(Updates with force on Gaza-Egypt border)

By Axel Bugge

LISBON, June 15 (Reuters) - Israel still wants a two-state solution with moderate Palestinians despite Hamas's takeover of the Gaza Strip, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said on Friday.

But Livni, speaking in Lisbon after Hamas Islamist fighters routed forces loyal to the Western-backed President Mahmoud Abbas in Gaza in six days of fighting, said Israel will maintain pressure on Hamas in the coastal region.

"The goal is a two-state solution, or to give the Palestinians their own possibility to fulfil their aspirations in a state of their own," Livni told journalists during a visit to Portugal.

"We are waiting, watching the situation very closely," she said. "But on the other hand we are going to keep this strategy of a dialogue with the (Palestinian) moderates and to send some hope for those who support their vision."

Livni said the two-state solution had to be based on the idea that a Palestinian state "is the answer to the national aspirations of the Palestinians" and that Israel and the Palestinians live side by side in peace.

"The decision (for a two-state solution) is basically a decision for the moderate Palestinians," Livni said.

She also said Israel was still considering asking for an international force in the Philadelphi Corridor along Gaza's border with Egypt but such a force would only be of use if it was aimed at stopping arms smuggling to Hamas.

She said Palestinians are digging under the border with Egypt to smuggle weapons.

The European Union's foreign policy chief Javier Solana said this week the bloc would consider contributing to such a force and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon also raised the possibility of an international force in Gaza.

"We need forces to stop them and there is a huge question whether those who are talking about an international intervention in the corridor are also willing to go house to house and to confront (them)," she said.

"I am talking about confrontation with the terrorists, with Hamas, and this is an open question," Livni said, adding Israel was only interested in an international force on the border in order to crack down on arms smuggling.

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