GAZA, 8 February 2005 — Thousands of Palestinians took to the streets in Gaza yesterday to urge President Mahmoud Abbas to link any revival of peacemaking with Israel to the release of nearly 8,000 Palestinians from Israeli jails.
Leaders who participated in the rally said no calm could prevail after four years of bloodshed without agreement on a timetable for the release of all prisoners, with priority given to long-serving inmates.
“We can only see hope in the summit in Sharm El-Sheikh if there was a clear Israeli decision to free our prisoners,” said Ferial Kullab, one of the marchers. She held a picture of a relative sentenced to life imprisonment for killing Israelis.
In a goodwill gesture to Abbas, who meets Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon at a summit in the Egyptian Red Sea resort today, Israel announced last week it would free 900 Palestinian prisoners, but not any convicted of deadly attacks.
Palestinian leaders voiced disappointment that veteran prisoners Israel describes as having “blood on their hands” would remain behind bars, and both sides agreed on Saturday to set up a joint committee to set criteria for release.
Hailing Abbas’s efforts to coax fighters into a truce, Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz said Israel would release the jailed son of Marwan Barghouti, a grassroots leader in the West Bank.
Marwan Barghouti was sentenced to five life terms by Israel after being convicted of orchestrating attacks that killed Israelis. His son, Qassam, was arrested in 2003.
At the rally, mothers of prisoners held their pictures aloft as they marched under heavy rain.
“Abu Mazen you can negotiate but do not sell us out,” they chanted.
In another development, Israeli authorities have released a captain in the Israeli Army accused of fatally shooting a 13-year-old Palestinian girl at close range, media reported yesterday.
The killing in October caused outrage world over and led to an indictment against the officer in November, but a chief witness for the prosecution suddenly changed his testimony Sunday.
Another witness had earlier retracted his statement that he saw the officer, identified only as Captain R., firing a volley at the girl. Both now say they only heard it.
The two witnesses were soldiers in the company commanded by Captain R.
According to the captain, they gave false testimony because they wanted to frame him.
But Israel Radio quoted the prosecutor as saying that he had information about “intense pressure” and “even threats” against the soldiers who testified against their commander.
Soldiers at a lookout post on the Gaza Strip border with Egypt shot dead 13-year-old Iman Al-Hams on Oct. 5. They believed she was carrying a bag with explosives, but when they approached her she transpired to be a schoolgirl carrying only books.
Their commander nevertheless allegedly fired his semi-automatic weapon at her as she was lying on the ground, to “verify a kill” — military parlance for making sure fighters are dead by firing at them from short range. Family members said her body was riddled with bullets.
Meanwhile, the Israeli Army yesterday reopened a border crossing between Israel and the Gaza Strip that had been closed after a deadly attack in mid-January, the military and Palestinian officials said.
Traders exporting food and other perishable goods were being allowed to use the Karni crossing which was the site of an attack by Palestinian fighters on Jan. 14, Mahmud Farraj, a Palestinian official in the district coordinating office, said.
Six Israelis and the three Palestinian assailants were killed in the attack at the Karni crossing, which is reserved for Palestinian food trucks.
It was temporarily reopened late last month but it will now be opened each day between 8:30 a.m. and 5:00 p.m., Farraj added.
In the run-up to a peace summit in Egypt today, Israeli authorities also reopened the main Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt last week that had likewise been closed after a Palestinian attack.
