World

Hamas Is Excluded From Mideast Peace Talks

June 22, 2007 / 12:55 PM EDT / CBS/AP

Representatives of the Quartet of Mideast peacemakers will hold talks Tuesday in Jerusalem for the first time since Islamic Hamas seized control of the Gaza Strip, U.N. and Israeli officials said Friday.

The meeting comes as moderate regional leaders try to use Hamas' takeover of the chaotic territory to promote peacemaking between Israel and moderate Palestinians in the West Bank lead by President Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah. But deposed Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas' leader, warned Friday that his movement could not be ignored.

The Quartet meeting will follow a regional summit Monday with the leaders of Israel, the Palestinians, Egypt and Jordan, reports CBS News correspondent Robert Berger.

In other developments:

Israel has sent 400 tons of food, 50,000 gallons of fuel and 40 tons of cooking gas across the border into Gaza, reports Berger. But Bernard Barett of the Red Cross says the biggest problem is the hospitals, with as many as 500 people injured in the factional fighting between Hamas and Fatah. Israel is considering airlifting food into Gaza to avert a looming humanitarian crisis.

Abbas on Friday authorized the government to review all private organizations, a step that might enable him to shut down dozens of Hamas-allied groups in the West Bank. He also gave these groups a week to re-register.

In a bid to exert control over chaotic Gaza, Hamas demanded that residents turn in most of the estimated 400,000 rifles and guns that have flooded the territory. But the only items dropped off at a collection point were a metal door, a window frame and a faucet, reports Berger. Those fell under the category of "looted government property." The poor response indicates that Hamas may not fare any better than its predecessors in curbing lawlessness in Gaza.

A top Fatah security commander resigned over his failure to prevent Hamas' takeover of Gaza, Palestinian officials said. Abbas accepted the resignation of Rashid Abu Shbak, who headed the Fatah-linked Internal Security organization in Gaza and the West Bank, officials in Abbas' office announced Friday.

Efforts to restart the peace process have been complicated by the emergence of a two-headed Palestine ruled by the Iranian-backed Hamas in Gaza and the Western-backed Fatah in the West Bank.

Immediately after Hamas routed Fatah-led security forces in Gaza, Abbas expelled Hamas from its governing coalition with Fatah and installed a new government of moderates.

In confirming the Quartet meeting, Israeli government spokeswoman Miri Eisin said it will consist of low-level envoys.

A higher-level meeting of officials from the Quartet — the United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations — was to have taken place Monday in Egypt. But that session was delayed to give Quartet officials time to assess changes in the region following Hamas' violent takeover of Gaza last week.

A U.N. spokesman in Jerusalem, Brenden Varma, said the officials gathering in Jerusalem on Tuesday would be "comparing notes."

In Moscow, Sergei Yakovlev, a Russian Foreign Ministry envoy for Middle East peacemaking, said officials "will discuss the situation in the region, the talks for the Quartet and plans of action for the future," Russia's Interfax news agency reported.

Abbas will meet on Saturday in Amman with Abdullah and on Sunday in Cairo with Mubarak to coordinate Monday's summit, Abbas' office said Friday.

In Gaza City on Friday, Haniyeh said Fatah would not be able to exclude Hamas when determining the future of the Palestinian people. And he derided international attempts to sideline the Islamic group.

"There is a big force that nobody can wipe out," Haniyeh said in his weekly Friday sermon, referring to Hamas.

He also promised to give a detailed political speech in coming days to clarify the group's positions.

Hamas spokesman Salah Bardawil, denounced Monday's summit and said Abbas would not be able to wipe out "Hamas' sovereignty."

Hamas will not back down in its efforts to establish a Palestinian state "in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip on the 1967 borders ... with Jerusalem as its capital," Bardawil said of the territories Israel captured that year in the Mideast war.