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Opinion poll shows Israelis favor formal talks with Hamas

A majority of Israelis want their government to hold talks with the Hamas militants who control the Gaza Strip, a poll showed yesterday.

Israel has been working to isolate Hamas since the Islamic group came to power in Gaza in June, 2007, and has said talks with the group won't be possible until it recognize Israel, renounces violence and observes signed peace agreements. Hamas has been labeled a terror organization by Israel, the US and EU.

But the poll, carried out by the Dialog company and published in the Haaretz daily, showed that 64 percent of Israelis believe Israel should talk to Hamas now to bring a halt to ongoing rocket barrages fired by Gaza militants at Israeli towns and to win the release of a captured soldier.

The soldier, Gilad Schalit, was seized in June, 2006 by Hamas militants and has been held in Gaza since then as talks on a prisoner swap have stalled.

Only 28 percent of Israelis reject talks with Hamas, according to the poll. The poll included 500 respondents and had a margin of error of 4 percent.

Though the Israeli government has consistently rejected talking to the Islamic group, some Israeli officials have recently been expressing support for such talks, a proposal once unthinkable given Hamas' history of suicide bombings in Israel and its calls for Israel's destruction.

Meanwhile, Israeli troops yesterday shut down four more charity offices in villages around the West Bank town of Hebron that authorities said were linked to Hamas, witnesses said.

Israel had shut down seven branches of the Islamic Charity Movement and the offices of the Islamic Youth Association in raids in Hebron earlier this week, charging that they were being used to finance terrorist activities.

Soldiers entered each of the four offices, confiscated computers and files, and sealed the doors on their way out, witnesses said.

Israeli air strikes killed at least six Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip yesterday, including Hamas men who local residents said returned recently from training in Syria or Iran.

Five of the militants, senior members of Hamas, were killed when the van in which they were travelling was attacked from the air near the southern town of Khan Younis.

An Israeli army spokeswoman described the air strike as a joint operation by the military and the Shin Bet intelligence service.
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