Hamas stresses on national conciliation to face Israel

The Islamic Hamas movement stressed Wednesday that it's still clinging fast to dialogue and national conciliation to face the Israeli "stubbornness." In a statement issued in the Syrian capital of Damascus to mark the 11th anniversary of the Aqsa uprising, Hamas said it's still adhering fast to the target of establishing a full-sovereign Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital "without making concessions or giving up our national rights, and the right of return at the forefront, without recognizing the legitimacy of the Zionist entity on any span of our ancestors' soil." The government of the Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas is seeking recognition of an independent state on territories that Israel captured in the 1967 Mideast war, including the West Bank, east Jerusalem and Gaza. However, Damascus-based Palestinian factions, including Hamas, opposed Abbas' statehood bid and said in a statement issued recently in Damascus that the measure lacks national consensus and harbors "significant dangers." The factions said a Palestinian state on the 1967 borders would "abrogate the Palestinian people's rights in the historical Palestine and usher in the establishment of the Zionist state on the largest portion of the Palestinian territory, dropping thereby our people's right to resist occupation."