ON THE squalid streets of Gaza yesterday there was none of the euphoria that greeted the pledge on Tuesday by the Israeli and Palestinian leaders to halt four years of bloodshed.

In the teeming enclave’s breeze-block refugee camps, where the militant organisation Hamas holds sway and the ceasefire faces its sternest test, there was gloomy resignation that renewed violence would soon snuff out any chance of peace.

Moving quickly to build on the ceasefire announcement, Israel announced that shortly it would readmit 1,000 workers from the Gaza Strip, restoring an economic lifeline to the impoverished coastal territory.

Yet in the Jabaliya camp, where the first Palestinian intifada began in 1987, Palestinians complained that the despised and distrusted Israelis had broken every deal they had ever made. They also rebuked Mahmoud Abbas, the new Palestinian President, better known as Abu Mazen, for surrendering his only bargaining chip — the armed struggle — and getting nothing in return.

“Abu Mazen sold us out,” Abu Fayed, 45, said as green Hamas flags flapped overhead. “Why did he shake Sharon’s hand? What did he get? Nothing. With the Israelis, there’s no solution. It’s much better to go on with the resistance and defend ourselves.”

A spokesman for Hamas, an organisation committed to Israel’s destruction, was only a little more diplomatic. “I wouldn’t say it’s a betrayal,” Sami Abu Zuhri said, “but it was a mistake. The only card the Palestinians have to play is the resistance card. Abu Mazen gave it away for free.”

But Mr Abu Zuhri was careful to emphasise that Hamas, which was among the first to use suicide bombs against Israeli civilians, was not rushing back to the path of violence just yet. It has observed a ceasefire, having promised Mr Abbas a period of calm to give him room for manoeuvre with Israel. The group will meet him shortly to learn whether his private talks with Ariel Sharon, the Israeli Prime Minister, yielded more than was revealed in public.

“Most of our assessment of the situation is negative,” Mr Abu Zuhri said. “Hamas is providing Abu Mazen space to give Israel time to fulfil our requirements. But if there’s no response from Israel to our conditions and the calm that currently prevails, we will continue the armed resistance.”

For Hamas, Israel’s apparent failure to agree to return the bodies of its fighters killed in action, to release its prisoners or to resolve the issue of those expelled from the West Bank to Gaza are serious problems.

The gloomy prognosis combined with — or caused by — deep-seated scepticism about Israel’s trustworthiness left little room for optimism in Gaza..

“We had a ceasefire before and still they destroyed our houses, bombed us out of the area and assassinated our leaders,” said Abed el-Ati Taloli, 65, whose son, Majdi, an al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades fighter, was killed by an Israeli sniper during a raid on Jabaliya two years ago.

“We’ve totally lost our trust in the Israelis,” Mr Taloli added. “They hit us all the time, making us believe we were going to die anyway, so you might as well go out and fight.”

Mohassen Khalil, 35, an accountant, foresaw a desperate spiral of violence that would salvage Palestinian pride and keep them locked in poverty.

“We’ve seen summits like this one come and go before, and always we get nothing,” he said. “This latest one is no different. I was really unhappy when I saw Abu Mazen shaking Ariel Sharon’s hand. If Israel had any intention of finding a solution here, they would have done it long ago.”

HAMAS

• Hamas means “zeal” in Arabic: it is an acronym for Harakat al-Muqawama al-Islamiya, or Islamic Resistance Movement
  
• It was founded by the late Sheikh Ahmed Yassin in 1988 during the first intifada and has strong links with the Muslim Brotherhood
  
• It is committed to the destruction of the State of Israel and the establishment of an Islamic Palestinian state
  
• It is a rival to Fatah, which it views as corrupt
  
• It boycotted the presidential elections won by Mahmoud Abbas but may participate in parliamentary polls in July
  
• It is regarded as a terrorist organisation by Britain and America

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