Hamas Would Accept Peace With Israel: Carter

Offer to avoid civilian targets

(NEWSER) - Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit is alive, Hamas leader Khalid Meshaal tells Britain's Sky News. "Gilad is alive and we are treating him well but Israel is treating the Palestinian prisoners they hold very badly," he said in an interview in Damascus, offering the first word in almost a year on the hostage, who was captured in a cross-border raid in 2006. Meshaal also offered to negotiate with Israeli and Palestinian authorities. More»

Party shares blame with Israel for sky-high unemployment

(NEWSER) - As joblessness mounts in the beleaguered Gaza Strip, more and more residents are blaming the ruling Hamas party for their woes, GlobalPost reports. Although Gaza has one of the fastest population growth rates on earth, 45% of people have no job and 85% depend on aid to get by. And while Palestinians largely blame Israel’s stifling economic blockade, they are increasingly turning their ire on Hamas, too. More»

(NEWSER) - Explosives-laden horses were part of an attempt today by Palestinian militants to plant bombs in Israel, the BBC reports. Israel says it shot and killed four men—who where wearing explosive vests—and their explosive-laden horses after they first fired on a border post. The Israeli response to the men and their horses was carried out with machine guns, tanks, and helicopters. More»

Boss pledges to be 'part of the solution' in NYT interview

(NEWSER) - Hamas has stopped firing rockets at Israel for the time being, its head told the New York Times in a lengthy interview in which he discussed the militant Palestinian group’s goals. “I promise the American administration and the international community that we will be part of the solution, period,” Khaled Meshaal said, adding that Hamas wants control only of areas Israel took in 1967. More»

Officials say civilian deaths isolated, unintentional

(NEWSER) - An Israel Defense Forces probe has found that no Gaza civilians were intentionally harmed in Israel’s recent incursion into the region, Haaretz reports. IDF colonels who weren’t involved in the fighting found that the IDF “adhered to international law and maintained a high level of professionalism and morality.” Civilian deaths, they determined, were isolated and unintentional. More»