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Carter Says Hamas May Accept Right of Israel to Exist •
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Mashaal Offers Truce if Israel Withdraws From 1967 Lands
By Albert Aji
The Associated Press
Damascus, Syria - The leader of Hamas says his Palestinian militant group is
offering Israel a 10-year truce if it withdraws from all lands it seized in
the 1967 war.
Khaled Mashaal says he made the offer to former President Carter in talks on
Saturday.
Mashaal says Hamas would accept a Palestinian state limited to the lands Israel
seized in 1967 - an implicit acceptance that Israel would exist alongside that
state.
But Mashaal says the group would never outright formally recognize Israel.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's
earlier story is below.
DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) - Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal says his militant Islamic
group will not recognize Israel.
But Mashaal says Hamas will accept a Palestinian state on Palestinian territories
occupied by Israel in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.
The statement amounted to a tacit acceptance of Israel's right to exist alongside
a Palestinian state, but without explicit recognition of the Jewish state.
Earlier, former President Jimmy Carter said that Hamas is prepared to accept
the Jewish state's right to "live as a neighbor next door in peace."
Carter met twice with Mashaal over the weekend.
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Carter Says Hamas May Accept Right of Israel to Exist
By Alisa Odenheimer
Bloomberg
Monday 21 April 2008
Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, who helped broker peace between Egypt and
Israel in 1978, said that Israel's enemy Hamas may accept, under certain circumstances,
the Jewish state's right to exist.
Hamas leaders told Carter that the group would accept a peace agreement negotiated
by the leader of the rival Fatah group, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud
Abbas, on condition that the agreement is submitted to the Palestinian people
for approval, the former president said in a speech in Jerusalem.
"Hamas leaders said they would accept a Palestinian state on the 1967
border and the right of Israel to live as a neighbor, provided the agreement
was submitted to the Palestinian people for overall approval," Carter said.
Hamas later said it wouldn't necessarily accept the results of a peace referendum,
the Associated Press reported.
Hamas, an Islamic group which seized control of the Gaza Strip in June, is
sworn to Israel's destruction, and launches regular rocket attacks against Israeli
towns, killing and maiming citizens. Abbas, who is in control of the West Bank,
is in negotiations with Israel about a framework peace agreement that President
George W. Bush wants by the end of the year.
Syrian Position
Syria believes that nearly all its differences with Israel have been resolved
and that talks "just need to be reconvened," Carter said in Jerusalem
after meeting with Syrian officials in Damascus. Syria is eager that the U.S.
play a "strong role" in talks with Israel, while in the meantime,
the U.S. is opposing talks, Carter said.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad confirmed his country exchanged messages with
Israel via third parties about the possibility of resuming peace talks, Syria's
state-run SANA news service reported today. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert
told the daily Yediot Ahronot last week that the two countries, which failed
to sign a peace accord after the Six-Day war in 1967, clarified what they expect
from a potential peace accord. Each side now understands what the other wants,
Olmert said.
Carter said that, while he is glad that Bush is committed to reaching a peace
agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, there is a general feeling that
no progress is being made of any significance in the talks.
Israel and the U.S. strategy of excluding Syria and Hamas from peace negotiations
"just isn't working," and they would have to be involved in order to make
progress, Carter said.
Prisoner Exchange
Hamas leaders said that they are making progress in Egyptian-mediated talks
about a prisoner exchange that would include Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who
was captured by Palestinian gunmen in June 2006. Hamas has agreed to allow Shalit
to send a letter to his parents, Carter said.
Carter's speech came after meeting with exiled Hamas leader Khalid Mashaal
in Damascus and other Hamas officials in Cairo over the past week.
By meeting with Hamas officials, Carter went against the policy of the Bush
administration, which says Hamas must be sidelined until it recognizes Israel
and ends violence, and ignored Israeli objections. The U.S. considers the group
a terrorist organization.
Hamas won 2006 Palestinian parliamentary elections and ousted forces loyal
to President Mahmoud Abbas from the Gaza Strip in June last year. Abbas heads
the Fatah faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization and controls the
West Bank.
During a visit to Israel on April 11, U.S. Secretary of StateCondoleezza Rice
told reporters that she found it "hard to understand what is to be gained by
having discussions with Hamas when Hamas is, in fact, an obstacle to peace."
Congressional Appeal
Fifty members of the U.S. Congress, both Democrats and Republicans, wrote an
appeal to Carter on April 14 not to meet with Hamas.
In Carter's visit to Israel, President Shimon Peres told him it was a "mistake"
to meet with Hamas. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert declined to receive the former
U.S. leader. Israel barred Carter from crossing into the Gaza Strip.
Since his 1977-1981 presidency, Carter has occasionally embarked on private
diplomacy. In 1994, he visited Pyongyang and persuaded North Korea to freeze
its nuclear program. The agreement collapsed when the CIA discovered, in 2002,
that North Korea ran a covert uranium-enrichment program. Carter also visited
U.S. adversaries Iraq, when it was ruled by Saddam Hussein, and Cuba.
Egypt navigates a delicate path with Hamas: It has called for Israel to lift
a trade and travel blockade of the Gaza Strip, while declining to open its own
border to Gazans, which has been breeched in the past. Instead, Egypt has tried
to mediate in the Abbas-Hamas dispute.
Carter won the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize for promoting peaceful solutions to conflicts
and social and economic justice.
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