JERUSALEM — The Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, expressed abhorrence on Monday over the killing of five members of a family in a Jewish settlement in the West Bank. The emphatic condemnation, delivered over Israel’s public radio, came after Israel criticized the Palestinian leadership for what it considered to be an initially mealy-mouthed response.

“This act was abominable, inhuman and immoral,” Mr. Abbas said in a rare interview with Israel Radio that was conducted in Arabic. Referring to the killing of three of the family’s young children, including a baby, he added, “Any person who has a sense of humanity would be pained and driven to tears by such sights.”

The victims, Udi and Ruth Fogel, and three of their children, ages 11, 4 and 3 months, were stabbed to death in their beds late Friday in Itamar, near Nablus in the northern West Bank. The assailants, who are still at large, are widely suspected to be local Palestinians.

In the days since the attack, which shocked Israelis across the political spectrum, Israel has accused the Palestinian Authority of an indirect role in encouraging violence, citing incitement in the authority’s schools, mosques and news media.