Exiled Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal criticized an upcoming US-sponsored Mideast peace conference Saturday, saying Washington was trying to impose its agenda and widen divisions between the Palestinians. US President George W. Bush proposed the conference this summer after bloody Palestinian infighting split the Hamas and Fatah movements into two rival governments. "The international conference is a tool to be used by America to impose the US agenda and to embarrass Arabs into taking the side of American policy," Mashaal told Hizbullah's Al-Manar television. "America wants to engage the service of the conference to strengthen the Palestinian division," said Mashaal.