Fawzi Barhum, Hamas spokesperson said in a press statement issued on Saturday that ‘the call of the Middle East peace Quartet for the Israeli government to freeze settlement activity and to lift blacked of the Gaza Strip is an insufficient and lacks seriousness.’ He affirmed that ‘ what is required from the Quartet is complying decisions to Israel to stop settlement activity and to immediately lift the siege imposed on the Gaza Strip and to approve mechanisms to deliver all kinds of support to all of the Palestinians especially after tightening the closure in accordance with the Quartet’s preconditions and decisions at the time when the whole world has declared the Gaza Strip as a disastrous place that should be supported and the closure to be lifted of it.’
Barhum added that ‘ also the Quartet has to renounce its policy of denial to the Palestinian democratic choice and to respect the Palestinian legitimacies that were the polling boxes and to renounce its preconditions which it imposed on the Palestinian legitimate government because of which political and economic isolation were imposed on the Palestinians and caused them suffering and pain.’
