Hamas has backtracked on earlier statements expressing regret over Israelis being harmed by their rockets.
The Hamas government in Gaza distanced itself on Saturday from an earlier statement in which it expressed regret for harming Israeli civilians in rocket attacks.
Hamas, in an unusual move, expressed regret for the deaths of Israeli civilians in Palestinian rocket attacks during fighting in Gaza a year ago.
That apology was part of the Hamas government’s response to a United Nations report that alleged both Hamas and Israel committed war crimes during Israel’s Gaza offensive last winter. The UN report, authored by South African jurist Richard Goldstone, accused Hamas of firing rockets indiscriminately at Israeli civilians.
On Saturday, the Gaza government said the report it submitted does not include any apologies in this regard.
In the report by a committee set up by Hamas to examine the UN war crimes allegations, the authors said “we regret any harm that may have befallen any Israeli civilian.”
“We hope the Israeli civilians understand that their government’s continued attacks on us were the key issue and the cause,” added the report, of which Reuters obtained a copy.
Mohammed-Faraj al-Ghoul, justice minister in the Hamas government and the chairman of the committee which drafted the report, said on Saturday “some words or phrases were taken out of context. The report held the [Israeli] occupation fully responsible and it did not include apologies.”
Israel, where Hamas suicide bombers have killed hundreds of civilians over two decades, had already dismissed any apology for the three non-combatants hit by rockets from Gaza in the war as insincere.
In response to the report, delivered to the UN this week, Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor said Friday that “for years Hamas has boasted about deliberately targeting civilians, either through suicide bombings, by gunfire or by rockets. Who are they trying to fool now?”
Meanwhile, our Fatah “peace partners” are upset that Hamas expressed regret over Israeli deaths to begin with.
Fatah spokesman Ahmad Assaf expressed astonishment at Hamas’ regret for the deaths of Israeli civilians by rocket fire
“while they [Hamas] don’t regret killing and injuring hundreds of Palestinians during the bloody coup they staged [in 2007] …” he said in a statement on Saturday.“President Abbas and the Palestinian leadership have always warned of these useless rockets,” he added, in reference to Hamas’ investigation into the Goldstone report submitted late on Wednesday, which stated that the Islamist movement’s intentions were to fire solely at military targets, but the rudimentary nature of the projectiles led to the unintended death of Israeli civilians, Hamas said.
“While Hamas avoids speaking of reconciliation, refuses to sign the Egyptian document and restore Palestinian national unity, they are now humiliating themselves in front of Israel and the international community in order to get recognition from both at the very expense of the Palestinian people and its just cause,” Assaf said.
Notice how Abbas was said to have warned Hamas about the rockets – not because their firing was immoral, but that they were “useless.” Which I presume means they were not killing enough people.
Yet more proof that Fatah are terrorists just like Hamas. The only difference is they choose to wear Armani suits instead of table cloths on their head.
