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World Jewish News
'Hamas agrees to demand that Schalit deal precede cease-fire'
17.02.2009
Hamas has no objection to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's demand that a deal for the release of kidnapped IDF soldier Gilad Scahlit be finalized before a cease-fire agreement, as long as Israel releases all of the prisoners on Hamas's list, a senior member of the organization was quoted by the London-based Arabic daily Al-Hayat as saying Tuesday.
Olmert's spokesman Mark Regev told the paper that Israel hoped that Schalit's return would also help promote the truce. "If the Schalit issue is resolved we can also bring about an advancement of other issues," Regev was quoted by Al-Hayat as saying.
According to the Hamas official, the organization's delegation to Cairo has requested that Egyptian intelligence chief Omar Suleiman apprise the other Palestinian factions of the details of the emerging agreements with Israel in order to ensure that they accept the terms of the cease-fire.
The security cabinet is set to convene Wednesday morning in order to decide on Israel's final stance on a deal that would see the release of Schalit.
On Sunday night, Olmert said that Israel would not reopen Gaza's border crossings until Schalit was freed, reiterating a change of policy that he articulated in a statement from his office on Saturday.
"We will not allow the opening of the crossings to Gaza, to the extent that it will bring back life to normal, certainly not before Gilad Schalit is home," Olmert said in an address to a delegation of American Jewish leaders visiting Jerusalem.
On Saturday night, with rumors swirling that Israel and Hamas were just hours away from a cease-fire deal, Osama Hamdan, a Hamas representative in Lebanon, said that Israel's insistence on including Schalit's release in any truce agreement with his organization was jeopardizing the chances of reaching such an agreement, Reuters reported.
Источник: JPost.com
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