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Hundreds
and thousands of Palestinian mourners
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Additional
Reporting By Mohammad Yassin, IOL Correspondent
GAZA
CITY, August 22 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - Some 100,000
enraged Palestinians packed the streets of Gaza City Friday, August
22, for the funeral of martyrs Ismail Abu Shaban and his two
associates who were assassinated in an Israeli air strike a day
earlier, vowing to avenge them.
Hoisting
banners and flags and chanting anti-Israeli slogans, their ranks were
swelled by thousands more Gazans pouring out of Friday prayers to vent
their anger over the death of Abu Shanab, a top political leader of
the resistance group Hamas.
While
mourning the deaths of Abu Shanab and his associates, the crowd also
buried a seven-week-old truce declared unilaterally by the main
Palestinian resistance factions on June 29, reported Agence
France-Presse (AFP).
Hamas
and Islamic Jihad issued a joint statement Friday, August 22, formally
ending the truce and heaping blame on Israeli Prime Minister Ariel
Sharon for wrecking the fragile ceasefire.
The
bodies of the three men were first transported from Shifa hospital to
their respective homes in Gaza City, covered with the group's green
flag and surrounded by the group’s members.
As
the crowd was marching towards the cemetery, some protestors were also
carrying a mock coffin bearing the word "hudna".
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Angry
Palestinians carrying a mock coffin bearing the word
"hudna" (truce) |
Amid
a forest of Palestinian and Hamas flags, a group of gun-toting
resistance fighters from the armed wing of Hamas - Ezzedin al-Qassam
Brigades – vowed to avenge the new martyrs, chanting: "Tel
Aviv, here we come! We will be martyrs!"
The
Gaza Strip is Hamas's stronghold and some 20,000 furious supporters of
the movement had already taken to the streets there Thursday night to
protest the new Israeli crime against a moderate political figure of
the resistance group.
All
Palestinian factions were represented, after the National and Islamic
Forces - an umbrella organization grouping all Palestinian movements -
issued a call for the population to take part.
Ziad
Abu Amr, the Palestinian Culture Minister who was also in charge of
liaising with factions on the now-defunct truce, was present, as well
as several other ministers and members of parliament.
Thousands
of Palestinians had followed Abu Shanab's body from his home in the
Sheikh Radwan neighborhood to the al-Omari mosque, before the
procession gathered steam on the way to the cemetery.
Gaza
residents said the funeral was the largest since the start of the
Al-Aqsa Intifada in September 2000.
The
last funeral to have reached similar
proportions was in July 2002 after Hamas military leader Salah
Shehadeh was assassinated in a similar Israeli air strike, which left
another 14
people dead, including several children.
Stone
Dead
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"Israel
had killed the truce stone dead with the first missile fired at
martyr Abu Shanab’s car," Rantissi said |
Top
Hamas leader Abdelaziz
al-Rantissi, who narrowly escaped an Israeli attempt on his life
on June 10, asserted that "Israel had killed the truce stone dead
with the first missile fired at martyr Abu Shanab’s car."
Vowing
to strike hard and in every place, he told IslamOnline.net that
"Hamas will resume its martyr operations against the Israeli
occupation.
"Hamas
only option is shattering strikes across historical Palestine
(including the now Israel)."
On
the impact of Abu Shanab’s assassination on inter-Palestinian
relations, the leading Hamas figure said the Israeli crime helped in
consolidating Palestinian bonds.
He
cited, in this respect, "the thousands of people who flooded Gaza
streets today to reaffirm that resistance remains the only alternative
of the entire Palestinian people."
Rantissi,
who founded Hamas in Gaza City in 1987 with Abu Shanab, asserted that
Hamas would not be deterred by the dear price it has to pay for
defending Palestine and the Palestinian people.
"Until
they leave our lands, the Israelis will have to live in
trenches," he asserted, hinting at wide-scale retaliation for the
Israeli heinous crime.
Asked
if he expects another Israeli attempt on his life, the Hamas leader
confidently replied: "I’m not expecting but rather awaiting to
meet my martyrdom. But let it be known to all that the resistance
would not die out with the assassination of Rantissi, (Mahmoud)
al-Zahar or the Islamic leadership."
On
what Hamas would do if Israel assassinated all members of its
leadership, he told IOL "then the group would form an underground
body to steer the battle."
Pride
Not Loss
Speaking
to IOL, Hamas founder and spiritual leader, Sheikh Ahmad Yassin,
threatened that "the Israeli people will pay a costly price for
the policies of their criminal government which is dragging them to an
abyss."
He
pledged that Israel would never be able to finish off Hamas,
underlined that "Hamas is a popular movement of deep and solid
routes in the Palestinian soil and if Israel assassinates its
political leaders others will grow to protect it."
Like
Rantissi, Sheikh Yassin expected Israel to try to kill him, asserting
that the most honorable death for any person is to day a martyr.
"My
assassination would not be a loss to Hamas as much as a source of
pride to the nation and Muslims," concluded the aging leader.
