Hamas calls for 'Friday of Rage' in West Bank
Ahram Online, , Thursday 22 Oct 2015
The de facto Gaza Strip rulers want to 'deliver a message' to Israel


The Islamist resistance group Hamas has called for a "Friday of Rage", urging Palestinian protesters to join "new confrontations with the occupation forces" across the West Bank.

Hamas released a statement on their website on Thursday declaring that protests will occur after Friday prayers in a bid to "deliver a message to the [Israeli] occupiers that campaigns of arrests will not end the Quds (Jerusalem) Intifada."

The current wave of protests and repression started in late July when 18-month old toddler Ali Dawabsha was burned to death and three other Palestinians severely injured after their house in the occupied West Bank was set on fire by Israeli settlers.

The parents of the toddler, Riham and Saad, and their other son Ahmad, later lost their lives after suffering serious injuries in the arson.

Palestinians have also been protesting repeated illegal Israeli and Jewish settler attacks on Al-Aqsa Mosque and the closing of the Muslim holy site to worshippers on numerous occasions. Protests have taken place in occupied East Jerusalem, the occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

The Gaza strip, of which Hamas are de facto rulers, has suffered three Israeli offensives since 2008. The latest, in summer 2014, lasted 50 days and left 2,200 Palestinians dead and more than 10,000 injured, as well as rendering 100,000 people homeless.

In April 2014 US-mediated talks between Palestine and Israel collapsed nine months after beginning.

US Secretary of State John Kerry started talks with Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday in Berlin.

"It is absolutely critical to end all incitement, to end all violence and to find a road forward to build the possibility, which is not there today, for a larger process," said Kerry, as reported by AFP.

The US top diplomat said he had held telephone discussion with Jordan's King Abdullah II and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the previous 24 hours.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon met with Israeli government members, including Netanyahu, on Tuesday and with Abbas earlier on Wednesday, calling on both sides – only one of which has a sophisticated military apparatus - to avoid falling into a "dangerous abyss".

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