Mahmoud Abbas moves to halt armed Palestinian resistance

The Palestinian authority chaired by Mahmoud Abbas has taken a series of decisions aiming at halting armed resistance operations against the Israelis. A matter which raises fears of bloody clashes between the authority and the armed groups Israel has ever hope to. This was on the fall on Abu Mazin's visit to Gaza to discuss the question of the truce and the cease fire.

The Palestinian communications minister Azzam al-Ahmad said that Mahmoud Abbas called on the security forces to prevent any acts of violence against the Israelis and to work for containing the activists of al-Aqsa martyrs groups (stemmed from Fatah movement) in the Palestinian security department. Al-Ahmad said "there are security measures and plans put by the national security council and we will start gradual steps until we reach the supremacy of the law and ending the state of chaos and we do seek for a reciprocated truce between the two sides."

On Monday, Mahmoud Abbas chaired a joint meeting at the headquarters of the Presidency in Ramullah for the government and the national security council. A security official said that Mahmoud Abbas asked in a previous meeting included leaders of the security department and the designated prime minister Ahmad Qurei and the minister of the interior Hakam Bal'awi all security forces to stop operations of violence against the Israelis. A high ranking Palestinian official said that the national security council ordered the formation of a fact finding commission to investigate al-Mintar ( Caeny) operation which was carried out by Palestinian resistance men on Thursday and resulted in killing 6 Israelis, described by the Palestinian officials as " damaging national interests."