Palestinian militant group Hamas has contacts with al Qaeda, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said on Wednesday, adding that this was not the result of Western pressure to isolate the movement.
Kouchner was reacting to comments by Italian Foreign Minister Massimo D'Alema this week, who said the West's policy of isolating Hamas, which seized control of the Gaza Strip last month, could push it into the arms of al Qaeda.
"I think Hamas did not wait for this extreme situation - the current terrible situation in Gaza - to have contacts with al Qaeda. And it would perhaps be too simple to think that we, the international community, are responsible," Kouchner said.
Kouchner, who was speaking at a news conference, did not elaborate. The leader of Hamas in the Gaza Strip, Ismail Haniyeh, has denied that al Qaeda is present there. "There is no al Qaeda in the Gaza Strip and talk of Gaza becoming a foothold for al Qaeda is an invitation to international hostilities," Haniyeh told Reuters in a recent interview.
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