The Islamist group Hamas has defended a suicide bombing that killed four Israelis as "resistance" against Israeli "crimes", putting it at odds with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who condemned the attack. Hours after the bombing, Israeli warplanes and artillery struck the Gaza Strip, though no casualties were reported. A car explosion in Gaza later killed a top leader of the Popular Resistance Committees, a group that frequently fires rockets into Israel. The Army, which often targets Palestinian militants in air strikes, denied involvement in the blast.
The conflicting statements of Hamas and Mr Abbas on the West Bank suicide bombing were the first since the President swore in the Palestinian Authority's first Hamas Government on Wednesday. Mr Abbas has said he could overrule the group, which is pledged to Israel's destruction, if it continues to block peacemaking. The suicide bombing, claimed by al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, occurred days after Israeli leader Ehud Olmert's Kadima party won elections on a platform of setting Israel's borders in the occupied West Bank unilaterally in the absence of peace talks. Palestinians say such a move would annex land and deny them the viable state they seek in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Israeli officials said the bomber, whose group is part of Mr Abbas's Fatah faction, was disguised as a religious Jewish hitchhiker and blew himself up when Israelis in a car picked him up near a settlement late on Thursday. A spokesman for Mr Abbas told official Palestinian media that the President condemned the bombing and that he asked all factions to abide by a truce declared last year. Hamas described the attack as a "natural response to Israeli crimes". Information Minister Youssef Rizqa said: "Resistance is a legitimate right for people under occupation."