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Palestinians strike after Israeli raid
GAZA - Palestinians went on strike across the Gaza Strip and the West Bank on Wednesday and vowed a wave of demonstrations against Israel ‘s seizure of the leader of a militant group from a Palestinian jail.
Israeli security forces were on high alert after Ahmed Saadat‘s Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and the Islamist militant group Hamas promised retaliation.
Israeli forces grabbed Saadat after tanks and bulldozers tore apart Jericho jail on Tuesday. The Jewish state said the raid sent a powerful message to Hamas, which is forming a Palestinian government after winning elections in January.
Israel has accused Saadat of involvement in the 2001 killing of an Israeli cabinet minister and said it had no choice but to act after the United States and Britain, citing security concerns, withdrew monitors supervising his incarceration.
Political rivals and newspapers in Israel agreed the 10-hour operation was a success, a boost for the security credentials of interim Prime Minister Ehud Olmert ahead of a March 28 general election his centrist Kadima party is expected to win.
In Gaza, shops were shuttered in protest at the Israeli operation and many children had to return home after they arrived at closed schools. Shops in key West Bank towns were also closed.
Palestinian militants said three remaining foreigners kidnapped in Gaza on Tuesday in response to the Israeli raid had been released.
Militants said the three journalists, two French nationals and a South Korean, were being handed over to political leaders in Gaza. They were among nine foreigners snatched in Palestinian areas. The six others were freed soon after they were taken.
"There is no compromise when it comes to security and we will deal out justice to murderers," Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, commenting on the prison raid, said on Israel Radio.
Kayed al-Ghoul, a senior PFLP leader in Gaza, said the group "will not stand handcuffed against the Israeli pirating and kidnapping of comrade Saadat."
The raid, in which a Palestinian guard and a prisoner were killed, dealt another blow to moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, already shaken by Hamas‘s election win. Hamas is sworn to Israel‘s destruction.
"This incident weakens president Abbas and the pragmatists and moderates and strengthens Hamas and extremists because Israel will not respect agreements and pursues policies of dictating facts on the ground," independent Palestinian lawmaker Hanan Ashrawi told Reuters.
More
http://www.heraldnewsdaily.com/stories/news-00158182.html
Israeli forces grabbed Saadat after tanks and bulldozers tore apart Jericho jail on Tuesday. The Jewish state said the raid sent a powerful message to Hamas, which is forming a Palestinian government after winning elections in January.
Israel has accused Saadat of involvement in the 2001 killing of an Israeli cabinet minister and said it had no choice but to act after the United States and Britain, citing security concerns, withdrew monitors supervising his incarceration.
Political rivals and newspapers in Israel agreed the 10-hour operation was a success, a boost for the security credentials of interim Prime Minister Ehud Olmert ahead of a March 28 general election his centrist Kadima party is expected to win.
In Gaza, shops were shuttered in protest at the Israeli operation and many children had to return home after they arrived at closed schools. Shops in key West Bank towns were also closed.
Palestinian militants said three remaining foreigners kidnapped in Gaza on Tuesday in response to the Israeli raid had been released.
Militants said the three journalists, two French nationals and a South Korean, were being handed over to political leaders in Gaza. They were among nine foreigners snatched in Palestinian areas. The six others were freed soon after they were taken.
"There is no compromise when it comes to security and we will deal out justice to murderers," Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, commenting on the prison raid, said on Israel Radio.
Kayed al-Ghoul, a senior PFLP leader in Gaza, said the group "will not stand handcuffed against the Israeli pirating and kidnapping of comrade Saadat."
The raid, in which a Palestinian guard and a prisoner were killed, dealt another blow to moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, already shaken by Hamas‘s election win. Hamas is sworn to Israel‘s destruction.
"This incident weakens president Abbas and the pragmatists and moderates and strengthens Hamas and extremists because Israel will not respect agreements and pursues policies of dictating facts on the ground," independent Palestinian lawmaker Hanan Ashrawi told Reuters.
More
http://www.heraldnewsdaily.com/stories/news-00158182.html
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The Palestinian Authority is already in a heightened state of alert after the raid on the Jericho jail provoked a wave of abductions and threats of revenge against the Jewish state.
The strike was ordered late on Tuesday after emergency talks in the Gaza Strip, and on Wednesday most businesses were shuttered and schools were closed.
The siege by Israel succeeded in its aim of capturing Ahmad Saadat, the leader of the resistance movement, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), but has sparked an angry reaction.
Three foreign captives - two French and a Korean - were being held by Palestinian fighters in the Gaza Strip after the raid, and much of the backlash has been directed at British and US interests.
Saadat surrendered to Israeli troops late on Tuesday along with 5 other jailed Palestinian political activists.
Israel holds the five PFLP members responsible for the killing of an Israeli minister in October 2001.
Two Palestinian security guards were killed and 26 others wounded, five of them critically in the assault.
Call for calm
A US State Department spokesman urged both sides to exercise "calm and restraint" amid mounting questions over why the international monitors at the prison were removed just minutes before the raid. The UN Security Council also called for calm.
The president of the European Parliament roundly condemned Israel's massive raid on the prison and the wave of kidnappings of foreigners that followed it.
More
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/47AAE50A-8113-4959-8804-F85AD0CEA7C5.htm
Businesses remained shuttered and schools closed across the Gaza Strip and West Bank, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).
The strike was ordered late Tuesday, March14 , during emergency talks in the Gaza Strip to protest Israel's raid on the Jericho jail to arrest the leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) Ahmad Saadat.
"The Palestinian factions called during an emergency meeting for a general strike across the Palestinian territories to condemn the seizure of Saadat, the Israeli aggression and the killing of Palestinians," a delegate said.
Two Palestinian security guards were killed and 26 others wounded, five of them critically in the Israeli assault of the Jericho jail in a bid to capture Saadat, four other PFLP members and wanted Fatah member Fuad Shubaki.
Israel holds the five PFLP members accused by the Jewish state of being responsible for the killing of Israeli tourism minister Rehavam Zeevi in2001 . The PFLP claimed the assassination, saying it was to avenge the assassination of Saadat's predecessor in October2001 .
Saadat surrendered to the occupation troops after the day-long siege, which began just minutes after British and US monitors at the jail withdrew.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas left Strasbourg late Tuesday to return to the Palestinian territories as unrest flared after the Israeli raid.
His spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeina warned that the situation "would reflect negatively on many things, on the truce (and) the negotiations" and charged that "Israel is committing a crime in Jericho".
US officials told Reuters Tuesday that Israel received advance word from the United States that foreign monitors were preparing to withdraw from the West Bank prison.
They said Washington had given Israel a copy of a March 8 letter it sent to Abbas saying monitors could be withdrawn at once unless security conditions were met.
Some Hostages Released
A number of foreigners were kidnapped in the Gaza Strip and West Bank on Tuesday in a wave of attacks on foreign interests to protest against the Israeli military operation and perceived British and US collusion in the raid.
Two French women working for the medical charity Medecins du Monde (MDM) were freed Tuesday evening in the Gaza Strip.
"The two French workers with MDM have been freed. They are safe," a government official told AFP, without giving details.
Two Australians, an American and a Swiss employee of the International Committee of the Red Cross were also kidnapped but later released unharmed by their abductors.
Three foreign journalists, however, were being held hostage in the Gaza Strip for a second day by fighters from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.
Two French and a South Korean were also still in captivity "because the Palestinian Authority had not managed to protect Ahmed Saadat," the PFLP said.
More than two dozen foreign aid workers and journalists took refuge in the compound of the Palestinian Preventive Security agency in the Gaza Strip.
Islam strictly forbids kidnapping and killing innocent civilians.
UN Resolution
On the diplomatic landscape, Qatar urged the UN Security Council Tuesday to condemn the Israeli raid and oblige Tel Aviv to return all prisoners to Palestinian custody.
A draft statement by Qatari Ambassador Abdulaziz Al-Nasser would further call on Israel to withdraw all its forces from Jericho.
Council diplomats said the15 -nation council would discuss the draft behind closed doors Wednesday after Al-Nasser revised it overnight in response to council members' initial comments, diplomats told Reuters.
Palestinian UN Observer Riyad Mansour called on the council to "uphold international law" by supporting the Qatari measure. He said the Israeli raid grew out of "a desire to negate the Palestinian elections" won by Hamas.
But the text would almost certainly face a veto from the United States, Israel's closest ally, if brought to a vote in its current form, the diplomats said.
http://islamonline.net/English/News/2006-03/15/article01.shtml