Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyya offered a peace proposal for the current standoff with Israel late Saturday, an offer that Israeli authorities flatly refused. Over 40 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces in the last week in an ongoing offensive that Israeli leaders say will not end anytime soon.
In a press statement issued by his office, Haniyya affirmed, "Out of the Palestinian national interest and to protect and enhance the Palestinian national unity and out of our concern to preserve what the Palestinian people have achieved over the past years and out of our conviction to provide the Palestinian people with all means of honorable and peaceful life, my government is launching such an initiative as a hope to get out of the current crisis and achieve the aspirations of our people."
The prime minister’s initiative called for immediate and mutual ceasefire of all military operations and for Israel to make a swift pull out of the Gaza Strip. Haniyya also called for the unconditional release of kidnapped ministers and Palestinian lawmakers, economic sactions be lifted, and Gaza border crossings to be reopened. The Prime Minister stated that he wants to continue negotiations over the captured soldier’s and for the issue to reach a suitable solution for it.
Meanwhile, the office of the Palestinian deputies in Al-Khalil city denounced the "unexplainable silence on the part of the Arab world and the international community towards the Israeli troop’s non-stop murdering of innocent Palestinian families."
In a statement issued Saturday, the deputies’ office stated that "two bloody weeks have passed amidst continued Israeli troop’s massacres of Palestinian civilians and destruction of Palestinian homes and lands as well as the expanded incursions in the West Bank cities and killing and arresting more Palestinian people. Neither the Arab world nor the international community have stepped in to stop those massacres in clear and unjustified indifference on their part."
The office raised suspicion over the true role of the international community, adding that the mere condemnation of the Israeli aggressions weren’t enough to bridle the incessant atrocities being carried out daily by Israeli forces in Gaza.
The deputies also denounced the Arab silence and passivity towards what is happening to their brethren in occupied Palestine, and urged Arab and Muslim people to "fill the streets of their countries in massive demonstrations so as to push the Arab regimes to act favorably."
In the city of Qalqilia, Islamic and nationalist women organizations held massive rallies and sit-ins to challenge the ongoing Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip and the continued detention of the kidnapped Palestinian ministers and Palestinian legislators.
For its part, the Egypt-based Human Relief Committee, in coordination with the professional syndicates in the Alexandria governorate, has organized a conference for governorates, businessmen, and merchants in a bid to collect 170,000 dollars for the Palestinian government.
*this article was sourced from palestine-info.co.uk
