Sharon, all Israelis on a warning

DAMASCUS - Hamas' political leader Khaled Meshaal has warned all Israelis, from Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to ordinary people, that they will not be safe from attack until Israel abandons occupied land.

Meshaal stepped up earlier vows that the Palestinian militant group would target Sharon to avenge Israel's assassination of its founder and spiritual leader, Ahmed Yassin, in a missile strike outside a Gaza City mosque.

In his warning to all Israelis, Meshaal said: "There will be no safety so long as there is occupation. If they want safety they should leave."

Hamas, which has vowed to destroy the Jewish state, envisages having Israel and the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip as part of a Palestinian state.

Meshaal said any Hamas attacks would be confined to Israel, the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Earlier, the United States warned Americans in the Middle East and North Africa of a heightened attack threat after the assassination of Yassin.

Americans were told to be vigilant and some acknowledged a little anxiety in the Gulf, where US missions in the United Arab Emirates closed after a threat and the American Embassy in Saudi Arabia shut down for an hour over rumours of an explosion in Riyadh.

In Bahrain, home to the US Navy's 5th Fleet, schoolboys pelted the American Embassy's walls. In Egypt, police increased the security around the US Embassy in Cairo.

"No to American embassies in Islamic countries," read a banner carried by demonstrators in the Yemeni capital, San'a.

But Hamas officials later sought to reassure the US, Israel's chief ally, that they would confine their armed struggle to Israel and the Palestinian territories.

"It's not in our policy to target Americans or American interests," said another Hamas political leader, Sayed Seyam.

"It is the right of the resistance to target the leaders of the enemy, the heads of Zionist terrorism ... it is a matter of right and duty," Meshaal said when asked if Sharon was a target.

"The practical aspect is left for the military wings of Hamas ... We are accustomed to see the military wing rising to expectations.

"I ask God the Almighty to be in their aid."

Meshaal said Sharon's leadership would bring Israelis only bloodshed and destruction.

"My message to the Israeli people is: until when are you going to wait for the promises of your leaders and their allegations that they can terminate the [Palestinian] uprising?"

"Your leaders, chaired by Sharon, will only bring you destruction. Blood begets blood. The Palestinian people can endure a long struggle and if you think the confrontation will exhaust it then you are deluded. You will lose."

Meshaal said he remained the political bureau chief of Hamas and would not assume Yassin's place.

"There is no change in the hierarchy.

"The martyr Sheikh Ahmed Yassin had a symbolic stature among Palestinians, Arabs, Muslims that goes beyond the limits of Hamas ... this cannot be inherited."

Israeli tanks thrust into a Gaza refugee camp yesterday, keeping up the pressure.

Security around Israeli leaders has been beefed up to levels not seen since just after the killing of Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi in a Jerusalem hotel in 2001 by gunmen from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher likened the Israeli Government to a "terrorist organisation" for its policy of assassinating militant leaders - Egypt's strongest criticism of Israel in recent years.

Keeping tensions high in Gaza, 10 tanks rolled into the Khan Younis refugee camp and bulldozers razed several homes near a Jewish settlement before pulling back.

About 60 families fled, witnesses said.

A military source said troops destroyed abandoned buildings used by gunmen and militants firing rockets.

- REUTERS