Zoabi justifies Hamas rockets as fighting 'soft occupation' in Gaza

Palestinians should not negotiate or coordinate security with Israel, Balad MK writes in Hamas publication.

By LAHAV HARKOV
MK Haneen Zoabi. (photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)
MK Haneen Zoabi.
(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)
Palestinians should continue fighting, besiege Israel and refuse to negotiate, MK Haneen Zoabi (Balad) wrote in an op-ed for a Hamas-affiliated news site this week.
The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) translated an article Zoabi published Sunday on felesteen.
ps in which the word Israel appeared only in quotes throughout the article.
“‘Israel’ will in no way eliminate Hamas, the motives for the resistance or the motives for [pursuing] liberation from the occupation,” she wrote.
According to the MK, Israel maintains a “soft occupation” in Gaza based on a blockade, a fence and security cooperation – she did not specify with whom – which is “precisely [what] the Hamas rockets are eliminating.”
“Hamas is eliminating Israel’s belief that over the past decade it has successfully used these three important achievements – the fence, the siege and the security coordination – to control the situation and to cement a situation in which there is an occupation without an occupier. The resistance is restoring the Palestinian presence as an occupied [people] to the Israeli [consciousness] – [a presence] that had disappeared from its reality and its consciousness.
The resistance is reminding the Israeli that he is an occupier, and of the reality that he wishes to forget, so that he can live in peace and security without being reminded of its existence,” Zoabi wrote.
The lawmaker accused Arab countries and the international community of a “conspiratorial silence” that will lead Israel to conclude that it can prepare for the next round of “oppression, killing and destruction.”
Zoabi posited that for Israel to end the “occupation” of Gaza and no longer maintain its elements, “Palestinians should declare the end of their own deadly trinity of [security] coordination, negotiations and the schism [between Hamas and Fatah].
“We must abandon our own deadly trinity – and instead of security coordination, declare popular resistance; instead of negotiating with ‘Israel,’ besiege it; and instead of splitting, unite,” she wrote.


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