Israel Matzav

Great news: 'Palestinian factions' agree on 'cease fire' terms

JPost reports that all the 'Palestinian factions' have agreed on 'cease fire' terms in Cairo.

Qais Abu Laila, a senior leader from the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine who was in Cairo, said the different Palestinian factions had agreed on a unified list of conditions.

"Cease-fire, the pullout of Israeli forces, ending the blockade, releasing the prisoners ... and starting the reconstruction process," he told Reuters by phone.

"There are details attached to each of these points and there will be a meeting soon with the Egyptian side to discuss the (Palestinian) paper," he said.

There's just one small problem. There's this other party, without whom a 'cease fire' is meaningless, and they're not there in Cairo and have no intention of coming there.

American and Egyptian officials conducting the negotiations were apparently pressing Israel to take part in diplomatic talks to end hostilities in Gaza.

On Saturday, Israel said it would not send envoys as scheduled, accusing Palestinian Islamists of misleading international mediators.

And for those of you who are wondering why Israel would now reject the initiative it accepted three weeks ago, while Hamas would now accept the initiative it rejected three weeks ago... thanks to John FN Kerry, it's not the same initiative any more.

The discussions in Cairo are focusing on President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s cease-fire initiative, which was announced three weeks ago but was rejected by Hamas.

Egyptian sources said that Egypt is “flexible towards any details that the Palestinian factions would find appropriate to add to the initiative whether directly or indirectly, the Egyptian newspaper Ahram reported. “The Egyptian side explained many times in the past few days that the main aim is to put an end to the bloodshed in Gaza and end the severe conditions I which civilians there are living in,” the sources said.

Sounds like the Egyptians have just had the Qatar-Turkey-Kerry initiative foisted on them, doesn't it? No wonder Israel will have nothing to do with it. And no, the conditions above are not acceptable to Israel.

What could go wrong?

Labels: cease fire, Egypt, Gaza, Hamas, IDF, John Kerry, Operation Protective Edge, Qatar, Turkey

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 9:02 PM