Education Minister Meir Sheetrit said the announced invitation was an “international scandal.”

“It is something that is not done and it is stabbing Israel in the back,” he told Israel Radio. Israeli leaders from across the political spectrum strongly condemned the planned invitation.

Both Yossi Beilin of the dovish liberal Meretz party and Avigdor Lieberman of the hawkish, ultranationalist National Union called for recalling the Israeli ambassador to Russia for consultations.

“How would they feel if the state of Israel recognized the heads of the Chechen rebels and invited them?” Lieberman told the radio.

Israeli newspapers quoted government sources as saying they were ”furious.”

“President Putin is spitting in Israel’s face,” a government source was quoting as telling the Yediot Ahronot daily. “It is the height of hypocracy.”

The United States earlier sought clarification from Russia, with State Department spokesman Sean McCormack saying Thursday the US ambassador in Moscow had contacted the Russian Foreign Ministry.

Hamas scored a surprise victory of the January 25 Palestinian parliamentary elections. The international community has called on the radical Islamic movement, which is listed as a terrorist organization in both the US and Europe, to recognize Israel, renounce violence, disarm, and accept past Israeli-Palestinian agreements before any direct contacts with or aid to it are possible.