Source: AFP, 30-11-2006
CAIRO. - Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniya said yesterday a time frame for the creation of a Palestinian state needs to be defined but did not insist on the six-month deadline put forward by the leader of his Hamas movement.
A settlement "guaranteeing the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state inside the June 1967 borders . . . could come within six months or a year, a bit less or bit more", Haniya said. "What is essential is that (the issue) not remain unaddressed indefinitely and that a specific deadline be set," said Haniya, after meeting Arab League chief Amr Mussa on his first foreign tour since taking office in March. "A deadline is necessary," agreed Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit, who also met Haniya yesterday.
He explained it would help exert pressure on the Jewish state to seek a final settlement to the "Israeli"-Palestinian conflict.
Khaled Meshaal, the Damascus-based leader of Hamas's political bureau, threatened a "third intifada" during a recent visit to Cairo if an agreement for the creation of a Palestinian state was not reached within six months.
"We give the international community six months for real political horizons . . . There is a historic opportunity for a Palestinian state within 1967 borders," the leader of the Islamic movement said on November 25. "Israel" captured the West Bank, Gaza Strip and Arab east Jerusalem (al-Quds) in the 1967 Middle East war.