Jerusalem, April 28: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas must choose – between peace with Hamas or peace with Israel, in the wake of an apparent reconciliation deal between Fatah and Hamas.
Netanyahu did not welcome a surprise agreement reached in unpublicized talks between rivalling Palestinian groups, but rather charged it showed the Palestinian Authority (PA)’s ‘weakness.’
‘The PA must choose between peace wither with Israel or with Hamas. It cannot have both, because Hamas aims to destroy the state of Israel and says so openly,’ Netanyahu said according to a statement by his office.
Hamas, he said, ‘fires missiles at us. It fires anti-tank missiles at our children.
‘I think that the very idea of reconciliation shows the PA’s weakness and makes us wonder whether Hamas will also take control of Judea and Samaria, as it has of Gaza,’ he added, using the Hebrew Biblical terms for the southern and northern West Bank.
‘I hope that the PA will choose right – that it will choose peace with Israel. The choice is in its hands.’
–Agencies