/ 3 February 2009

Israel’s Netanyahu vows to smash Hamas

Hawkish frontrunner Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday vowed he would smash Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist rulers of Gaza, if he becomes Israel’s prime minister after next week’s elections.

”We must smash the Hamas power in Gaza,” the former prime minister told residents of the southern Israeli city of Ashkelon, where a rocket fired from the Palestinian enclave exploded on Tuesday morning.

”We will act in a way to make it fall and put an end to the threat the rockets present in Ashkelon and other areas of the south,” said Netanyahu, who heads the right-wing Likud party.

”Over the past year, the blind policies of Kadima have led us to where we are now,” he said in reference to the ruling party of Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni which trails Likud in opinion polls.

”We need a change of policies,” he said, according to Israeli media.

Pollsters say Netanyahu is the best placed to become prime minister after the February 10 elections, with Likud credited with 28 mandates, five more than Kadima, in the 120-seat Parliament.

Israel warns Hezbollah against attacks
Meanwhile, Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak on Tuesday responded to threats by Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia by saying any attack would prompt an unimaginably painful response from Israel.

”I want to say here, on the border, that I don’t recommend that Hezbollah test us because the consequences would be more painful than one can imagine,” Barak said during a visit to the Israeli-Lebanese frontier area.

Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah vowed last week to avenge the killing of top commander Imad Mughniyeh, who died in a February 2008 car bombing in Damascus which the Shi’ite militant group blamed on Israel.

”I want to tell the Lebanese government we would hold it responsible,” Barak said, according to a statement by the defence ministry.

Barak also expressed concern that Syria could transfer weapons to Hezbollah, something he said would ”change the strategic balance and force Israel to act.” — Sapa-AFP