Hamas rejects Abbas' account over Goldstone report

• Source: Xinhua
• [10:17 October 12 2009]
• Comments

A senior Hamas leader on Sunday rejected Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' justifications for supporting putting off a UN vote on a Gaza war report.

"Abbas wants to dodge responsibility for postponing the report by saying that Hamas has foreign agenda while in fact he is linked to Israeli and US agenda," said Mahmoud Zahar, a Gaza-based Hamas politburo member.

Palestinians were outraged for an alleged role by Abbas in delaying the UN Human Rights Council's (UNHRC) vote on a report condemning Israel for war crimes during Israel's winter military operation in Gaza.

The UNHRC delayed the vote on the report, conducted by a UN fact-finding mission led by South African Justice Richard Goldstone, to its next session in March 2010.

Zahar said Abbas "has blocked the report to give Israel a chance to escape being condemned" for the war on Gaza which killed over 1,000 Palestinians.