A senior Palestinian official said Wednesday the Palestinians were in favor of a war of attrition against Israel.
"What we want is for the war of attrition to continue," Faruq Qaddumi, head of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) political department, told a press conference in Dubai.
"The Intifada has only just begun," Qaddumi said of the uprising in the Palestinian territories that has gone on for nearly seven weeks, causing the death of more than 220 people, most of them Palestinians.
"The Intifada is the right way. It must continue and it must last, despite the Israeli blockade" of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
He said the "armed struggle is the only way to face up to Israeli arrogance," adding that it will be "carried inside Israel" and "target Jewish settlers."
Qaddumi said the Palestinians were winning the international public opinion battle, pointing to the recent Arab and Islamic summits, which backed the Palestinians but held off from coordinated action against Israel.
"We know the Israelis are imposing a blockade on us, but we are in the process of encircling Israel before international public opinion," he said.
"The Intifada has also strengthened Arab solidarity and motivated the Arab masses," he added.
Concretely, he suggested that the killing of 17 US sailors in a suicide- bomb attack on a US destroyer in Aden harbor last month "reflects the rage of the Arab and Islamic masses against American alignment with Israel."
The attack demonstrated the conviction of the Arab masses of an "American renunciation of achieving a just peace in the Middle East and of Israel's denial" of that peace -- DUBAI (AFP)
© 2000 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
