Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas vowed Sunday to pursue Israeli 'war criminals' on the first anniversary of the Jewish state's massive offensive against the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip. 'We are determined to go after the war criminals that committed the most heinous and atrocious crimes against our children and women and elderly and our innocent youth,' the Western-backed leader said in a statement. 'This anniversary calls on us to criticise this aggression and these crimes in the strongest terms,' he added. Abbas faced heavy criticism earlier this year when, amid Israeli and US pressure, he supported postponing discussion of a UN report that accused Israel and Palestinian militants of war crimes during the 22-day conflict. He later backtracked and has since lent his support to the so-called Goldstone report commissioned by the UN Human Rights Council, but the incident weakened him with respect to his rivals in the Islamist Hamas movement. On Sunday he said Hamas was in part to blame for the war because it had driven his Fatah-led security forces from Gaza in June 2007. 'This aggression would not have happened, not on this scale and not with the loss of so many lives and so much property, if there were not a rift because of the coup Hamas carried out in Gaza,' he said. The takeover of Gaza left the Palestinians geographically divided, with Hamas ruling Gaza and Abbas's forces confined to the occupied West Bank, where they worked to curtail public protests and prevent violence during the war. Some 1,400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis were killed before the war was brought to an end on January 18 with unilateral ceasefires. 