RAMALLAH, Friday, December 8, 2023 (WAFA) - President Mahmoud Abbas tonight called for an immediate end to the Israeli aggression against the Gaza Strip, and the convening of an international peace conference to work out a permanent political solution that leads to the establishment of a Palestinian state.
In an interview with Reuters at his office in Ramallah, President Abbas said the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians in general had reached an alarming stage that requires an international conference and guarantees by world powers.
In parallel with the Israeli aggression on Gaza, he said Israeli forces have intensified their attacks everywhere in the occupied West Bank over the past year with settlers escalating violence against Palestinian towns, according to Reuters.
He reiterated his longstanding position in favor of negotiations and peaceful resistance to end the longstanding occupation.
"I am with. I am for negotiations based on an international peace conference and under international auspices that would lead to a solution that will be protected by world powers to establish a sovereign Palestinian state in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem," he said.
He said the PA had abided by all the peace deals signed with Israel since the 1993 Oslo Accord and the understandings that followed over the years but that Israel had reneged on its pledges to end the occupation.
Regarding holding presidential and parliamentary elections, Abbas said: "Whoever wins, wins, these will be democratic elections."
President Abbas said he had planned to hold elections in April 2021 but the European Union envoy told him before the due date that Israel was objecting to voting in East Jerusalem so he was forced to call it off, said Reuters.
He insisted that there would not be elections without East Jerusalem, saying the PA held three rounds of elections in the past that included East Jerusalem before Israel imposed the ban, added Reuters.
"The United States tells us that it supports a two-state solution, that Israel is not allowed to occupy Gaza, to keep security control of Gaza or to expropriate land from Gaza," he said regarding the US position of the Israeli aggression on Gaza.
He Reuters that the PA was still present in Gaza as an institution and still pays monthly salaries and expenses estimated at $140 million for employees, pensioners, and needy families. The PA still has three ministers present in Gaza, he added.
"Gaza today is not the Gaza that you know. Gaza was destroyed, its hospitals, its schools, its infrastructure, its buildings, its roads, and mosques were destroyed. There is nothing left,” he said.
T.R.
