Israel's envoy to the United Nations on Thursday accused Iran of bribing a Hamas leader to sabotage the release of Israel Defense Forces soldier Gilad Shalit who was captured by Palestinian militants near Gaza in June and has not been heard from since.

Ambassador Dan Gillerman told the UN Security Council that "we heard news" earlier in the day that Tehran had paid $50 million to Hamas leader Khaled Meshal, who lives in the Syrian capital Damascus, "to sabotage the negotiations on the release of Corporal Gilad Shalit and prevent his release."

"We have every reason to believe that the Iranian regime has bribed Khaled Meshal," he later told reporters. "I cannot divulge the sources or give you any further details on this."

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Shalit was seized on June 25 by Palestinian militants in a cross-border raid, in which two other soldiers were killed.

Egypt has been mediating between Israelis and Palestinians for the past three months in an effort to arrange a prisoner swap that would result in Shalit's release.

Iranian UN envoy Mansour Sadeghi, also appearing before the 15-nation Security Council, dismissed Gillerman's allegations as "baseless and absurd."

The charges were meant to "deflect attention from the root causes for all tensions in the Middle East - that is the Israeli regime's aggression, occupation and state terrorism," Sadeghi said.

Gillerman said the alleged bribe raised questions about what Iran was willing to do to derail a diplomatic initiative in the Security Council aimed at pressuring Iran to suspend its nuclear enrichment activities.

"I believe that the Security Council is worried about this and I hope that these worries will be translated into action very very swiftly," he said.

Western Powers suspect Iran is enriching uranium to make nuclear weapons. Tehran insists it is pursuing the technology only to produce electric power for civilian use.