Hamas Agrees to Cease Attacks

Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants said Saturday that they would hold fire against Israel while deciding whether to honor the cessation of hostilities declared at last week’s landmark summit in Egypt between Palestinian and Israeli leaders.

The announcements, essentially restoring a de facto cease-fire in place before the summit, mark a partial victory for Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, who met with militant leaders late Saturday in Gaza City to press them to halt further attacks on Jewish settlements.

The talks carried urgency after Hamas fighters let loose with an extended barrage of rocket and mortar fire in the Gaza Strip two days after Tuesday’s summit in the seaside resort of Sharm el Sheik.

Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahar said after Saturday’s meeting that his group was “committed to what is called ‘quietness.’ ” He added that Hamas would launch strikes against Israeli targets in retaliation for any perceived hostile acts by Israel.

The group said Thursday’s attack, which caused no injuries, was in response to the deaths of two Palestinians, one of them a man who was shot while walking near a settlement in southern Gaza.

In a shift, Hamas said it would consult first with Palestinian Authority officials before deciding on any retaliation.

Zahar said Hamas leaders would hold internal discussions during the coming weeks to address concerns, including their quest for more clout within Palestinian politics. The group plans to run in parliamentary elections this summer and is pushing for rules to ensure that it would get the most seats possible. Hamas is also intent on winning the release of most or all of the 8,000 Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails.

Islamic Jihad also planned to confer with its members.

Israel, meanwhile, said earlier Saturday that it would allow dozens of Palestinian deportees to return to their homes in the West Bank. The return of deportees, an important issue to Palestinian militants, would affect about 55 Palestinians expelled to Gaza or Europe. Most were deported under terms that ended a standoff between Palestinian fighters and Israeli troops at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem in 2002. It was not clear when the return would take place.

Saturday’s developments were signs of the tricky political landscape Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon must navigate. Each came home from the summit to confront political headaches that could threaten their tentative moves toward peace.

Sharon has been greeted by a right wing that is mobilized against his Gaza Strip withdrawal plan, a focal point of the emerging peace process. For Abbas, Thursday’s mortar and rocket attack appeared to mock his vow to halt violence against Israelis. The summit, which was highlighted by declarations on each side to cease the fighting, drew praise across much of the world and appeared to have given a boost to Sharon and Abbas with their publics back home. But the peace moves upset Israeli and Palestinian hard-liners, setting the stage for what could be weeks of turmoil as each leader seeks to fulfill his central promise: Israel’s planned evacuation from Gaza this summer and Abbas’ commitment to quiet the fighters. The internal challenges are not new, but the summit has elevated global expectations for progress and raised the stakes considerably. How much Sharon and Abbas can achieve together will ride heavily on whether each succeeds in his own plans.

Israel and the United States expect Abbas to rein in militants if there is to be any hope of negotiations for a future Palestinian state. The Palestinians are eager to get to full-scale peace talks, but Israel has made it clear that it wants to focus on security matters for now. Israel has insisted that Abbas’ vow to quell the violence requires him to round up fighters, confiscate weapons and dismantle the makeshift factories where bombs and Kassam rockets are made.

Abbas has previously said he prefers persuasion to force, hoping he can get the militants to lay down their weapons on their own by drawing the groups’ leaders into mainstream Palestinian politics and perhaps training the fighters for the security forces.

Abbas had won promises from several militant groups, including Hamas, to refrain from attacks while he negotiated with Israel before the summit. That promise appeared to evaporate once the summit succeeded, when Hamas leaders asserted that they were not bound by truce declarations issued by Sharon and Abbas. The de facto cease-fire had brought two weeks of calm to the Gaza Strip until Thursday, when Hamas fired 56 rockets and mortar shells into Israeli communities.

Observers have questioned whether Abbas, elected last month by a wide margin but without a passionate grass-roots following, is strong enough politically to stand up to those committing violence. His decision to fire top security officials in Gaza in response to the barrage came as a pleasant surprise to many skeptics.

Among those sacked were the head of the national security forces, the Gaza police chief and the commander and deputy commander for southern Gaza, where most of the weapons were fired. If he is to create order, Abbas also will have to reform the mishmash of Palestinian security forces, consolidating them into fewer agencies and rooting out corrupt commanders.

That will not be easy, especially because Abbas has yet to name a new government since being elected in January. Abbas is expected to nominate a general, Nasser Yousef, as interior minister, a crucial post that oversees the police.

The Palestinian president also confronts a public desperate for better living conditions after more than four years of fighting and Israeli restrictions that many say have throttled the Palestinian economy. Loosening restrictions would depend on Israel, and the extent of any concessions is likely to hinge on Sharon’s assessment of his own political standing.

Nader Said, who directs polling of the Palestinian public, said the optimism generated by the election and summit could backfire on Abbas if newly hopeful Palestinians see few gains in their lives and the depleted economy. “There is so much riding on this for him,” he said. “He promised them so much.”

Sharon’s plan has much better odds of going forward if Abbas succeeds in providing a calm environment in which Israel can remove the settlers.

The Gaza pullout is vehemently opposed by Jewish settlers and their right-wing supporters, whose vows to disrupt the evacuation have stoked worries that the showdown could turn into civil unrest.

A group of right-wing activists accosted Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as he left a wedding Thursday night. He was not injured, but Israel’s attorney general, Menachem Mazuz, has promised to crack down on the extremists.

Sharon, once a hero to the settlers, also faces the revived possibility of a national referendum on the planned withdrawal before settlers can be removed from Gaza and a small piece of the West Bank. Only hours after Tuesday’s summit, Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom announced he would lead the campaign for a referendum. The speaker of the Israeli parliament, Reuven Rivlin, also supports a vote.

The moves brought a forceful response from Sharon, who has said a referendum would only serve to delay the evacuation or scuttle it altogether. He said failure to carry out the withdrawal would aggravate hatreds and split the country.

“I can assure everyone, this will not happen,” Sharon said.

The withdrawal plan faces several crucial tests. A bill to compensate the approximately 8,500 settlers for their homes is expected to go to a vote in the parliament this week. A crucial government vote to approve the evacuation itself may take place in the Cabinet as early as Sunday. Sharon appears to have majority support but may face an effort to tie approval to a referendum.

“The stronger Ariel Sharon becomes on the outside, the weaker he becomes at home,” commentator Nahum Barnea wrote in the Yediot Aharonot newspaper. “Every step toward the evacuation leaves in his wake scorched political earth.”

The pullout is broadly supported by the Israeli public, but Sharon faces a revolt among members of his conservative Likud Party and others on the right who view it as a surrender of Jewish land.

Looming in the wings is perhaps a bigger threat: Sharon must win approval for his 2005 budget before March 31 or he is required by law to call new national elections -- a process that could upend withdrawal plans.

So far, he lacks a majority of votes needed for passage, despite a flurry of efforts to bring holdouts around. In the end, he may have to rely on leftist lawmakers to back a budget they view as bad for the poor to preserve a pullout that they want to see occur.