DUBAI (AFP) - Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas said that Hamas could only participate in any future government if the Islamist militant group recognizes the Oslo peace accords with Israel.

Abbas also said the January 25 polls, in which Hamas was participating for the first time, will be held on time if Israel did not prevent the vote in annexed east Beit-ul-Moqaddas.

Israel has already made clear that it will not allow campaigning in east Beit-ul-Moqaddas by Hamas, which has carried out the majority of attacks against Israel in the past five years and refuses to recognize the Jewish state.

"Hamas is now participating in the elections according to a certain basis, and not any other basis from the past," Abbas said in an interview with the Al-Jazeera news channel.

"If Hamas wants to participate in the government, it has to abide by this basis ... upon which we (the Palestinian leadership) returned (from exile) to Palestine in 1994, based on the Oslo accords," he said.

"We returned on the basis of the Oslo accords which rule the legislative council and all the agreements that took place afterwards between us and the Israelis, and subsequently the roadmap," he said.

"So whomever wants to participate in this government has to do so on this basis," he said.

The internationally drafted roadmap plan, which has made next to no progress since its launch in 2003, calls for an end to Israeli-Palestinian violence, a freeze in Israeli settlement activity and the creation of a Palestinian state. Abbas said "if Hamas participates and wins a number of seats and wants to participate in the Palestinian Authority... why would we stop them, and I do not think that the Americans have the right to stop them from doing so."

Despite previous warnings from Abbas that he is ready to cancel the whole election if Arab residents of east Beit-ul-Moqaddas are not allowed to take part, Israel has yet to give its final approval.

Abbas told Al-Jazeera that he had received assurances from Washington that the Israeli cabinet would approve the polls in east Beit-ul-Moqaddas during its meeting on Sunday.

A U.S. envoy has already indicated after talks with both Abbas and acting Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Friday that he expected that authorization to be forthcoming.

"We want to assert our right over (east) Beit-ul-Moqaddas through the elections because it is part of the (future) Palestinian state," said Abbas.

"We are determined to hold those elections on January 25, unless we do not obtain our complete rights, in line with the Oslo accords and the elections of 1996," he warned.

Israel allowed voting in east Beit-ul-Moqaddas in the only previous elections to the Palestinian parliament in 1996, and again in elections for the Palestinian Authority presidency last year.

But in 2005, barely 6,000 of the 110,000 registered voters in east Jerusalem and its suburbs took part, prompting accusations that Israeli obstacles had prevented people turning out at the polls.

Abbas complained that the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories, its continued military attacks and countless roadblocks were a hindrance to the free movement of voters during the electoral process.