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U.S.
Names Palestinian Resistance Group A Terrorist Organization
WASHINGTON,
March 21 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - The United States
Thursday formally designated the Palestinian Al-Aqsa Martyrs
Brigades, one of the major resistance groups, a "foreign
terrorist organization".
The
move will bar any members of the group, an offshoot of Palestinian
President Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement, from obtaining U.S. visas
and prohibit any fund-raising operations it may have in the United
States.
The
move, which Israel and Jewish groups in the United States have urged
for some time, has been under consideration for months but not
expected to be announced until next week.
U.S.
Secretary of State Colin Powell decided to take the step on Tuesday
and told Congress Wednesday, spokesman Philip Reeker said.
"Secretary
of State Powell decided to designate the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades a
foreign terrorist organization on March 19. We notified Congress
March 20," Reeker said.
"The
situation has changed dramatically over the past couple of
hours," one State Department official told AFP, referring to
the suicide attack that killed at least two people and wounded 40
others on a busy street in central Jerusalem.
Observers
in the Middle East believe the move represents pressure on Arafat to
submit to the Israeli demands of dismantling Palestinian resistance
organizations.
Arafat
was under virtual house arrest since December 3, 2001, untill early
March. Consequently, he was restricted in his activities of
leadership. He could not do much to rein in people living under
desperate conditions.
The
Palestinian group claimed responsibility for the Jerusalem blast
Thursday.
Mohammed
Hashikeh, 22, from the village of Taluza, north of Nablus, blew
himself up to avenge the assassinations of two Palestinian men by
the Israeli army earlier this month.
“It
is of value to mention here that the Israeli occupation army
committed atrocities against civilians as well as resistance
activists afiliated to the Al-Aqsa and other resistance groups,”
an observer told islamOnline.
“The
U.S. is giving Sharon the go-ahead to continue his aggressive
actions against the Palestinians,” added the observer.
The
designation is meant as a clear signal to Arafat that the United
States is not satisfied with his efforts to halt anti-Israel
violence, a message President George W. Bush reiterated earlier
Thursday.
Less
than two hours after Thursday's attack, Secretary of State Colin
Powell made the same point in a phone call to Arafat, a senior State
Department official said.
"The
message was the same as we have been saying privately and publicly:
he must take steps to rein in the violence," the official said
of the call which Powell, accompanying Bush on a trip to Latin
America, placed from Air Force One.
The
Al Aqsa brigades emerged during the Al Aqsa Intifada, which began in
September 2000, and is the first Palestinian group to be added to
the list since the start of the Palestinian Intifada.
The
addition of the group to the "foreign terrorist
organization" list brings the number of groups so designated by
the State Department to 29. Other active Palestinian groups on the
list are the Islamic Resistance group, Hamas; Palestinian Islamic
Jihad; and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP),
news agencies reported.
With
additional reporting by, Khaled Mamdouh
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