GAZA CITY, 3 May 2006 — Israel’s interim Prime Minister Ehud Olmert plans to meet moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas after visiting Washington, an Israeli official said yesterday. This confirms that Israeli-Palestinian contacts need not be cut off because of the Hamas takeover of the Palestinian government.

The official said no date has been set for the summit, the first since Hamas won parliamentary elections in January. Israel insists it won’t talk to the group sworn to its destruction, and it was not clear if using Abbas to bypass Hamas could lead to a resumption of Mideast peace talks. The Israeli official spoke on condition of anonymity because firm plans have not been made. Israel has said it would not regard the Palestinian Authority as a two-headed entity, negotiating peace with Abbas while fighting Hamas. But Olmert never ruled out talks with Abbas, who unlike Hamas is eager to negotiate with Israel about creating a Palestinian state.

Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said Abbas was “ready to meet with Mr. Olmert as soon as he forms his government.”

Israeli media also quoted Shimon Peres, who was appointed vice prime minister and minister for Negev and Galilee affairs in the new government, as saying that Olmert was likely to meet with Abbas.

“I think that Olmert will meet Abbas after setting up the government …maybe after his visit to USA, we will try for a while to reach a bilateral agreement,” Peres said.

Also yesterday, an explosion destroyed a building inside a Palestinian national security compound in the northern Gaza town of Jabaliya, killing two police officers and wounding seven others, Palestinian security officials said. They said the blast was caused by unexploded Israeli shells stored in the building, pending transfer to another location, where they were to be disabled. The officials said it wasn’t clear why the shells went off.

Medical sources identified the two security men as Khaled Sanona, 33, and Tamer Al-Masharawe, 26. Olmert, whose new government is to be sworn in tomorrow, plans to set Israel’s border by 2010, completing construction of a separation wall, evacuating tens of thousands of Jewish settlers and withdrawing from parts of the West Bank on the other side of the wall. He said he would try to negotiate a settlement with the Palestinians, but would take unilateral action if that fails.

Abbas, a moderate elected separately a year earlier, has been urging Israel to conduct peace talks through him, bypassing Hamas.

Hamas rejects the concept of a Jewish state in an Islamic Middle East. Some Hamas officials have indicated they would accept a temporary Israeli presence if Israel pulls out of all of the West Bank and allows millions of refugees to return to Israel — far from a starting point for talks acceptable to Israel.

In the past decade, Hamas has sent dozens of bombers into Israel, killing hundreds, but the group has largely complied with a cease-fire announced in February 2005 by Abbas and then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon at a summit in the Egyptian resort of Sharm El-Sheikh. There have been no summits since then.

Olmert’s West Bank pullout plans are expected to top the agenda when he meets US officials in Washington. That trip is expected to take place shortly after the new Israeli government is installed.

— With input from agencies