Palestinian PM denies Israeli barrier cement claim

Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia today rejected claims made on Israeli television that a cement company owned by his family provided concrete for Israeli settlements and the Israeli West Bank barrier.

“I invite you and I invite the people who said this to come and check on the ground,” Qureia said in Rome.

“This report is not even worth the ink it was written with.”

Qureia is one of the most vocal opponents of Jewish settlements and the barrier, and restated his opposition to the barrier after a meeting with Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini.

Qureia’s comments were his first since Israel’s Channel 10 TV reported yesterday that the Al-Quds Cement Company – owned by Qureia’s family – had been providing the materials to help build the barrier.

The TV report said Qureia was providing the cement to build the concrete slabs right outside his house in Abu Dis, a town near Jerusalem divided by a 25-foot wall.

Television footage also showed cement mixers leaving the Al-Quds company and driving to the Jewish settlement of Maale Adumim, just a few miles away.

On Wednesday, journalists who went to the Al-Quds factory mentioned in the TV report were told by workers that the company belongs to the Qureia family.

But the managers at the factory refused to talk to reporters, and demanded that a TV crew stop filming the factory immediately.

Palestinian media have not been reporting the story and only the few people who have access to the internet are aware of the report.

However, a Palestinian lawmaker said yesterday that a parliamentary committee was investigating whether Palestinian cement companies were providing Israel with material for the controversial barrier.

The lawmaker said there was evidence that a company owned by Qureia’s family was among them.