Doesn't make any difference Keith - all combatants exaggerate their figures.
An Israeli spokesman during the Gaza massacres claimed to have killed 1000 "terrorist" - work it out for yourself.
What the Observer "opined" is immaterial - the number of people slaughtered by 1000 heavily armed Israeli teoop at Jenin constituted a massacre to ordinary human beings.
It has become fashionable to refer to all opposition to Israeli terrorism as "terrorism".
Whatever we may personally think of Hamas, they are the only ones standing between the Palestinian people being ethnically cleansedd and slaughters and their persecutors.   
Counties with a record of war criminality themselves, like the U.S. have made sure that the Palestinians have no outside support from politicians in 'The Free West'.
When push comes to shove, there is little difference between Hamas and the Israeli Freedom Fighters of the 1940s
Jim Carroll