Tuesday, May 01, 2012

Stalemate Ending of Peace Talks While Gaza Exchanges Fire With Israel

Nadene Goldfoot
Supposedly, though  PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad was to meet with President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Netanyahu on the 17th , he did not attend.  Abbas had announced that he would, and seemed to be surprised that he didn't show up.

As it turned out, he wouldn't meet with Netanyahu.  Saeb Erekat, head of the PA negotiating team had told journalists just a few hours before the supposed meeting that he would be there, too.  Erkat had to stand in for Fayyad and was joined by Majed Faraj, PA general intelligence chief.

Netanyahu had his special envoy, Isaac Molho with him and the men talked for one hour 20 minutes.  The time was followed by a joint statement saying they both were committed to achieving peace.  Molho is to meet Abbas in Ramallah in the next 2 weeks and will bring an answer to a letter from the Palestinians about Israel's position on the borders of a future Palestinian state and security arrangements for Israel as part of any peace agreement.  It will no doubt include Israel's expectation that Palestinians recognize the State of Israel.

In the meantime, just 3 hours ago, the IDF and PA terrorists fired at each other on the Gaza border.  One was wounded.  The terrorists fired at the soldiers while they were near the security fence in central Gaza doing routine operational activities of clearing land in the early afternoon along the border.  .

The shooting damaged two armoured cars, so the Israelis answered back.  Israel's military keeps an exclusion zone inside the Gaza Strip along the border and regularly does this chore so that the land is safer and terrorists cannot hide in clumps.

On Tuesday evening, a rocket fired from Gaza and landed in Ashkelon.  This is what they had hoped to prevent.  Things like this that keep on happening.

Resource: http://news.yahoo.com/gaza-militant-killed-israeli-border-firefight-193154283.html
haaretz.com/misc/.../palestinian-delegation-delivers-peace-talks-demands-to-netanyahu-1.424905?trai

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