CBNNews.com - GAZA STRIP - Senior Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Zahar compared Palestinians in the Gaza Strip to Jewish residents of the Warsaw Ghetto during the Nazi reign.
In a Washington Post opinion piece entitled "No Peace without Hamas," al-Zahar called the Gaza Strip "the world's largest open-air prison."
"Sixty-five years ago, the courageous Jews of the Warsaw Ghetto rose in defense of their people," al-Zahar wrote. "We Gazans, living in the world's largest open-air prison, can do no less."
"[US] Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice acts as if a few alterations here and there would make the hideous straightjacket of apartheid fit better," he wrote.
In a long list of "essentials" necessary for the peace process to succeed, al-Zahar said not even "its first tiny step" of any agreement would succeed unless all Palestinian demands, including the following, are achieved.
- Withdrawal to the 1967 borders
- Dismantlement of all settlements
- Removal of all Israel Defense Forces soldiers in Gaza and Judea and Samaria
- Repudiation of "illegal annexation" of Jerusalem
- Release of all prisoners
- Permanent end to blockade of Gaza's "international borders," including its coastline and airspace
According to al-Zahar, last week's terror attack at the Nahal Oz Fuel Depot "should not surprise critics in the West. Palestinians are fighting a total war waged on us by a nation that mobilizes against our people with every means at its disposal. Resistance is our only option," he wrote.
Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter's decision to dialogue with Damascus-based Hamas chief Khaled Mashaal "brings honesty and pragmatism to the Middle East," he said.
Judaism, al-Zahar wrote, has "corrupted itself in the detour of Zionism, nationalism and apartheid," a conclusion shared with Carter, calling his visit with Mashaal a "sensible plan."
Sources: The Jerusalem Post, Haaretz