Hamas trains militants in Iran, Shin Bet chief says

The Islamic Hamas, which runs the Palestinian government, has sent dozens of militants to Iran for training, the head of Israel's Shin Bet security service told a small group of foreign correspondents on Monday, The New York Times reported.

The paper quoted Yuval Diskin, director of Israel's internal security arm, as saying that Hamas has begun sending men to Iran for training ''tens and a promise of hundreds.''

Diskin said he saw this as a ''strategic danger, more than any weapons smuggled into Gaza.'' Without offering concrete proof of the allegation, Diskin said the training could last months or years.

Diskin said he saw mixed results from the West's boycott on the Palestinian Authority. The paper quoted him as saying that it persuaded Hamas that it cannot rule without international legitimacy, but it also drove it closer to Iran.

Hamas is committed now to forming a new government with the more moderate Fatah of President Mahmoud Abbas, but Diskin felt it would not last, calling Hamas a ''ticking time bomb inside the unity government.''

Diskin said the smaller violent group, Islamic Jihad, is sending militants to Lebanon and Iran for training and continues to manufacture rockets and antitank weapons to be used against Israel.

The paper quoted Diskin as warning that if the buildup continues, ''at the end of the day we will have to do something about it.''