Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said in remarks published yesterday there were signs of an al-Qaeda presence in the Gaza Strip and West Bank

"We have indications about a presence of al-Qaeda in Gaza and the (West) Bank. This is intelligence information. We have not yet reached the point of arrests," Abbas said.

"The last security report I received was three days ago," he told the London-based al-Hayat newspaper. "This is the first time that I've spoken about this subject. This is a very serious matter."

Israeli officials said they were worried that foreign militants and al-Qaeda agents entered Gaza from Egypt during a brief period of chaos on the border following the Israeli

withdrawal from Gaza last year.

The Palestinian Authority said that was untrue.

Islamic militant group Hamas swept Palestinian elections in January. But unlike militant groups such as al-Qaeda, Hamas emphasizes that its fight is only with Israel.

Meanwhile, Russia is in a position to rectify "errors" of US policy in the Middle East and advance a more balanced approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a senior member of the radical Palestinian group Hamas said yesterday.

The Palestinian ambassador to Moscow meanwhile evoked the possibility that Hamas could modify its stance against Israel, ITAR-TASS news agency reported.

Russia "can fill the void created because of errors in the policy of the United States in the Middle East," Mousa Abu Marzook, Hamas's

deputy chief, said in an interview with the RIA Novosti news agency.

"Russia can present to the world a more fair and transparent vision of the Palestinian problem, as opposed to those whose positions are based only on the interests of Israel," Marzook said.

A Hamas delegation led by the organization's leader, Khaled Meshaal, was scheduled to travel to Moscow on Friday for a two-day visit that was to include talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

Hamas is classified as a terrorist organization by the United States and the European Union, but not by Russia. All three however, along with the United Nations, are members of the Middle East "quartet" trying to mediate a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.