Palestinian Chairman Abbas: If you will fight Israel, we are in favor

Palestinian Media Watch Bulletin, July 7, 2010.

The official Palestinian Authority daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida reports that PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbassupports negotiations with Israel today because it is the only option. However, the newspaper quotes Abbas about the military option:

“If you [Arab states] want war, and if all of you will fight Israel, we are in favor. But the Palestinians will not fight alone because they don’t have the ability to do it.”

The PA daily reports that Abbas said this at a meeting with writers and journalists in the home of the Palestinian Ambassador to Jordan.

The following is the transcript from the official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida:

“‘We don’t accept the statement [of Hamas]: a [Palestinian] state of resistance and refusal. What we hear from everyone is that the basis is negotiations, at a time that the entire world agrees about this, despite the absence of other options, we either have negotiations or no negotiations, what has put Israel in the corner.

We are unable to confront Israel militarily, and this point was discussed at the Arab League Summit in March in Sirt (Libya). There I turned to the Arab States and I said:

‘If you want war, and if all of you will fight Israel, we are in favor. But the Palestinians will not fight alone because they don’t have the ability to do it.’

He [Abbas] said: ‘The West Bank was completely destroyed and we will not agree that it will be destroyed again,’ in addition to ‘the inability to confront Israel militarily.'”
[Al-Hayat Al-Jadida (Fatah controlled newspaper), July 6, 2010]