Israeli minister: Khaled Mashaal is target for assassination (Extra)

May 21, 2007, 9:55 GMT

Tel Aviv - Top Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal is a target for assassination by Israel 'at the earliest opportunity,' an Israeli cabinet minister said Monday.

'I am convinced that they (Israel) will part from him at the earliest opportunity, even though the complexity, the sensitivity and the fact that he isn't here on the other side of the (West Bank security) fence obviously make things a lot more difficult,' Internal Security Minister Avi Dichter said.

'Khaled Mashaal is certainly not immune, not in Damascus and not in any other place,' he told Israel Army Radio.

'Naturally, all the political and operational sensitivities must be taken into account,' he said, but added, 'He knows himself that he is not immune.'

Mashaal's deputy in Damascus, Moussa Abu Marzouk, dubbed the announcement 'cowardly.'

'This Israeli policy is cowardly and the entire world should stand against it,' he told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa by telephone.

Marzouk said that the policy was not new, and that Israel had already 'assassinated tens of Palestinian leaders outside the Palestinian lands.'

As the head of Hamas' political bureau based in Damascus, Mashaal is considered the most senior leader of the ruling, radical Islamic Palestinian movement abroad.

Mashaal survived an Israeli assassination attempt a decade ago.

In September 1997, two agents of Israel's Mossad intelligence agency followed him in Amman and injected him with poison, but the two were caught in a chase, sparking an embarrassing international scandal which forced then premier Benjamin Netanyahu to hand over an antidote to the Jordanian authorities.

'We already (tried to) part from him once. He knows the procedure,' Dichter said of Mashaal.

He added that Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniya would also be a target if Israel had evidence that he ordered the rocket attacks against it.

'If Ismail Haniya is counted among the echelon that orders the continuation of attacks, he certainly is a worthy target,' he said, but added, 'I don't know if he is among those who give the instructions.'