ISRAEL: Hamas could accept the creation of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza as well as a long-term truce with Israel, a leader of the militant group has said, signalling a possible new overture to end hostilities before the election in January of a new Palestinian president.
Hamas has made such offers before, but this was the first time it had commented on future strategy since the death of Yasser Arafat last month.
"The whole world should seize this opportunity and build on it, because this is a realistic position being taken by the Hamas movement," Mr Hassan Youssef, the top Hamas official in the West Bank, said yesterday.
However, a senior Israeli official dismissed the proposal, calling it a ruse aimed at "destroying Israel in stages".
Mr Youssef said that Hamas would accept a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, with a capital in Jerusalem, if Israel removed all troops and Jewish settlers and ceased military operations in the territories.
"Of course we would accept," Mr Youssef said. "Then we can have a ceasefire for a period of time . . . It may be a long period."
But he stopped short of saying that Hamas would recognise Israel's right to exist or give up its claim to all of the land which was Palestine under the British mandate preceding the creation of Israel more than 50 years ago.
A number of Hamas officials have previously said that they would accept an independent state in the territories, but only as a step towards taking over Israel.
"I am talking about establishing a state within the 1967 borders," Mr Youssef said, referring to the lands Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East war.
Just a day before, Mr Mahmoud al-Zahar, a Hamas leader in Gaza, had suggested that the group would consider suspending attacks on Israel to allow a smooth election of the successor to Yasser Arafat on January 9th. But he stuck to Hamas's long-standing conditions, including a halt to Israeli raids in Palestinian areas.
Despite Hamas's decision to boycott next month's election, the group does not want to be seen obstructing the voting.
Hamas has been the main group responsible for the campaign of suicide bombings against Israel since the outbreak of the intifada in 2000.
Hamas's latest overtures follow efforts by the PLO leader, Mr Mahmoud Abbas, the favourite in the presidential race, to coax militants into suspending attacks on Israelis during the election campaign. Mr Abbas is the candidate of Fatah, the dominant Palestinian faction, which seeks a state bordering Israel. - (Reuters)