AL QUDS: Can Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas tame the Palestinian militants? This is one of the main questions for anyone who does not want to see the international “roadmap” peace plan end up, like so many of its predecessors, in the waste bin.

The issue was also one of the main points on the agenda of United States Secretary of State Colin Powell, who made a brief visit to the region on Friday.

Abbas prefers to force the militant groups into calling a halt to their attacks against Israel rather than to combat them. “Civil war, never!” he has pledged.

Since becoming premier nearly two months ago he has held a series of meetings with the groups, including the high-profile Hamas movement. But so far the talks have ended inconclusively.

A source close to Hamas told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa that its leadership knows it has three options: a ceasefire, a confrontation with the Palestinian Authority or, thirdly, a massive Israeli offensive against the Hamas infrastructure in the Gaza Strip, either with a full-scale invasion of the strip or with another deadly wave of helicopter strikes against its leaders like the one last week.

Hamas wants the first option, he said, but it is afraid of losing popularity by openly announcing a ceasefire and its leadership is looking for a way to accept one without appearing to have caved in.

Hamas has also come under intense pressure from other directions to suspend its suicide bombings and shooting attacks.

Echoing tough talk by the US, the European Union, which like the US has already place Hamas on its list of terror organizations, warned it with an EU-wide assets freeze if it did agree to a ceasefire.

The Hamas leadership in Gaza is under pressure from neighbouring Arab states too.

“Hamas depends on them, on Arab states, for political support, but also for money,” said Ariel Merari, a terrorism expert and professor at Tel Aviv University.

“Saudi Arabia is now at bay because of American pressure on other matters, because of the terrorist attacks inside Saudi Arabia and because 15 of the 19 9-11 attackers were Saudis,” he told dpa.

“And Saudi Arabia is pressing Hamas. Egypt is pressing Hamas. I don’t know what the Syrian position is right now ... but Syria is also under heavy American pressure.”

Another factor which weighs heavily on Hamas’ decision-making is the Palestinian street.

“Hamas has always been very careful to read Palestinian public opinion,” said Merari.

Since the intifada erupted in the autumn of 2000 amid a deadlock in peace negotiations, the radical movement has slowly gained in strength.

More than one in five Palestinians now support Hamas, which for the first time has become equal in strength to Palestinian President Yasser Arafat’s ruling Fatah party.

Support for the intifada and for armed attacks against Israelis is declining, Palestinian opinion polls show, but it is still strong.

As many as 60 per cent still support suicide bombings in Israeli cities, according to the last poll by the Jerusalem Media and Communication Centre, held in April among 1,201 Palestinians. The poll has a margin of error of 3 per cent.

Whether the atmosphere in the Palestinian street will be in favour of a ceasefire, depends on whether people see the effects of the roadmap on the ground, said a Palestinian journalist.

Mentioning road blocks, closures and house demolitions, he said: “As long as people see these things still going on, people will have no faith in Abu Mazen (Abbas) and support what Hamas does.”

He said Hamas, which also seems to be enjoying the media attention and newfound air of legitimacy gained from its talks with Abbas, was stretching the talks and playing the tough negotiator, demanding guarantees that Israel stop its assassinations, release militant leaders from its jails and cease its military operations in the Palestinian areas.

“They may lower their demands to some degree,” he said cautiously.

One way to agree to a ceasefire without appearing to have abandoned its vow to continue its “resistance” so long as the Israeli occupation exists — and as far as Hamas is concerned that means from the Jordan river to the Mediterranean — is a pause in suicide bombings in Israel, but a continuation of attacks on soldiers and settlers.

A senior Palestinian official was quoted as saying late this week that Hamas had notified Egypt that it would halt large-scale bomb attacks against Israel, but would continue carrying out “local and insignificant” attacks.

Israel, however, made clear it will not accept this.—dpa