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Entries in Khalil Al-Hayya (1)

Friday
Jan302009

The Latest on Israel-Gaza-Palestine (30 January)

10 p.m. Hamas has started paying out compensation in cheques, rather than cash, to families whose houses were destroyed in Israeli attacks. About 2700 families have received 4000 euros ($5000).

Because of the shortage of banknotes in the area, it is unclear if the cheques can be cased.



5:05 p.m. Hamas Makes Its Move. The game for the moment is not "reconcilation", at least not with Fatah and the Palestinian Authority. Several thousand Gazans turned out Friday in support of Hamas' call for the abolition of the Palestinian Liberation Organization and its replacement by a new umbrella group.

5 p.m. The French Foreign Ministry says that Israel has blocked its attempt to get a water purification station into Gaza. The equipment is being brought back to France.

3:45 p.m. A senior Hamas leader, Khalil Al-Hayya, has appeared for the first time in public since the Israeli attacks on 27 December. He told a rally, "We promised to come out to you either as martyrs or as victors," Hayya told supporters. "Today I come out to you and you are victors."

Al-Hayya urged Hamas fighters to maintain their resistance and promised that the organisation would lead the reconstruction of Gaza.

2:20 p.m. A Gaza Twist from the Past. A Spanish court has named seven Israelis, including Infrastructure Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer, in a war crimes lawsuit brought by relatives of 15 Gazans killed in a 2002 bombing.

2:15 p.m. I don't think there is a very good sign. George Mitchell has said, after talks in Jerusalem, ""The tragic violence in Gaza and in southern Israel offers a sobering reminder of the very serious and difficlt challenges and unfortunately the setbacks that will come."

Mitchell could be just damping down expectations, but it may be that talks with Israelis and the Palestinian Authority have confirmed the gaps between the positions of those two actors, let alone the position of Hamas. At the very least, Mitchell's statement indicates Washington will not be putting forth any dramatic proposals during and immediately after his trip.

1:45 p.m. (Israel/Gaza time): US envoy George Mitchell's tour continues today with meetings with Israeli Housing Minister Isaac Herzog and the leader of the opposition Likud party and Prime Ministerial candidate Benjamin Netanyahu. Mitchell then goes to Jordan.

There is no shift in Mitchell's general line, which we have noted in the last 48 hours, of an end to arms shipments to Gaza and a re-opening of border crossings in line with a 2005 agreement brokered by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.