HAMAS OFFICIAL: US IS DREAMING IF IT WANTS TO FORCE GROUP OUT OF GAZA GOVERNANCE

Wed 08 October 2023:

A member of Hamas’s political bureau has rejected any attempt to exclude the group from future rule in Gaza, in response to an earlier statement by US National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby that Hamas could not be part of the governance equation in Gaza.

“I think the Americans are dreaming a lot,” said Ghazi Hamad, in an interview with Al Jazeera Arabic. “The Americans who failed in Iraq, who failed in Afghanistan, who failed in Somalia … now they want to restructure Gaza?”

Ghazi Hamad, a member of Hamas' decision-making political bureau, speaks during an interview with The Associated Press in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Oct. 26,

Hamad said that any change in the governance of Gaza was an internal Palestinian matter, adding that Hamas would be involved in any decision.

He also warned the Palestinian Authority in the occupied West Bank not to make a deal with the US and Israel at the expense of Hamas, as the question of what happens in Gaza if Hamas is defeated grows.

“You must not cooperate with the Americans,” Hamad said, addressing the PA. “And don’t [go into Gaza] on the back of the American tank.” He added that PA President Mahmoud Abbas should refuse any US attempts for it to takeover Gaza, but added that a lack of public comments on the matter from the PA “raises a question mark”.

In response to Israeli military claims that its forces were in the heart of Gaza City, Hamad asked for the Israelis to show evidence of their advances, and added that the Israelis did not want to rescue the captives being held in the Gaza Strip. Israel has publicly stated that the rescue of the captives is a priority of their military operation.

Netanyahu adviser: Israel plans security presence, not political control in Gaza

Mark Regev, a senior adviser to Israel’s leader Netanyahu, has said that Israel will not, in his words, re-occupy Gaza, but instead plans to maintain a security presence in the enclave.

“When this is over and we have defeated Hamas, it is crucial that there won’t be a resurgent terrorist element, a resurgent Hamas,” Regev told CNN, following comments from Netanyahu on Monday that Israel would keep “overall security responsibility… for an indefinite period”.

“There will have to be an Israeli security presence, but that doesn’t mean Israel is re-occupying Gaza, that doesn’t mean that Israel is there to govern the Gazans,” he added.

Experts point out that Israel’s control of Gaza’s borders and airspace, even before the current conflict, means that Israel has continued to occupy Gaza, even after the removal of Israeli illegal settlements in 2005.

Regev claimed that Israel wanted Palestinians in Gaza to rule themselves, although there have been several voices within the Israeli establishment calling for the mass expulsion of Palestinians from Gaza, in what has been described as a second Nakba, in reference to the expulsion of Palestinians from historic Palestine in 1948.

SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES

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