Hamas said on Tuesday it hoped Israel would resume talks on exchanging hundreds of Palestinian prisoners for a captured Israeli soldier after two days of indirect negotiations in Egypt. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has made freedom for Gilad Shalit a precondition for a wider truce with the Gaza Strip's Hamas rulers and the opening of the enclave's borders to crucial reconstruction aid after Israel's offensive in December and January. Olmert has been making a last-ditch push for Shalit's release before handing over to right-winger Benjamin Netanyahu, who is trying to form a government following Israel's parliamentary election last month. "I hope that Olmert will listen to the voice of reason and come back to pursue the talks to reach a deal by meeting (our) conditions," senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan told Reuters by telephone from Lebanon. "But if the Israeli government sticks to its negative position, it will not be possible to clinch a deal, at least at the present time," Hamdan said.
