Israel Rejects Hamas Truce Offer []
4/25/2008 12:10:47 PM Israel on Friday rejected the Hamas proposal for a six-month truce in the Gaza Strip, saying that the offer was intended to buy time for the Islamist extremist group to re-group rather than to bring peace in the area.
Israeli Government spokesman Mark Regev said Friday that the offer does not appear to be "serious" and added that what Hamas seem to be proposing is 'the quiet before the storm.'
Ragev said that Israel wants peace in Gaza, but added that a truce is possible only if the Gaza militants stop attacking Israel, give up violence and stop the smuggling of arms from Egypt into the Palestinian territory.
Earlier Hamas had offered a six-month truce in Gaza if Israel lifts its blockade of the Palestinian territory. The Islamist group also offered to extend the truce to the occupied West Bank if the initial phase of the deal was implemented successfully.
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Al Sadr Says His Threat Is Targeted On U.S.-led Foreign Troops []
4/25/2008 11:52:01 AM Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr announced Friday that his threat to unleash an "open war" unless a crackdown against his Mahdi Army militia is stopped is targeted on U.S.-led foreign troops.
In a sermon during Friday prayers in Baghdad's militia stronghold of Sadr City, imam Sheik Hassan al-Edhari clarified that the Iraqi troops will be spared from the threat.
He also urged Iraqi soldiers and policemen "not to support the occupiers in combating your brothers." He called for an "end to the shedding of Iraqi blood" as a result of "a war between our Iraqi brothers."
Al-Sadr's message comes in the wake of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's meeting with British Foreign Secretary David Miliband on Thursday. Al-Maliki vowed that the crackdown on Shiite militias would continue, adding that the government's fight against the militants has won political support from Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish political parties.
On Friday, the U.S. military said 10 militants were killed in a joint crackdown by U.S. and Iraqi forces in overnight clashes in northeastern Baghdad.
Also on Friday, a U.S. soldier was killed in a roadside bomb blast south of Baghdad, the U.S. military said. With this, the number of American troops killed in April has risen to 39, according to the Associated Press. |
