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May 08, 2007
Hamasniks Tell Captors to Drop Islamic Justification
The irony has a distinctly mideastern flavor. The AP reports:
Palestinian officials are trying to persuade the kidnappers of a long-held BBC journalist that they are mistaken in using Islamic justifications for their actions, an aide to the Palestinian premier said yesterday.
Ahmed Youssef, an aide to Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, said there had been contacts with the kidnappers of Alan Johnston, who has been held for 50 days, by far the longest time in captivity for a Western hostage.
"It's on the way to being resolved. It's being addressed religiously and ideologically," he said, but would not say whether he expected Johnston to be released in days or weeks.
Youssef said negotiators were trying to convince kidnappers that the extremist Islamic ideology they used to justify holding Westerners was incorrect. Last week Haniyeh suggested the kidnappers belonged to an Islamic extremist group.
An Islamic extremist group, as opposed to say, Haniyeh's Hamas, listed as a terror group by the U.S., EU and Israel and whose charter calls for Muslims to kill "the Jews."
The AP article also says that Youssef denies earlier reports about the captors' demands.
Posted by TS at May 8, 2007 05:12 AM
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