel’s military strikes in the Gaza Strip, which came in response to rocket attacks towards Israel. The protesters called on the international community to immediately intervene to halt the Israeli “aggression.” Chanting “America is the head of the snake,” the protesters also called on Hamas and Islamic Jihad to launch rocket attacks against Tel Aviv.
