It issued the warning two days before Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) begin talks on a final peace treaty.

``We can say that the coming weeks or months will witness a distinctive escalation both in the quantity and quality of our armed attacks with different methods,'' said the statement sent to Reuters in the name of Hamas's Izz El-Deen Al-Qassam brigades.

It added: ``The Zionist government has wasted by stupidity and arrogance a golden and historic chance to exclude Israeli citizens from our armed operation...It should be ready to receive more painful strikes in our holy occupied land.''

A Hamas political leader said he could not confirm the statement but said it was ``not straying from the general policy of the movement.''

In the statement, Qassam attacked recent peace-making moves betweenPalestinians and Israel as ``an attempt to liquidate the Palestinian cause.''``All agreements between the Palestinian authority and Israel will not be binding for us and will not represent an obstacle for our jihad holy project in Palestine,'' the statement said.

The brigade added it was opposed to any compromise with Jordan, which in September arrested several Jordanian-based leaders of the movement, citing Hamas activities against the kingdom.

``We refuse any form of compromise proposed by the Government of Jordan that will deprive or deny the detained leaders of the movement their political representation in Jordan...Or conditions to leave Jordan after their release,'' it said.