Time's up Hamas, what's your answer to Abbas?

Interior Ministry general director Jamal Abu Samhadana,  also a founding member of the Popular Resistance Committees who had been accused of plotting attacks inside Israel, was 'assassinated' in an Israeli air strike in the Gaza town of Rafah on Thursday.  As a result, Hamas has called off the 'cease fire/truce'. 

With the gloves off again (were they ever really back on?), a rocket veered off course today and killed a family while on a picnic.

Israeli gunboats off the Mediterranean coast shelled suspected rocket launching sites in Gaza, and Palestinian officials said the artillery hit a family picnicking on the beach, killing nine people, including three children.

Israel has been targeting sites where it suspects Palestinian militants vowing to avenge the assassination of the Hamas government‘s security chief have fired rockets into Israel.  source

This is a terrible thing to happen, but when living in each other's back yard and lobbing missiles at each other, accidents are sure to happen occasionally.  Egypt is condemning the attacks, saying it was use of excessive force by Israel.

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak met Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh this week and pressed him to resume peace talks with the Palestinian Authority.

Egyptian officials in Gaza have also been mediating between the two main Palestinian factions, the secular Fatah movement of President Mahmoud Abbas and the Islamist movement Hamas.  source

President Mahmoud Abbas has given Hamas until Saturday to accept the 18-point plan or he will put it to a referendum.  Hamas/The Palestinian Authority are broke and workers continue to go unpaid.  The United States and EU have held back funds from the Palestinians until Hamas accepts Israel's right to exist. 

Several Arab/Muslim countries have given large sums to the Palestinians, but only in what is considered 'one time shots', with no apparent plans for regular infusions of cash. 

The United Nations and a number of NGOs (including churches) operating in occupied Palestinian territory have launched an emergency appeal for additional funding in the face of a deepening humanitarian crisis. ... David Shearer, head of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNRWA) says humanitarian agencies have upwardly revised their 2006 emergency appeal by 80 per cent.  It has now gone up from 215million US dollars to 385 million US dollars.  source

Everybody in the world seems to have an opinion on Israel and Palestine.  I'm serious, everybody.  This is a global concern and today the Communist party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) put their two-cents in:

The Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) Friday said India should take a lead in building world opinion for restoring international financial aid to Palestinian Authority and the need to address the larger issue of a homeland for its people.

Terming as 'utterly condemnable' the stand of Israel, the US and European Union in cutting off funds to the Palestinian Authority after the Hamas formed the government, the party urged the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government to take a categorical stand that the wishes of the Palestinian people should be respected and all financial allocations to them should be restored.  source

Today's the deadline Hamas, what's your answer to Abbas?

Dive Desk says:  "Hamas Largely Tells The Truth"

Thanks Hamas for “Largely Telling the Truth”. It makes it so much easier to deny funds and retaliate to the suicide bombers/other acts of war with a clear conscience. Now that Hamas has offically called off the truce … let the games begin in earnest!