Haniyeh: No Cease-Fire Unless Our Demands Met

Uploaded with permission from Israel National News


Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh

In a recorded speech broadcast on Hamas television, Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh on Monday announced that Hamas would not agree to a cease-fire unless Israel agreed to its terms.

“Our resistance is bravely holding back the Zionist murderers,” Haniyeh said. “Our fighters are defending the Palestinian nation.”

Haniyeh listed ten demands that Israel would have to agree to if it was interested in a cease-fire.

The conditions include an “immediate end to Israeli aggression against the Palestinian people in Gaza on land, in the air, and by sea;” an end to targeted elimination of Hamas terrorists; a cessation of the policy of destroying terrorists' houses; a halt to the flyovers by the Israel Air Force over Gaza; the reopening of land crossings, and the rehabilitation of the Gaza seaport; the free flow of goods into Gaza; a guaranteed supply of fuel and building materials; an end to “collective punishment” of Gazans; and continued supply of electricity.

Both US Secretary of State John Kerry and UN Secretary-General Ban ki-Moon are on their way to the region and are likely to present frameworks for a cease-fire. Egypt on Monday said that it was willing to adjust its cease-fire proposal in order to get Hamas to agree to it. On Monday, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said that the operation in Gaza was likely to expand further.

In his speech, Haniyeh said that his special units “were punishing the enemy, and attacking them over and over. We are striking at them underground and on the sea. The ground campaign by the enemy is an admission that their air war against us failed.”