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JERUSALEM-U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney said on Monday he did not believe Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas would agree to reconcile with Hamas until the Islamist group gave up control of the Gaza Strip.Cheney spoke to reporters following a breakfast meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, and a day after Abbas's Fatah faction and Hamas issued a declaration in Sanaa agreeing to resume dialogue under a Yemeni fence-mending initiative."My conclusion from talking with the Palestinian leadership is that they have established preconditions which would have to be fulfilled before they would ever agree to a reconciliation, including a complete reversal of the Hamas takeover of Gaza," said Cheney, who later flew on to Ankara.Cheney, who paid a three-day visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories to try to push Israeli-Palestinian peace talks forward, met Abbas in the occupied West Bank on Monday shortly after the declaration was issued in the Yemeni capital.The Yemeni initiative calls for the "Palestinian situation" to return to the way it was before June, when Hamas Islamists wrested control of the territory of 1.5 million people from secular Fatah in fighting in June.The West Bank-based Palestinian leadership made clear in a statement after the Sanaa declaration was issued that it continued to demand, as part of any renewed dialogue with Hamas, that its rival give up control of the Gaza Strip.Hamas rejected that position, saying articles of the Yemeni plan were up for negotiation.Hamas opposes Abbas's U.S.-brokered peace talks with Israel, which the United States hopes can lead to a Palestinian statehood deal before President George W. Bush leaves the White House in January.To read more go to:
As in the days of Noah....
