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Hamas Confirms: Carter To Meet Terrorist Leader
By Joseph Abrams
A senior Hamas official has confirmed that former President Jimmy Carter will meet with Khaled Meshal, the exiled head of the Palestinian terror group Hamas, during a visit to Syria
next week, according to the Associated Press.
The official, Mohammed Nazzal, told the AP that Carter sent an envoy to Damascus requesting a meeting with Hamas leadership, including Meshal, and that Hamas "welcomed
the request." The meeting will take place on April 18, he said.
FOXNews.com first reported Tuesday on an item in the Arabic-language newspaper Al-Hayat that said Carter was preparing the unprecedented meeting with
Meshal, and a State Department official in Israel confirmed Wednesday Carter's plans for an unsanctioned diplomatic trip to Syria.
Meanwhile, a State Department spokesman in Washington, D.C., told FOXNews.com that the
department was aware that Carter is planning a stay in the region, but would not disclose details of the trip.
The spokesman noted, however, that “the State Department has expressed our concerns and advised President
Carter that past engagement with the Syrian regime has not produced positive results.”
FOXNews.com tried numerous times to reach the Carter Center for comment Wednesday, but calls and e-mails were not returned.
The State Department has designated Hamas a “foreign terrorist organization.” Chief spokesman Sean McCormack once said of the prospect of meeting with Meshal, “That’s not something that we could possibly conceive of.”
Meshal, who lives in Syria to avoid being arrested by the Israeli government, leads Hamas from his seat in Damascus, where he is a guest of Bashar al-Assad’s regime.
Carter would be the first Western leader of his
stature to meet with Meshal. Though Meshal met with Clinton officials in the 1990s, the Bush administration has sought to isolate Hamas, enforcing rigid sanctions on its government in Gaza and refusing to meet with its leaders
unless it recognizes Israel and abandons terror.
The two founders of Hamas, the cleric Ahmed Yassin and Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi, were killed by Israeli air strikes in 2004.
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