CAIRO,
December 1 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - Talks in Cairo
designed to secure a truce by the Palestinian resistance groups, which
were due to take place Tuesday, December 2, have been postponed for
two days for "logistic reasons", a member of the Democratic
Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) revealed Monday, December
1.
Speaking
to IslamOnline.net by phone, Fahd Suleiman, who heads the Front's
delegation to the talks, denied that differences have triggered the
surprise delay.
Islamic
Jihad top official Mohammad al-Hindi further confirmed the news.
"We
have agreed to postpone the dialogue until Thursday (December
4)," Mohammad al-Hindi told Agence France-Presse (AFP).
On
the contrary to Suleiman, al-Hindi, whose organization was one of 12
factions expected in the Egyptian capital, did not give any reason for
the postponement.
Hindi
said that his delegation would not make any "gratuitous
concessions" when they attend the talks.
But
informed sources said that the Palestinians did not want their meeting
to overshadow the aftermath of Monday's launch of the Geneva
Initiative, an unofficial Middle East peace plan.
The
main Palestinian groups, including the Islamic Jihad and Hamas, have
rejected the Geneva plan for its de facto renunciation of the right of
return of millions of Palestinian refugees.
Hamas
Participation
Meanwhile,
Osama Hemdan, member of Hamas' politburo and the representative of the
resistance group in Lebanon, said Hamas is mulling the possibility of
taking part in the Cairo talks.
He
told IOL that if his group decided to join the dialogue, it would
demand unlimited time to tackle all pending issues.
Al-Jazeera,
however, said that the resistance group will be represented by the
deputy head of the politburo, Moussa Abu Marzouk.
But
well-placed sources believe that Hamas wanted to pressure Palestinian
President Yasser Arafat's Fatah group into sending Prime Minister
Ahmad Qorei to represent the group in the talks.
"Without
a high-profile representation for Fatah, such as Qorei, the group will
not be able to make crucial decisions," the sources said.
Fatah
Optimistic
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|
Suleiman denied that differences triggered the surprise delay
|
The
head of Fatah's delegation to the talks, for his part, said that he
was hopeful the meeting would lead to a truce with Israel.
"We
are doing everything to ensure the success of the dialogue which is
taking place in very difficult conditions with the continuation of the
(Israeli) aggression," Zacharia al-Agha told Voice of Palestine
radio before his departure for Cairo.
"There
are no substantial differences between the different movements but
some differences of interpretation on certain subjects," said
Agha who is also a member of the executive committee of the Palestine
Liberation Organization (PLO).
Another
member of the Fatah delegation, public works minister Abdelrahman
Hamad, also told AFP that an eventual truce would over time commit
Israel to stopping "its daily aggressions" against the
Palestinians and the construction of its West Bank separation wall,
which snakes through vast swathes of Palestinian lands.
