Hamas leader's comments follow Haniyeh saying his gov't would accept Palestinian state on '67 land.
By JPOST.COM STAFFHaniyeh says hi 248 88 AP(photo credit: AP [file])
A long-term truce between Israel and Hamas cannot currently be implemented, DPA quoted Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahar as saying on Sunday.
Whilst the offer for a 20-year cease-fire, made by the late Hamas spiritual leader Ahmed Yassin, "was not canceled," Zahar said, it cannot currently be implemented because there is "no one to talk about this proposal with on the [Israeli] side."
Yassin's offer was for a truce between Israel and Hamas in exchange for Israel withdrawing from all territory taken in 1967.
Zahar's remarks came the day after Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh made contrasting statements, saying that Hamas would accept a Palestinian state within 1967 borders, meaning the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem.
Speaking to European politicians who arrived in Gaza on a 'blockade-busting' voyage from Cyprus on Saturday, Haniyeh was quoted in the DPA report as saying, "We don't have a state, neither in Gaza nor in the West Bank. Gaza is under siege and the West Bank is occupied. What we have in the Gaza Strip is not a state, but rather a regime of an elected government. A Palestinian state will not be created at this time except in the territories of 1967."
Asked about ties between Hamas and Iran, the Hamas leader said, "Our ties with Iran are like those with other Muslim states," adding, "Our conflict is not with the Jews, our problem is with the occupation," Haniyeh said.
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