Israeli PM says will press ahead with Gaza raids

JERUSALEM, July 10 (Reuters) Prime Minister Ehud Olmert today rejected international criticism of Israel's offensive in Gaza and Israeli air strikes killed eight Palestinians in the strip.

Olmert, speaking to foreign media, said operations in Gaza to press for the soldier's release and an end to cross-border rocket attacks against Israel would continue indefinitely as he rebuffed militants' demands for a prisoner exchange.

He also reaffirmed his commitment to his plan to redraw the Jewish settlement map in the occupied West Bank unilaterally in the absence of peace talks with the Palestinians, but acknowledged ''this will be difficult''.

''I will not release prisoners for the trade of Corporal Gilad Shalit to Hamas,'' Olmert said, referring to the 19-year-old tank gunner abducted in Israel on June 25 and taken to Gaza by militants who tunnelled under a border fence.

Militant groups, including the armed wing of the governing Hamas movement that kidnapped Shalit, have demanded Israel free more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners. Olmert has said he would not bend to what he termed extortion.

At a rare news conference in Damascus after Olmert spoke in Jerusalem, Hamas leader-in-exile Khaled Meshaal said: ''Our people ... are united on the insistence to swap the captured soldier with prisoners in the jails of the Zionist enemy.'' Israeli leaders have hinted strongly that Israel, which pulled troops and settlers out of Gaza last year, could kill Meshaal and other Hamas leaders if any harm came to Shalit.

''We have told mediators and those who made political efforts (to end the crisis) that we support the peaceful, calm handling of this matter but you need to understand the needs of the Palestinian people,'' Meshaal said.

''The solution is simple: swap. But Israel rejects this. The mediators in Europe know this, but they are incapable. Israel thinks it will bring the soldier back by (military) escalation, but it is disillusioned.'' Lashing out at the European Union, which has been outspoken in its criticism of Israel's ground and air assaults, Olmert said the bloc should have focused instead on daily rocket fire by militants in Gaza against the Jewish state.

''When was the last time that the European Union condemned this shooting and suggested effective measures to stop it?'' Olmert said. ''At some point, Israel had no choice but to take some measures in order to stop this thing.'' AIR STRIKES More than 55 Palestinians, including about 20 civilians, have been killed since the offensive began, Gaza residents said.

At least three civilians were among the dead on Monday. The army said most of the air strikes were aimed at militants firing rockets into Israel.

Olmert said Israel had ''no particular desire to topple'' the Hamas-led government despite the arrest by the Israeli military of dozens of Hamas officials and its Gaza raids.

''We haven't set a particular timetable for this operation (in Gaza). It will continue in places, in times, in different measures that will suit the purposes that were outlined,'' Olmert said, repeating what he told his cabinet yesterday.

Militants in Gaza fired several rockets into Israel today, causing no casualties.

The salvoes have raised new questions in Israel over Olmert's ''realignment plan'' to evacuate isolated Jewish settlements in the West Bank while strengthening large blocs.

Olmert said he had not changed his ''basic commitment'' to the blueprint, which Palestinians have condemned as effective annexation of land they want for a state.

The plan has been largely sidelined by events in Gaza and met with scepticism by some world leaders, who have voiced opposition to unilateral moves.

''I am absolutely determined to carry on in order to ultimately separate from the Palestinians and to establish secure borders that will be recognised by the international community,'' he said.

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