Hamas official Khalil al-Haya
Hamas official Khalil al-HayaAbed Rahim Khatib/Flash 90

A senior Hamas official in Gaza called on Thursday for the abduction of Israelis, who would be used to release terrorists held by the Jewish state.

"We tell the Zionist enemy: you are all a target for us and the resistance, we will fight you until we finally get rid of you and take as many captives as possible to free our heroes," said Khalil al-Haya, whose Islamist terror group de facto rules the enclave.

"Our men, our women, our children all envision kidnapping your soldiers and settlers, wherever they are," he said on the eve of "Prisoners Day" which Palestinian Arabs set for April 17. This year it comes a day after Holocaust Remembrance Day.

"And it is our right because we have no other way to free our heroes, and it is the Zionist enemy responsible for this state of affairs," Haya told hundreds of Palestinian Arabs listening.

Haya said jailed terrorists should "rest assured" because terror groups led by Hamas's military wing Al-Qassam Brigades "will release you as they did your brothers" in 2011.

The year refers to when Israel released 1,027 Arab terrorists, many with blood on their hands, is in return for captive soldier Gilad Shalit. Many of those terrorists immediately returned to murdering Israelis.

Ahmed al-Mudalal of the Islamic Jihad terror group in Gaza promised the rally that "the resistance will not falter until Israeli prisons are emptied of their Palestinian prisoners."