GAZA CITY, 23 August 2004 — The Palestinian group Hamas denied yesterday that it would ever carry out attacks in the United States as it condemned the arrest of two alleged members by American authorities as politically motivated.
“It is not our policy to carry out any attacks against Zionist targets outside the Palestinian occupied land,” the movement said in a statement received by AFP in its Gaza stronghold.
The statement also repeated claims by other Hamas officials that the arrest of Muhammad Hamid Khalil Salah, of Chicago, and Abdelhaleem Hasan Abdelraziq Ashqar, of Washington, were politically motivated by US President George W. Bush’s administration ahead of November’s presidential run-off with John Kerry.
US Attorney General John Ashcroft announced on Friday that the pair had been charged with supporting a foreign terrorist organization, money laundering and racketeering. “We condemn all the continuing American attempts to target the movement (Hamas) by different ways and means in order to raise its electoral stock, especially because John Kerry is getting more support,” the statement added.
Following the two arrests, the US State Department Saturday renewed warnings to Americans to exercise extreme caution in the Middle East and North Africa.
