Palestinian Leadership: We Condemn All Acts of Terror, Including Acts of State Terrorism April 13, 2002 On behalf of President Yasser Arafat, the Palestine National Authority issued the following statement: President Yasser Arafat and the Palestinian leadership express their condemnation of all the terrorist activities that target civilians, whether they are Israeli or Palestinian and whether this terrorism is perpetrated by a state, group, or individual. This condemnation stems from our fundamental principle, which rejects resorting to terrorism and violence against civilians as means to achieving political goals. Based on these principles - which we have declared since 1988 and upon signing the Oslo agreement in the White House, which we subsequently repeated a number of times, including on 16 December 2001, and to which we found no Israeli response but a systematic escalation of the military aggression, the choking siege, and occupation of our cities, towns, and refugee camps, as well as the systematic destruction of our infrastructure - we maintain our strong condemnation of any attacks that target Israeli civilians, especially the latest attack in West Jerusalem. By the same token, we vehemently condemn the massacres that the Israeli occupation army has been committing in the past fourteen days against the Palestinian civilians and refugees in Nablus City, the Jenin refugee camp, as well as the Church of Nativity in Bethlehem, and other Palestinian areas. We call on the international community and the Security Council, as well as Mr. Colin Powell, who is on an important peace mission, to examine the massacres that have been committed against our People by the Israeli occupation and as a direct result of the Israeli government's insistence on repressing our People's aspirations to freedom and independence through military force. On behalf of the Palestinian People, we reiterate our commitment to a just peace between both peoples and countries; the peace that would provide security to the Israelis and independence and freedom in an independent state to the Palestinian People. For only peace can achieve security for both peoples, while occupation, military force, massacres, and terrorist actions against civilians will not bring peace or security to either people. We must work together, especially in light of the latest Security Council resolutions, as well as the statements made by President Bush and the Quadripartite Committee declaration in Madrid, as well as Mr. Powell's presence between us, to stop this war. We must endeavor an immediate withdrawal of Israeli military forces, the commencement of implementing the tenet understandings and Mitchell recommendations. Moreover, we must work to immediately begin negotiations, based on the Beirut Arab League Summit resolutions, which adopted the Saudi peace initiative. Finally, we must work to protect the Christian and Muslim holy sites with the understanding of the importance of having an international peacekeeping presence to oversee the implementation of these goals.