Chief of Hamas' Political Bureau Khaled Meshaal, in exile in Syria, on Wednesday strongly condemned the Israeli incursion into Gaza as "a massacre that shakes the hearts of free people all over the world."
At a press conference, he called on Arab and Islamic countries to adopt an actual and practical response to this massacre while criticizing the silence of the international community.
"Massacres are a mark of the Israelis and their aggressive terrorist behavior," Meshaal stated, adding that it is an attempt to solve the internal crisis in Israel as Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert attempted to preserve his coalition and escape an upcoming report on his conduct during the Lebanon war in 2006.
Meanwhile, the Hamas leader also downplayed prospects for a prisoners' exchange deal involving an Israeli soldier held by three Palestinian militant groups after the Gaza invasion.
"What you're committing will deprive you of anything you're betting on. There will be no exchange involving Gilad Shalit, no calm or nothing of this sort," Meshaal said, referring to the Israeli soldier captured in June 2006.
In June of 2006, Hamas' military wing, along with the Popular Resistance Committees (PRC) and the Army of Islam, kidnapped Shalit in a cross-border raid in southeast Gaza Strip.
Israeli forces backed by tanks and bulldozers killed 17 Palestinians and wounded 45 others in an incursion into the Zeitoon neighborhood on Tuesday in eastern Gaza City.
Two more Palestinian militants were killed on Tuesday evening in an Israeli airstrike in the northern Gaza Strip town of Beit Hanoun, medics and witnesses said.
Earlier on Wednesday, three Palestinian civilians were killed and five wounded in an Israeli airstrike at a car that was driving in the eastern part of Gaza City.
Source: Xinhua
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