Hundreds of Palestinian mourners buried on Saturday two teenagers, Hassan Shalabi and Hamza Ishteiwi, who were shot and killed by Israeli soldiers' gunfire in the marches of return.
Ishteiwi, 17, was shot in his chest in Gaza City and Shalabi, 14, in his chest in Gaza's southern city of Khan Younis.
Reliable sources said that Egypt convinced Palestinian factions, especially the Islamic Jihad Movement in Palestine, to ease confrontations with Israel in this phase to avoid a possible deterioration on the level of security.
Sources told Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper that Egypt that met Hamas and the Islamic Jihad Movement in Palestine will convene with other factions to stabilize the situation and discuss the reconciliation – sources affirmed that Fatah Movement informed Egyptians that it didn't intend to hold any bilateral talks with Hamas and that the latter was supposed to hand over Gaza Strip and participate in the next legislative elections to restore unity.
Last week, officials in the Egyptian intelligence met leaders in Hamas and the Islamic Jihad Movement in Palestine and they mainly discussed maintaining the calm. The Egyptian officials focused more on the Islamic Jihad Movement in Palestine amid concerns that it might escalate the situation due to disputes with Hamas regarding the marches of return.
According to an official Palestinian statistics, confrontations in these marches claimed 263 lives since they were launched last March and wounded 27,000.
Munir al-Jaghoub, head of Fatah's Information Department in the Office of Mobilization and Organization, said that Fatah delegation participating in Russia talks will leave to Russia on Sunday.
According to Russian arrangements, the participating delegations will meet at the end of its meetings with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov but it remains unknown whether Fatah will agree on a bilateral meeting with Hamas in Moscow or not.
However, sources informed Asharq Al-Awsat that the Fatah delegation has no such plan.
