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May 24, 2007

Israel Arrests More Than 30 Hamas Members as Crackdown Continues
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http://enews.voanews.com/t?ctl=1798EDB:A6F02AD83191E160488329040D00CBB89574F7DCC14957C0 Most prominent
leader arrested is Nasser Shaer, education minister in Palestinian
unity government Israeli security forces arrested more than 30 leading
members of Hamas, Thursday, in the occupied West Bank - part of a
continuing crackdown against Hamas for launching rockets into Israel
from the Gaza Strip. VOA's Jim Teeple has details from our Jerusalem
Bureau.







Nasser Shaer is escorted by Israeli soldiers after his release from an
Israeli jail at the Hawara Checkpoint near Nablus (Sept 2006 file
photo)The most prominent Hamas leader arrested is Nasser Shaer, the
education minister in the Hamas-dominated Palestinian unity
government. Israeli forces also detained the mayors of the West Bank
towns Nablus, Qalqiliya and Beita, as well as at least one former
cabinet minister and several sitting members of the Palestinian
legislature.

Speaking on Israeli Radio, Defense Minister Amir Peretz says the
arrests are part of an ongoing crackdown on Hamas for its continued
rocket attacks against the southern Israeli city, Sderot, from the
Gaza Strip.

Peretz says arrests are preferable to bloodshed. He says the
detentions send a message to Hamas leaders that Israel will not
tolerate the rocket attacks.

Israeli air strikes targeted currency exchange shops in the Gaza Strip
that Israeli military authorities say were being used to funnel money
to Hamas militants. The arrests and ongoing Israeli strikes in Gaza
were condemned by Palestinian officials, like presidential spokesman
Nabil Aburdeneh speaking on Palestinian radio.

Aburdeneh says the Israeli actions will not help Israel's security and
could only provoke Palestinians - saying international mediation is
needed to end the current crisis.

The Israeli actions on Thursday followed a meeting in Gaza between
Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh and moderate Palestinian President
Mahmoud Abbas. Media reports say the two men discussed declaring a
unilateral truce with Israel and the truce between the Palestinian
factions Hamas and Fatah that went into effect a few days ago.

Palestinian in-fighting, in the past two weeks, has led to the deaths
of about 50 people and sparked a surge in the firing of rockets
against Israel by Hamas - which in turn has led to Israeli reprisals
in the form of air strikes against Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip.


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