ALGIERS, Oct. 15 (Xinhua) -- Salah Goudjil, speaker of Algeria's Council of the Nation, the upper house of parliament, met with a senior Hamas official on Sunday and reiterated his country's "unwavering support" for the Palestinian cause, the council said in a statement.
Goudjil and Sami Abu Zuhri, a senior Hamas official living abroad, discussed in Algiers the latest developments in the Gaza Strip, where Israel has been carrying out airstrikes and "forced displacements" of Palestinians, the statement noted.
Goudjil urged the international community to protect the Palestinian people in accordance with international law and humanitarian norms, it added.
Abu Zuhri thanked Algeria for its "steadfast backing of the Palestinian cause," the statement said.
The Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) launched a surprise attack with thousands of rockets and the infiltration by scores of militants on Israel on Oct. 7, prompting extensive Israeli airstrikes on Gaza.
The ongoing conflict, now in its ninth day, has killed about 4,000 on both Israel and the Gaza Strip. ■