Fighting in Gaza Escalates to Possible Civil War
JERUSALEM _ Fighters from the militant Islamic group Hamas overran key positions of rival Fatah-led security forces in gun battles across the Gaza Strip on Tuesday, pressing a broad assault that supporters of President Mahmoud Abbas called an attempted coup to seize full control of the Palestinian government.
The Hamas advances signaled a possible turning point in the violent power struggle between the two factions that has taken hundreds of lives since Hamas won parliamentary elections in 2006, defeating Abbas’ Fatah party.
The fighting has now escalated to what many in Gaza are calling civil war. It has included execution-style killings, shootouts at hospitals and two cases this week in which people were hurled to their deaths from rooftops.
A total of 28 Palestinians were killed Tuesday, hospital officials said. That was believed to be the highest single-day toll in Gaza’s factional fighting. More than 40 have died in clashes this week.
The internal strife has dimmed prospects for a revival of regional peace efforts, undercutting attempts to restart talks between the Palestinians and Israelis. The U.S. has aided Abbas, who advocates negotiations while Hamas rejects any permanent peace with Israel.
In a key gain for Hamas on Tuesday, its forces captured the headquarters of the Fatah-led National Security Force in the northern Gaza Strip after an hours-long battle that claimed 13 lives, according to hospital officials. The compound near the Jabalya refugee camp was pounded with mortars, rocket-propelled grenades and machine gun fire.
Other Fatah posts were taken by Hamas fighters, and residents said that the Islamic group was in control of the northern and central Gaza Strip, with Fatah still controlling key security installations in Gaza City, including the presidential compound.
Fatah’s Central Committee warned after a meeting chaired by Abbas at his West Bank headquarters in Ramallah that Fatah ministers would suspend participation in a unity government with Hamas if the fighting did not stop. The shaky coalition was formed three months ago.
The exasperated head of an Egyptian mediation team in Gaza, Lt. Gen. Burhan Hamad, said there was “no one to talk to” among the warring factions, and he called on ordinary Palestinians to take to the streets Wednesday to demand an end to the bloodshed.
Factional violence spread to the West Bank, but it was sporadic. A deputy Cabinet minister from Hamas was kidnapped by Fatah gunmen, and Abbas’ presidential guards raided offices of a Hamas-controlled television station, confiscating equipment and arresting three staff members.
Late Tuesday, Fatah gunmen wounded four Hamas members in the city of Nablus, according to a Fatah statement reported by the Associated Press.
Fighting raged across Gaza City on Tuesday as residents huddled in their homes and combatants targeted symbols of leadership on both sides. A rocket-propelled grenade hit the house of Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas in the Shati refugee camp, but there were no casualties among family members. Mortars landed near Abbas’s Gaza residence. Neither leader was home.
Hamas fighters warned Fatah-led security forces to evacuate their bases, then attacked security compounds and positions in what appeared to be a planned assault on several fronts.
Fatah commanders complained that they were not given clear orders to respond and that they had no central command. Fatah’s strongman in Gaza, Mohammed Dahlan, has been in Cairo for several weeks, reportedly recovering from knee surgery.
The U.S. has worked to bolster Abbas’ presidential guard with additional training, and Israel has allowed Abbas’ forces to bring in arms, ammunition and reinforcements through Egypt. But they appeared outgunned and overwhelmed by the better-organized Hamas fighters, drawn from the group’s armed wing and security force.
In Gaza City, gunfire and explosions were heard from the base of Abbas’ National Security Force, whose commanders issued an order exhorting troops to “confront the seekers of the coup.”
The order described Hamas as a “bloody party which is launching a coup against the president and against the authority and national unity government.”
Hamas called the attack on Haniyeh’s home an assassination attempt. “They have crossed all the red lines,” said Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum.
Fighting erupted near the headquarters of the Fatah-led Preventive Security Service, with Hamas fighters firing mortars and drawing return fire from the compound, according to reports from the scene. Fatah forces tried to attack Hamas’ main television station, but were repelled and their vehicles burned.
In Khan Yunis in the central Gaza Strip, Hamas forces captured the district government building and exchanged fire with Fatah forces at the local security headquarters, according to local reports. A gun battle erupted at a hospital when Hamas militants on the roof traded fire with Fatah forces.
Nabil Shaath, a prominent aide to Abbas and former foreign minister, said that his Gaza house had been raided and burned, though none of his family was present. The home of Samih al-Madhoun, a leader of the armed wing of Fatah, the Al-Aqsa Brigades, was attacked and burned.
The fighting this week has included incidents of extraordinary brutality. On Sunday a cook in Abbas’ presidential guard was kidnapped and hurled to his death off a 15-story apartment building, his hands and legs tied. A few hours later a Hamas supporter was thrown from the roof of another high-rise. Fatah supporters gunned down a Hamas cleric outside his mosque and a Fatah commander who survived an attack on his home was caught and killed execution-style, riddled with dozens of bullets by Hamas gunmen, medics said.
The State Department and the U.S. consulate in Jerusalem, warning of “a precarious and dangerous security situation,” advised American journalists not to travel to Gaza and urged all Americans still there to leave.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said that “serious consideration” should be given to posting international forces along the Gaza Strip’s border with Egypt to prevent arms from reaching Palestinian militants.
“If the Gaza Strip ultimately falls to Hamas, this will be of great regional significance,” he said, but added that Israeli forces could not enter Gaza to help Abbas.
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(Chicago Tribune correspondent Hamza al-Attar contributed to this story from Gaza City.)
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(c) 2007, Chicago Tribune.
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