One of Hamas' top leaders, Dr. Mahmud a-Zahar, said on Saturday his movement would lock up anyone breaching the calm with Israel and said several members of armed groups had already been arrested. "There is an agreement between Islamic Jihad and Hamas stating that all people from Jihad or Hamas, who violate this accord will be arrested and their weapons confiscated," Zahar was quoted as saying in the Palestinian daily Al-Quds.
"People have already been arrested. Some opened fire on lorries and others fired rockets at the Nahal Oz (oil terminal)," Zahar added. According to him, Hamas had even negotiated for some families to hand over their children to Hamas police for breaking the calm.
However, Islamic Jihad threatened on Saturday to resume rocket attacks on Israel if it continues military operations in the occupied West "Islamic Jihad reserves the right to respond to all Israeli violations," one of the group's Gaza Strip chiefs Khaled al-Batch said on Saturday, but added they would "not take the initiative in breaking the calm."
"If the crossing points (with Gaza) do not reopen, if the siege and the aggression does not stop, the calm will go up in smoke," Batch added. "In the West Bank or in Gaza, we are the children of a single cause and a single land," he added, according to AFP.
