January 11, 2003

The Jerusalem Post reports that Archimandrite Atallah Hanna, an Israeli Arab serving as the official spokesman of the Greek Church in the Holy Land, was quoted by the Hamas Web site as saying: "These martyrdom freedom fighters are the heroes of the people and we are proud of them. We categorically reject suspicious attempts to cast suspicion on their deeds. They are not suicidal, as some are claiming. Nor are they terrorists, as others are claiming. They are resisting the occupation."  and also "We support the martyrdom [suicide] operations without any reservations, regardless of what skeptics and opponents of this form of resistance are saying." Jan 12/03 Update: Hanna says that the reports are lies and he was never at this meeting. 10:29:42 PM