Mubarak offers Cairo as venue for Hamas-Fatah talks

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
President Hosni Mubarak offered on Friday to host talks between rival Palestinian Fatah and Hamas leaders, in an apparent effort to raise his country's role as Mideast peace broker and ease the pressure following Gaza Palestinian influx into Egypt from the Hamas-controlled strip. In an interview for Saturday's edition of the Egyptian weekly al-Osboa, Mubarak said he wants peace between the Palestinians. "I want this language of violence to stop," Mubarak was quoted as saying by the state MENA news agency. "Peace could be achieved on the basis of international resolutions and agreements that demand the establishment of Palestinian state." Ayman Taha, Hamas spokesman in Gaza, told the pan-Arab Al-Jazeera TV that Hamas' supreme leader, the Syria-based Khaled Mashaal, was ready to accept Mubarak's invitation to an "unconditional dialogue."