Hamas has asked U.S. President Barack Obama to engage it in a dialogue, because it "enjoys broad support in the Palestinian street," Hamas spokesperson Ahmed Yousef said. The request was made in a letter Yousef said was given to U.S. Senator John Kerry, who visited Gaza last week. Kerry, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, was in Gaza Thursday to meet with U.N. officials, and said he did not meet with any Hamas officials. The letter was passed to Kerry by a U.N. official.

Yousef, an advisor to Hamas' Foreign Ministry, said that the letter asked Obama "to deal fairly with the Palestinian issue," based on his promise to reach out to Muslims. "We tried to seize the opportunity, and that led us to quickly write a letter to President Obama, to be passed to his hands," Yousef told The Associated Press.