Israel Arrests at Least 7 Hamas Political Leaders in West Bank Sweep

JERUSALEM  Israeli soldiers rounded up at least seven of the Islamic militant group's political leaders in the West Bank in a pre-dawn arrest sweep Thursday, Hamas officials and relatives said.The detentions come after the failure of recent efforts to win the release of an Israeli soldier Hamas is holding in Gaza. The Israeli military, which routinely arrests suspected militants in the West Bank, said 20 Palestinians had been detained overnight. But it said it had no information on the arrests of the Hamas politicians. Israel has detained dozens of Hamas politicians in the West Bank on various occasions since the capture of Sgt. Gilad Schalit, 22, in a cross-border raid in June 2006. The detainees in this latest raid include Nasser Shaer, a former Palestinian deputy prime minister, and several Hamas lawmakers, Hamas officials and relatives said. Some of them were detained and released in past raids. Outgoing Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert had hoped to secure the release of Schalit before a new Israeli government is formed. He dispatched two senior envoys to Cairo over the weekend to try to clinch an Egyptian-brokered deal with Hamas, which rules Gaza and has no direct ties with Israel.