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SUBJECT: MEDIA REACTION ON HAMAS IN MOSCOW 
 
                        Summary 
 
-- Lead stories in all papers published today, March 
5, highlight the Arab Foreign Ministers' decision at 
the Arab foreign ministers summit meeting in Khartoum 
"supporting Hamas movement in the face of the `unjust 
conditions' being imposed on it and calling for 
adopting the Arab peace initiative as a basis for a 
just settlement of the Arab Israeli conflict".  Other 
lead stories highlight developments in Nazareth 
following the attack against the Church of the 
Annunciation.  More stories continue to highlight the 
violence in Iraq. 
 
                 Editorial Commentary 
 
-- "Hamas in Moscow" 
 
Daily columnist Nahed Hattar writes on the back page 
of the independent, mass-appeal Arabic daily Al-Arab 
Al-Yawm (03/05):  "The Russians do not play games and 
their invitation to Hamas for negotiations in Moscow 
is not a side tactic, but a penetration of the heart 
of strategic developments in the Middle East.  The 
Hamas movement's victory in the Palestinian elections 
is not just a regular victory in a founded democracy, 
but a complete political coup that ousted the 40-year 
Fatah movement control over the Palestinian policy.. 
Fatah's defeat is comprehensive and final, and the 
fact that Fatah retains the presidency means nothing, 
because the Palestinian leadership has moved to Hamas, 
which is backed by the Palestinian people inside and 
outside the territories and by Syria and Iran and 
their allies, and which is capable, in turn, to 
control the Palestinian armament and the decision- 
making process.  At the end of the day, Hamas has 
become a Palestinian reality, and sooner or later, all 
parties will come to cope with this fact and adapt, 
even it has to do with context of the settlement, a 
context that will itself undergo changes and 
renovation to accommodate the new Palestinian givens. 
Here comes Russia's role, being the only international 
party capable of breaking Israel's ban on Hamas and of 
qualifying Hamas to deal with international 
realities..  Russia's qualification however does not 
mean that Hamas is made to succumb to American 
demands.  Neither Moscow has an interest in that nor 
Hamas is willing to abandon its victory and its 
chances.  Qualification simply means breaking the 
rough edges and reaching basic understandings on the 
context with room for maneuvering." 
 
-- "Hamas and Moscow and the conflict's vocabulary" 
 
Columnist Mazen Hammad writes on the op-ed page of the 
center-left, influential Arabic daily Al-Dustour 
(03/05):  "The problem is not in Hamas' political 
program, because it has been known and declared for a 
very long time.  The problem, at least as far as 
Israel and the United States are concerned, lies in 
the vocabulary that Hamas seems to have reintroduced. 
Who would have imagined that after Oslo, the roadmap 
and the unilateral Israeli withdrawals one would say: 
there is no peace until Israel's withdrawal to the 
1967 borders?  Such a conditional statement that is 
being reiterated by Hamas since its victory in the 
elections and that was said by Khaled Mash'al in 
Moscow has been absent..  Four thousand reporters who 
attended Mash'al's press conference did not feel that 
there was any change in Hamas' program.  The 
conference, however, was an important occasion to 
revitalize core questions that Israel had sought to 
eliminate from the conscience and to bury in history 
books.  Some of these questions include: where are 
Israel's borders that you demand we acknowledge? Who 
should acknowledge the other, the victim or the 
victimizer? Is the problem with Hamas or with the 
occupation?  Washington, on its part, swallowed 
Moscow's stab in the back and tried to portray the 
situation as if Russia was delivering the message from 
the quartet..  Yet, Washington's choice to focus on 
this little part of the situation does not nullify the 
fact that Moscow is rebelling against the quartet and 
the United States and is deciding to look for its 
independence.  If the message has reached Hamas, as 
the U.S. Secretary of State said when she commented 
about the 'positive' meetings between the Russians and 
Mash'al, then a different and more effective message 
has reached the world . namely that Israel did not 
respect the concessions of the Palestinian people." 
HALE