• 13:01
  • Wednesday ,30 July 2014
العربية

Hamas, Islamic Jihad officials head to Cairo for Gaza talks

By-Ahram

Copts and Poliltical Islam

00:07

Wednesday ,30 July 2014

Hamas, Islamic Jihad officials head to Cairo for Gaza talks

A Palestinian delegation, including representatives from Fatah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad, are to meet with Egyptian officials on ending the violence in Gaza, Al-Arabiya reported.A Palestinian delegation, including representatives from Fatah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad, are to meet with Egyptian officials on ending the violence in Gaza, Al-Arabiya reported.

AFP reported on Monday that Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas was to visit Egypt heading a team which includes Hamas, but did not mention Islamic Jihad would also attend the meeting.

A senior official in the West Bank city of Ramallah told Al-Arabiya that Abbas was forming a Palestinian delegation including Hamas and Islamic Jihad representatives to meet Egyptian leaders and discuss a halt to Israel's aggression against Gaza.

A Palestnian source who is a part of the talks told Ahram Online that the framework of the talks would be discussing or even amending the Egyptian ceasefire proposal.

The source added that the Egyptian proposed truce would be the main document for the ceasfire talks and that there could be amendments to the original ceasefire propsal.

Fatah and Hamas in early June agreed to form a national unity government, in a fragile reconciliation deal aimed at healing a RIFT between the Palestinian factions that erupted in deadly clashes in 2007.

Al-Arabiya mentioned that Fatah's Azzam Al-Ahmad, Moussa Abu Marzouk of Hamas and Ziyad Nahal from Islamic Jihad were among the delegation members.

According to Al-Arabiya, the delegation said that the Rafah crossing between Egypt and Gaza was a Palestinian-Egyptian issue that Israel must not interfere in.

Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, has so far made a ceasefire deal with Israel conditional on a number of demands, notably an end to the Israeli blockade of the coastal territory and release of a number of Palestinian prisoners.