The Palestinian Fatah party yesterday wrapped up a landmark Congress after electing a new generation of leaders including a jailed militant whose fate is dividing Israeli leaders.

The party's first convention in 20 years was all but over, although officials are yet to count votes for the 120-member Revolutionary Council, a key body of the party founded five decades ago by iconic leader Yasser Arafat.

Fatah has also renewed its Central Committee, electing a new guard to the 23-strong governing body in the hopes of rejuvenating the once-dominant party weakened by internal rifts and a feud with its Hamas rivals.

Marwan Barghuti, a popular militant leader who is serving five life sentences in Israel for deadly attacks during the second intifada unleashed in 2000 was among those elected to the committee.

Israeli ministers are divided over whether Mr Barghuti should be freed.

"One should release him immediately and sit down with him, no one else than him is capable of taking difficult decisions," Trade Minister Benjamin Ben Eliezer told public radio.

"One doesn't make peace with schoolteachers but with leaders capable of taking decisions and imposing their authority to all Palestinian factions," said Ben Eliezer of Labour, a member of Israel's centre-right coalition.

Opposition Kadima leader Tzipi Livni however rejected his release.

"He is a murderer, he was convicted as a murderer," said Ms Livni, who as foreign minister under the previous government had led peace negotiations with the Palestinians.

"The fact Palestinians elected him and that some among us see him as a partner does not justify releasing him," the centrist politician said.