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GAZA - Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh said today the Islamist militant group Hamas would never recognise Israel.
Haniyeh, a Hamas leader, said in an interview from Gaza with Lebanese guerrilla group Hezbollah's al-Manar television station: "Hamas will never recognise the legitimacy of the occupation (Israel)."
"Hamas will never show flexibility over the issue of recognising the legitimacy of the occupation," he added.
Hamas took control of the Palestinian government last March after winning parliamentary elections a year ago.
The United States and its allies imposed sanctions on the Hamas-led government to pressure it to recognise Israel, renounce violence and abide by interim deals.
The group has refused to abide by these demands.
Last week, the movement's exiled leader Khaled Meshaal told Reuters in an interview in Damascus where he is based that Hamas does "not talk about recognising Israel or accepting it as a reality".
Meshaal said there was a Palestinian and Arab demand for a Palestinian state based on land which Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East War.
"It is true that in reality there will be an entity or a state called Israel on the rest of Palestinian land," Meshaal said. "This is reality but I don't deal with it from the point of view of recognising or admitting it."
- REUTERS
