No surrender

ISRAELI Prime Minister Ehud Olmert yesterday said freeing Palestinian prisoners in exchange for a captured Israeli soldier would be a “major mistake” and said there can be no negotiations with the “bloody organisation”.

Shortly afterwards, Hamas’s exiled political leader, Khaled Mashaal, said the Israeli soldier, Corporal Gilad Shalit, would not be freed without a prisoner swap.

Seven people were killed yesterday, including three militants who died in two Israeli airstrikes. A third airstrike, in eastern Gaza City, killed at least one person.