The head of Hamas’ political bureau, Khaled Meshaal, on August 30 pledged his movement would continue its struggle for “the liberation of Palestine.” Meshaal was addressing an audience at a tent set up in Sweileh, where he received condolences over the death of his father, Abdul Rahim Meshaal, who was buried a day before. “Hamas, which has a political vision, sticks to the land, Jerusalem, the right of return (for Palestinian refugees) and resistance as a way for the liberation of Palestine as well as to the political and diplomatic equations and other spheres of work,” Meshaal said. He vowed to work for ending rifts with inter-Palestinian feuds and to cooperate with any effort that seeks to achieve Palestinian reconciliation, be it Arab or Islamic, because “internal Palestinian divisions reflect an abnormal state of affairs.”
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was represented at the funeral by Speaker of the Palestine National Council Salim Zaanoun. The Damascus-based Hamas leader travelled to Amman on August 29 after King Abdallah allowed his entry to Jordan for the first time in a decade to attend the burial of his father and receive condolences.
Meshaal, who was deported from Jordan 10 years ago after the closure of Hamas offices in Amman in 1999, assured the Jordanian government that his group had no intention to interfere in Jordan’s domestic affairs. “We assure the leaders of Jordan that Hamas will only do what is in Jordan’s interests because we do understand the international and regional equations,” he said. The Hamas leader pledged to foil any Israeli or US scheme that may seek “to impose solutions at the expense of Jordan,” including the alternative homeland. He was referring to a recent proposal by an Israeli Knesset member to establish a homeland for Palestinians in Jordan.