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Hamas says Abbas’ speech at UN emotional

23 September 2011 20:44 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. The Islamic Hamas movement said Friday that the speech given by President Mahmoud Abbas at the United Nations General Assembly was emotional with big contradictions and concessions from the Palestinian side, APA reports.

"He could not employ the worldwide sympathy with the Palestinians to lift the legitimacy of the Israeli occupation," Ismail Al-Ashqar, a Hamas official said.

Abbas, standing at the marble podium, spoke of the failure of years of peace talks with Israel, blaming the Israeli government. He also said that the Palestinian state would be established on the borders of the lands that Israel occupied in 1967, with East Jerusalem as its capital.

"Abbas is unauthorized to give up 88 percent of Palestine’s historical land," Al-Ashqar said, noting "this concession is very difficult and he (Abbas) has not put this on referendum."

For Hamas, Abbas, while talking about refugees, did not emphasize on their right to return to their original homes and villages in what is now called Israel, Al-Ashqar said.

He hopes that Abbas could work on restoring national unity rather than going back to negotiations with Israel.