Hamas: No need for foreign observers to return to Gaza-Egypt border

May 29, 2011, 10:00 GMT

Gaza City - A Hamas official said Sunday the Palestinians saw no need for the immediate return of European observers to Gaza's border crossing with Egypt.

Hamas is capable of operating the Palestinian side of the crossing alone, said Ghazi Hamad, of the Islamist movement in de-facto control of the strip.

'The Palestinians have proven their ability to operate the Rafah crossing,' said Hamad, the deputy foreign minister in the de-facto Hamas government and the chief of Gaza's border crossing authorities.

'Talking about the return of international observers to work at the Rafah crossing; there is no need for them at this time,' he told Hamas' al-Aqsa Radio.

Under a 2005 internationally brokered agreement between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, European observers should be monitoring the Rafah crossing.

But they suspended their mission after Hamas violently seized sole control of Gaza in 2007.

Under the agreement, Palestinian Authority security forces, not those of Hamas, should be in charge of the Palestinian side of the crossing.

Referring to the 2005 agreement, Hamad said it 'had its special circumstances when it was signed, but the situation now is completely different.'

He listed the Egyptian revolution, the reconciliation pact brokered between Hamas and the West Bank-based PA earlier this month after years of feuding, and Hamas' control of Gaza.

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