The radical Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah said Thursday the overnight truce accord between Israel and the Palestinian Authority will not stop violence because it did not grant Palestinians their rights.
"We consider that these agreements are fragile," Hajj Mahmud Qomati, Hizbollah’s deputy politburo president, said in a statement.
Qomati, who spoke before a car bomb exploded in west Jerusalem and killed two people, was referring to the overnight Palestinian-Israeli accord to quell the unrest across Palestinian territories that has left more than 170 people dead over the past five weeks.
"They will not bring any results because they do not deal with the basic issues that caused the uprising ... mainly the issue of Jerusalem and the Palestinian rights that are not recognized by the Zionist entity," he said.
"These security agreements cannot be implemented, and the Palestinian people will continue to express their rejection of such agreements," he said.
Qomati said the Palestinian people "will continue their Intifada (uprising) and their resistance in all ways and means because their rights are still violated.
"I can assert that the Palestinian people will never recognize these agreements ... because such agreements do not grant them their rights," he said.
"There will be no stability and no peace in the region, even if such agreements are signed, as long as Palestinian rights are violated and as long as the agreements are unjust and incomplete."
Qomati said "the solution can only come in a just and comprehensive peace that gives the Palestinians their right to choose the authority to rule them.
"There should be a formula based on the fact that the Palestinian people decide their own fate and (the governing) authority which would rule on all religious confessions, including the Jews present under this authority," he said.
Hezbollah, which spearheaded a guerrilla war until Israeli troops pulled out of southern Lebanon in May after 22 years of occupation, has repeatedly urged Palestinians to escalate their Intifada until they regain all occupied Arab lands -- BEIRUT (AFP)
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