Palestinian Deputy Prime Minister and senior Hamas leader Nasser El-Dein al-Sha'er condemned an Israeli detention of ministers of the Hamas-led government and lawmakers early Thursday.

The detention was "a serious escalation and an assault on the representatives of the Palestinian people," Al-Sha'er said.

"The most dangerous thing is that those arrests are not spontaneous, it was conducted upon an official Israeli government political decision," al-Sha'er told reporters in Ramallah.

Al-Sha'er accused Israel of violating the international law and conventions, calling on the international community to stop Israeli acts.

The Israeli army stormed the West Bank town of Ramallah at predawn on Thursday and arrested eight cabinet ministers, including Omar Abdel Razeq, minister of Finance, and Samir Abu Eisha, minister of Planning, Palestinian security sources said.

They said that 87 Palestinians were arrested on Thursday all over the West Bank and east Jerusalem, including eight ministers and 21 lawmakers representing the Hamas movement.

Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed the detention of about 60 Hamas officials, including government ministers, parliament members and activists, during a swift operation carried out throughout the West Bank and the Jerusalem area early Thursday.

IDF announced on Thursday that the detainees could soon be brought to court for being involved in terror.

Ahmed Bahar, deputy speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council, denied that the ministers and the lawmakers were involved in an attack on an Israeli post on Sunday, during which Palestinian militants abducted Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.

He told reporters in Gaza that the detention was aiming at weakening the Hamas-led government in order to lead it to collapse.

The Israeli army launched a large-scale ground and air offensive code-named Summer Rain against the Gaza Strip to free the abducted soldier early Wednesday.

Source: Xinhua