18 April 2004	Sunday	27 Safar 1425

WASHINGTON, April 17: The United States "certainly did not give Israel any kind of green light" to assassinate Hamas leader Abdelaziz Rantissi, a US State Department official told CNN television on Saturday.

And Washington "did not have any kind of advance knowledge" of the helicopter rocket attack on Rantissi's car in Gaza City earlier on Saturday, the official said on condition of anonymity.

The Israeli Army claimed responsibility for the assassination, saying Rantissi was "directly responsible for the killing of scores of Israelis innumerous terror attacks."

"All along the United States has urged Israel to consider the consequences of its actions," the official told CNN.

"The US did not think the assassination of Sheikh Yassin was well considered," he said, referring to Israel's killing of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the Palestinian Islamist movement's founder whom Rantissi succeeded.

"They are at the same point again," said the official. "We are thinking about the implications."

PALESTINIAN PM: Israel's assassination on Saturday of Hamas leader Abdelaziz Rantissi was a "direct result" of US support for the Jewish state, Palestinian prime minister Ahmed Qorei said.

"This Israeli terrorist offensive is a direct result of America's encouragement and total partiality in favour of Israel, backing its plans and offering it political cover to usurp Palestinian land," Mr Qorei said in a statement issued here.

Qorei's government was outraged on Wednesday after US President George Bush gave his enthusiastic endorsement to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's disengagement plan.

BRITAIN: British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw condemned killing of Abdelaziz Rantissi, saying that such tactics were both wrong and unhelpful to peace.

"The British government has made it repeatedly clear that so-called targeted assassinations of this kind are unlawful, unjustified and counterproductive," Mr Straw said in a brief statement in London.

IRAN: Iranian Vice President Mohammad Ali Abtahi denounced the assassination as a "big crime" which would only serve to spur the Palestinian resistance.

"It is a big crime ... He is a martyr," Abtahi told the Qatar-based Arab satellite television Al-Jazeera.

Rantissi's assassination "will only give fresh blood to the resistance (movement) in the region," said Mr Abtahi, who also blamed the "wrongful" US policies in the region for inciting violence.

JORDAN: The Jordanian government held an emergency session in Amman on Saturday and condemned the assassination as an "odious crime".

"The Jordanian government denounces this odious crime and sees it a loss in hopes for achieving peace in the region," government spokeswoman Asma Khodr said.

"Jordan has always denounced this policy of assassination and its position on this has always been clear," she said.

The government also issued a statement in which it expressed its "astonishment" at the assassination of Rantissi and criticized the "odious crime of the Israeli government which defies all international laws and norms".-AFP