Palestinian official wants Qatar to back off
(Abbas and Mubarak in Cairo via al-Jazeera.)
Radio Monte Carlo reports on Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s visit to Cairo for discussions with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. The trip sounds standard enough, but in an interview with RMC, a Palestinian official by the name of Yasar Abutarabu (excuse the transliteration) has given an “unprecedented attack” on Qatar’s involvement in Palestine. (Note: Qatar is the home-base of al-Jazeera.)
There is no transcript of the interview, so here is my summary:
He said that Qatar is intervening in Palestinian internal affairs more than any other country — Arab or non-Arab — except Israel, of course, because Israel is occupying Palestine and interferes the most. The interviewer asks why he believes Qatar is building up Hamas’s point of view. The official says that he does not know if Qatar has some type of political plan in Palestine, but he mentions that Qatar is trying to turn al-Jazeera into an instrument which is very supportive of Hamas, as seen by al-Jazeera’s support of Hamas’s coup (inqilab) in Gaza.
(Addition: A source in the know has told me that this Palestinian official is totally corrupt and likes to get drunk in Tel Aviv.)
