Hamas leader Khaled Meshal on Monday called Israel’s mobilization on the border with Gaza a bluff, and dared Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to invade, the New York Times reports:
“If you wanted to launch it, you would have done it,” Mr. Meshal told reporters. He accused Israel of using the invasion threat as an attempt to “dictate its own terms and force us into silence.”
Rejecting Israel’s contention that Hamas had precipitated the conflict, Mr. Meshal said the burden was on the Israelis. “The demand of the people of Gaza is meeting their legimitate demands — for Israel to be restrained from its aggression, assassinations and invasions, and for the siege over Gaza to be ended,” he said.
