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Palestinian Authority, Hamas Officials Trade Allegations Over Gaza Clashes

Posted on: Friday, 15 July 2005, 12:00 CDT

Officials from the Palestinian National Authority and Hamas held the other side responsible for the clashes which occurred between Palestinian security forces and Hamas members in the Gaza Strip on 14 and 15 July during separate interviews with Qatari Al-Jazeera satellite TV on 15 July.

In a live interview, Palestinian Interior Ministry spokesman Tawfiq Abu-Khusah said that Hamas had deliberately escalated the situation in the Gaza Strip as Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas arrived in the area. Abbas had arrived in Gaza in order to hold talks with the factions on maintaining the truce in the wake of the fatal suicide bomb attack in the Israeli town of Netanya on 12 July.

"Hamas started this escalation yesterday soon after the arrival of brother President Abu-Mazin [Abbas] in Gaza. They received him with a volley of rockets that were fired on the Green Line [pre- 1967 border] areas," Abu-Khusah said.

He continued: "The information we have confirms that this is a deliberate and fabricated act, starting with what happened yesterday when Hamas fighters opened fire on the National Security forces, leading to what happened this morning when Hamas fighters laid an ambush for a Palestinian police patrol. They fired bullets and bombs on the patrol and then took refuge behind civilians and on the rooftops of buildings. They continued to fire their bullets, leaving nine members of the National Security forces and the Palestinian police wounded."

Asked to comment on reports that the Palestinian Interior Ministry had issued orders to stop Hamas firing rockets, Abu-Khusah said: "Hamas's attempt to portray this Palestinian position as a secret thing is a trick and an attempt to throw sand in people's eyes. We in the Palestinian Authority have a clear position. We say we will protect the state of calm which was unanimously endorsed by the Palestinian meetings in Cairo. We will stop these rockets because these rockets harm the national interest. For the record, there have been nine Palestinian martyrs and 70 Palestinians wounded by these rockets which do not reach Israel but fall on the heads and homes of the Palestinian people. Therefore, we believe that stopping these rockets is a Palestinian national interest which must be protected."

Asked if there would be further security measures, Abu-Khusah said: "According to the instructions of Interior Minister Maj-Gen Nasr Yusuf, the Ministry of Interior and National Security plays an exclusively executive role. Its role is to maintain law and order and to control things on the ground to provide security and safety for every Palestinian citizen. This power is a national issue, not a factional issue, although Hamas is now trying to pave the way for the pre-evacuation phase to usurp power by force. This logic is unacceptable. We, the Palestinian people, have accepted political plurality and accepted the ballot box as the arbiter. Therefore, there is no need for such fabricated events by Hamas which will be fully responsible for pushing our people to tragedy and sedition. We beseech God to spare our Palestinian people from the consequences of such a sedition and tragedy, and we hope that the wise people in Hamas will return to their senses and fear God and show respect for our people who have suffered a great deal."

Hamas spokesman

The TV then conducted a live interview with Hamas spokesman Sami Abu-Zuhri. Asked why Hamas did not stop firing rockets, Abu-Zuhri said that the rockets fired by the group's armed wing, the Martyr Izz-al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the previous day "were intended to defend our people in the West Bank, who are facing Israeli aggression and raids, especially in Nablus and Tulkarm".

He said that "what is happening now is not an incidental event, but a fabricated one. There is a decision by the Interior Ministry to open fire on any of the resistance mujahidin who fire rockets".

Abu-Zuhri then showed a piece of paper which he said included instructions from the Interior Ministry to the security forces to prevent the firing of rockets. Reading from the paper, Abu-Zuhri quoted it as saying: "Security forces should take decisive and firm measures to stop any attempt to fire rockets at the Green Line areas or the settlements, even if this leads to the use of weapons against those who do not comply with this."

Asked what was wrong with the Palestinian Authority position on preventing rocket fire, especially given that this was one of the Authority's obligations, Abu-Zuhri said: "We are still committed to the calm agreement. What is happening is retaliation for the ceaseless Israeli aggression. We have announced our compliance with the calm agreement, but we cannot let our people be killed in the West Bank and stand idly by."

He added: "We clearly say that we hold Interior Minister Nasr Yusuf fully responsible for the security deterioration in the Palestinian arena. This minister stands behind the Palestine Mosque massacre. We are now not talking about a transient incident. We are talking about a series of crimes against our people, particularly the Palestine Mosque massacre, for which Nasr Yusuf is directly responsible."

He continued: "We demand his immediate dismissal because he does not give any weight to the blood of our Palestinian people and because he is opening fire on the children and the mujahidin who are defending our people."

In conclusion Abu-Zuhri said that the Palestinian security agencies were now deploying armoured personnel carriers (APCs) to patrol Gaza's streets and asked: "These APC's are now deployed to open fire on women, children, buildings and Palestinian people. Where were these APC's if the purpose is to protect the Palestinian people? Where were they when Al-Zaytun district was raided?"

Source: BBC Monitoring Middle East

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