From WND (HT Hot Air), following up on a story blogged here last week, this one names someone willing to be quoted:

TEL AVIV – A key Hamas official has confirmed reports from last week the terror group held meetings with "important Democrats."

Ahmed Yousuf, chief political advisor to Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, told the Maannews Palestinian news website that Hamas officials met recently with high-ranking American figures, "especially members of the Democratic party."

Last week's post was triggered by the disappearance of two paras from a Jerusalem Post report that had been posted previously about this very topic. WorldNetDaily stuck to their story; the naming of a name quoted in another publication would appear to tentatively vindicate them.

And, if anyone cares -- There are a few laws against meeting with a recognized terrorist group, or, if you want to claim that the Palestinian Authority is a real government, against citizens negotiating with foreign governments. Start with the Logan Act and work up from there.

In the week since the JPost story broke, and un-broke, there has been no curiosity or apparent attempt at follow-up relating to this possible (emphasis: still not really confirmed) meeting, which is also said to have included European representatives, in the so-called Mainstream Media.

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UPDATE: Last week I said that "Maybe Hamas is in discussons with the Democrats about Palestine becoming the USA’s 51st state. Or maybe Hamas wants to be the next NATO member." OK, probably not. IMAO speculates how awkward such a meeting might be.

Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.

—Tom Blumer is president of a training and development company in Mason, Ohio, and is a contributing editor to NewsBusters