Russia Seeks to Unify Palestinian Factions, Including Hamas and Islamic Jihad, at Forthcoming Moscow Parley
Russia will seek to unify the various Palestinian factions at a special meeting in Moscow next week, one of Moscow’s top diplomats confirmed on Monday.
Russia’s deputy foreign minister, Mikhail Bogdanov, told pro-regime media outlets that “all Palestinian representatives who are located in different countries, in particular in Syria and Lebanon, other countries in the region,” had received invitations to the meeting in Moscow, which convenes on Feb 26. At the same time, Bogdanov stressed that President Vladimir Putin’s regime continues to regard the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) — the main power in the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority (PA) — as “the sole legal representative of the Palestinian people.”
The invitation has been extended to up to 14 Palestinian factions, according to Russian media sources, including Hamas and Islamic Jihad, both of whom are sworn to Israel’s violent elimination.
Bogdanov’s statement came as the PA’s Prime Minister, Muhammad Shtayyeh, urged Hamas to attend the talks in Moscow.
“We are ready to engage. If Hamas is not then that’s a different story. We need Palestinian unity,” Syhtayyeh declared in remarks at the Munich Security Conference over the weekend. Asked about the desirability of unifying with an organization designated as a terrorist group by the US, EU and other democracies, which is responsible for the atrocities carried out in southern Israel on Oct, 7, Shytayyeh dismissively responded, “One should not continue focusing on October 7.”
Since the Hamas pogrom, Russia has attempted to bolster its influence among the various Palestinian groups. On Oct. 26, it hosted a Hamas delegation led by Musa Abu Marzouk, a member of its politburo who received the status of “Specially Designated Terrorist” from the US Treasury Department in 1995.
More recently, Russia has criticized the decision of a slew of western governments to suspend aid to UNRWA, the UN refugee agency exclusively dedicated to the Palestinians, on the grounds that several of its employees had colluded with Hamas.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov denounced the decision as “collective punishment” while Putin himself spoke of the world’s “sacred duty” to aid Palestinians in Gaza at a recent press conference.
Russia’s latest intervention in the conflict between Hamas and Israel has been overshadowed by western fury over the death of opposition leader Alexei Navalny on Saturday while in custody at a penal colony in Kharp, a remote region close to the Arctic circle.
On Monday, Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya, expressly accused Putin of orchestrating her husband’s assassination, promising to release further details soon. Separately, the US is considering additional sanctions against Russia over Navalny, whose body has not yet been released, while the EU declared that it would “spare no efforts to hold Russia’s political leadership and authorities to account, in close coordination with our partners; and impose further costs for their actions, including through sanctions.”
Source » algemeiner.com
