criticized Abbas for meeting Zubeidi. Despite his readiness to accept Abbas' election to the presidency, Zubeidi still stated that he did not trust the latter in regard to the fundamental Palestinian claims concerning the status of Jerusalem and the right of return for Palestinian refugees. According to Zubeidi, Arafat was the only figure who could have fulfilled those aspirations, claiming this was "why he was poisoned... why Israel killed him." In September 2005 he declared that his group's cease-fire was at an end after Samer Saadi and two other militants were killed by Israeli forces in Jenin. On July 6, 2006, the IDF attempted to capture Zubeidi at a funeral, but he escaped after an exchange of gunfire. Amnesty On July 15, 2007, the Office of the Israeli Prime Minister announced that Israel would include Zubeidi in an amnesty offered to militants of Fatah's al-Aqsa-Brigades. As of 2008, he was hired by Juliano Mer-Khamis (who was later murdered) as director of the Freedom Theatre in the Jenin refugee camp. In an interview on April 4, 2008, he stated that he still had not received a full pardon from Israel, and blamed the PA for "lying" to him. He continued to sleep at the PA's Jenin headquarters and receive a salary of 1,050 NIS almost half of what he received earlier (2000 NIS). Asked why he had stopped fighting even when he had not received a full pardon, Zubeidi replied "because of the conflict between Fatah and Hamas. Look, it's perfectly clear to me that we won't be able to defeat Israel. My aim was for us, by means of the resistance, to get a message out to the world. Back in Abu 'Ammar's day, we had a plan, there was a strategy, and we would carry his orders... now there's no one capable of using our actions to bring about... achievements." Zubeidi criticized the PA leadership, saying "they are whores. Our leadership is garbage." Faced with the question of whether or not he admitted defeat he claimed "Even [late Egyptian president] Gamal Abdel Nasser admitted his defeat, so why not me?" Prior to Fatah's Sixth Conference in August 2009, Zubeidi called on fellow Fatah members to adopt a program of resistance in case peace negotiations with Israel failed and a Third Intifada broke out. Although he was accredited as one of 2,000 Fatah delegates to the conference in Bethlehem, Zubeidi