the hot-off-the-presses news as i arrived here this morning is that israel has accepted the french-sponsored gaza truce plan. one thing that's confusing is that the news report quotes president sarkozy as saying that the "palestinian authority" has accepted the truce plan as well. i'm a little unclear who they mean by the "palestinian authority" considering that france (like much of the west) doesn't recognize hamas' authority over gaza. does that mean the deal is just with fatah?
al jazeera is a little better, they at least bothered to ask hamas what it thinks about the proposal. (the hamas spokesperson replied: "We are discussing all the initatives that have been put forward. We cannot say there is a specific decision on this initative.")
it's really fascinating to me how israel claims it is at war against hamas, and not the palestinian people in general. but in the negotiations to resolve the conflict, everyone's trying hard not to be seen dealing with hamas. that makes no sense at all if hamas really is the adversary.
