(Adds Hamas comment, background) By Dan Williams JERUSALEM, Feb 25 (Reuters) - Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert urged Hamas on Wednesday to clinch a prisoner exchange with Israel before he leaves office, saying his successor would be less willing to free jailed Palestinians. Olmert, whose centrist government is in a caretaker capacity while hawkish prime minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu tries to form a new coalition, has stepped up efforts to recover Gilad Shalit, an Israeli soldier held in the Gaza Strip since 2006. Islamist Hamas, which rules Gaza and withstood a devastating Israeli assault in January, wants 1,400 Palestinian prisoners -- including militant leaders -- to go free in exchange for Shalit. Israel long balked at a lopsided swap but has recently signalled flexibility in the Egyptian-brokered talks. Diplomats have said Israel could release around 1,000 prisoners. "Even Hamas, though it's an inhuman group in terms of its behaviour, and violent and brutal and murderous and totally insensitive to the most basic norms that we believe in, ultimately wants to free its prisoners," Olmert told Israel's Channel Two television. "And it knows that if there is a chance of reaching a settlement, it's during my tenure," he said. "I am convinced that the prime minister who succeeds me will do everything in his power to free Gilad Shalit. I fear that doing what I am willing to do would be difficult for him, because of the makeup of the (political) forces supporting him." He refused to say how many prisoners he might agree to free. Hamas, which is shunned by Israel and the West for rejecting coexistence with the Jewish state, stuck by its demands. HAMAS UNMOVED Briefing reporters in Cairo after the Olmert interview was aired, Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Zahar said about the prisoner talks: "Our path is one of constancy and our vision is clear." Egypt, which like Israel borders Gaza, and has tried to consolidate a fragile Jan. 18 truce in the territory with a deal in which Hamas would win some respite from a crippling blockade. The Olmert government last week raised the stakes by demanding Hamas agree to free Shalit under any wider ceasefire. That drew a rare public rebuke by Amos Gilad, Israel's pointman to the Egypt talks, who was quoted by a newspaper as saying Olmert's inconsistency risked insulting the Egyptians. Olmert's office responded by saying it would replace Gilad, but reinstated the envoy on Wednesday after he apologised. A Feb. 10 election to choose Olmert's successor gave his Kadima party, headed by Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, the biggest number of seats in parliament. But it also created a majority bloc of right-wing factions, leading President Shimon Peres to task Netanyahu with forming a new government. Netanyahu, a former premier who heads the opposition Likud party, has so far failed to lure Livni or Defence Minister Ehud Barak of the centre-left Labour party into a coalition. Likud negotiators opened talks with rightist parties on Wednesday. Shalit, a young conscript, is a cause celebre for Israelis. His abduction in a border raid was the first major challenge to Olmert, a career politician who was propelled to power after Prime Minister Ariel Sharon suffered a stroke in early 2006. Two weeks after Shalit was taken, Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas seized two more troops, triggering a war with Israel. Setbacks in that conflict haunted Olmert and, along with graft allegations, prompted him to tender his resignation last year. (Additional reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi in Gaza; Editing by Elizabeth Piper)
British Foreign Secretary David Miliband talks during an interview with Reuters in Cairo February 25, 2009. Miliband said on Wednesday that talking to the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas was "the right ...
Israel
