3/5/2017

The movement’s new policy document could set it on the same disastrous path pursued by the PLO 

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– Rai al Youm 

Meshaal’s explanation of Hamas’ new programme resembled in many ways the explanations that Arafat gave for the Ten Points and the Independence Document all those years ago. Now as then, it was stressed that there was no question of relinquishing any inch of Palestinian soil, nor the right of return or armed struggle (which was referred to obliquely in the Hamas document under the rubric of ‘all means of resistance’).

[...] [T]he process of impoverishing and besieging the Gaza Strip’s two million inhabitants — including measures such as the PA’s reduction of salaries, Egypt’s border closure and Israel’s electricity cut-off – have been carefully calculated and targeted.