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Mohammad
Saadat, the brother of PFLP leader Ahmad Saadat, was
assassinated by Israeli forces Tuesday, August 20
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PARIS,
August 22 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - France said Wednesday,
August 21, it continued to oppose Israel’s policy of assassinating
wanted Palestinians, after the brother of a leading activist was
killed by a special unit of the Israeli army.
“Our
opposition to targeted assassinations has not changed,” foreign
ministry spokesman Francois Rivasseau said.
Mohammed
Saadat, 22, brother of Ahmad Saadat, the jailed head of Popular Front
for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), was shot dead Tuesday, August
20, by Israeli troops outside his home in the West Bank city of
Ramallah, Agence France-Presse (AFP) said.
Since
the start of the Palestinian intifada in September 2000, Israel has
assassinated more than 70 Palestinians it claimed were involved in
anti-Israeli attacks.
Israel
considers the “targeted killings” self-defense, although they have
been strongly denounced by the international community and human
rights groups.
Rivasseau
said France was urging Israel and the Palestinians to seize the
opportunity offered by an accord reached Sunday, August 18, calling
for a phased Israeli withdrawal from Palestinian areas in return for a
Palestinian crackdown on resistance groups.
“The
restoration of confidence between Israelis and Palestinians is
vital,” he added.
He
was speaking ahead of a meeting in Paris Thursday and Friday of
middle-ranking officials from the so-called quartet, the United
States, the United Nations, the European Union and Russia, plus Japan,
Norway, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, AFP
said.
Meanwhile,
the Jerusalem Mayor Ehud Olmert said Thursday he opposed a collective
punishment on the Palestinians in east Jerusalem.
Olmert’s
comments came as Interior Minister Eli Yishai said he would hasten to
withdraw the residency permits of four of the men who live in east
Jerusalem.
Israel’s
security services announced on Wednesday they had broken a ring of the
Islamic resistance group Hamas.
Four
of the 15 Palestinians arrested were residents of east Jerusalem,
which Israel occupied and annexed in during the Six Day War in 1967.
Most of the residents refused Israeli citizenship, but were given
Israeli residency permits.
