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News ID: 51118
Publish Date : 13 March 2018 - 20:35

Palestinian PM Hamdallah Survives Gaza Bomb Attack

GAZA (Dispatches) – Palestinian Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah survived an assassination attempt in Gaza on Tuesday, the Palestinian Authority said after an apparent roadside bomb targeted his motorcade.
The attack on Hamdallah, who is spearheading the Palestinian Authority’s reconciliation efforts with Gaza’s dominant group, Hamas, took place as the White House prepared to hold a meeting on the humanitarian situation in the enclave.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for what one Palestinian Authority security official in Gaza said was a roadside bomb. A second device failed to explode, the official said.
Six security guards had been wounded, Hamdallah said shortly after the attack.
Spokesman for Interior Ministry in Gaza said security forces were investigating the explosion.
Fatah, the West Bank-based political party to which Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas belongs, denounced the attack and held the Gaza-based resistance movement Hamas responsible.
Hamas condemned the attack, saying it was aimed at undermining the security of the Gaza Strip and the unity of the Palestinians.
Hamdallah and his delegation had arrived in Gaza to participate in the inauguration of a wastewater treatment plant. They continued with the tour after the attack.
The visit is Hamdallah’s second since Palestinian factions signed a reconciliation deal in 2017 in Cairo as part of an Egypt-backed initiative.
The two movements of Fatah and Hamas agreed in October 2017 to "enable the national unity government to carry out its work and assume its full responsibility in running the Gaza Strip, as is the case in the West Bank, by December 1, 2017.”
The Fatah-Hamas reconciliation efforts have enraged Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who stressed that the regime would not accept "imaginary appeasement where the Palestinian side is reconciling at the expense of our existence.”
The Zionist premier has already said that he would put his stamp on reconciliation only if Hamas recognizes the regime, disbands its military wing and cuts ties with Iran.