Blacklisted Hamas official: US shows 'total bias' for Israel

A senior Hamas official designated by Washington as a "global terrorist" has accused the US of "total bias" in favour of Israel.

Fathi Hammad, a member of Hamas' politburo, was added to the US' terror blacklist on Friday.

This means that US citizens and companies will be banned from doing business with him and any property he holds in areas governed by Washington will be frozen.

According to the US state department - which issued the designation - during his time as Hamas' interior minister in Gaza, Hammad used his position to "coordinate terrorist cells".

Washington already defines the Islamist Hamas organisation - which rules the Gaza Strip after a war with rival Fatah - as a "foreign terrorist organisation".

Hammad said in a statement that the latest US move - just as Washington signed a record ten-year military aid deal to Israel - "represents an additional dark page... of the US administration".

He said it showed "total bias toward the killing machine and Zionist terrorism".

The state department said that Hammad had founded al-Aqsa TV, "with programmes designed to recruit children to become Hamas armed fighters and suicide bombers upon reaching adulthood".