GAZA CITY, 20 July 2005 — Palestinian factions, including Hamas agreed with senior Egyptian officials during a meeting in Gaza yesterday to continue efforts to end the current crisis between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas. Saied Seyam, a senior Hamas leader in Gaza who attended the meeting told reporters that the crisis still existed, but efforts were being made to end it as soon as possible.
Last Thursday, as Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was arriving in Gaza for a dialogue with the factions to reinforce a cease-fire agreement reached in Cairo, Hamas militants intensified firing rockets at Israel. Both Hamas and the PA leaders have argued over the text of the agreement. Hamas insists that according to the deal, militants have the right to respond to any Israeli attack carried out against the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.
Abbas and chief of the follow-up committee for national and Islamic factions, Ibrahim Abu Naja, insisted however that any response to Israeli violations had to be first agreed upon among the factions and with the PA. Egypt sent a high-ranking Egyptian security delegation headed by Gen. Mustafa Al-Beheiri to Gaza for a series of meetings with Abbas and leaders of all the Palestinian factions and militant groups.
Israeli troops killed two Palestinian men yesterday during an arrest operation near the West Bank town of Jenin. Israeli military sources said soldiers surrounded a building in the village of Yamoun and the men came out shooting and were shot dead in an ensuing exchange of fire. Two other men surrendered and were arrested, they said.
Palestinian witnesses said the persons were members of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, an offshoot of the dominant Fatah movement, in the village of Yamoun. Israeli security sources said the men were also heads of Islamic Jihad, a group Israel has targeted in a series of raids this week since an Islamic Jihad suicide bomber killed five Israelis in the coastal city of Netanya on July 12. “The terrorists were on their way to a suicide attack within Israel and were a ticking bomb, and for that we killed them,” Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz told Reuters.
Palestinians responded angrily to the killings and militants threatened retaliation for the latest of a series of Israeli strikes into the West Bank since last week’s suicide bombing. Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qorei accused Israel of violating a five-month-old de facto cease-fire.
The truce has been brought to the verge of collapse by a surge of violence over the past week that has raised doubts over peacemaking hopes and threatened to disrupt Israel’s plan to withdraw 9,000 settlers from Gaza and West Bank in mid-August.
In another development, Palestinian security forces and Hamas men fought gunbattles in the Gaza Strip yesterday, as Egyptian mediators sought to restore calm after the worst internal violence in years. Eleven members of the security forces and two Hamas men were wounded in the clashes, which broke out after two Hamas offices and a vehicle were torched in predawn attacks that Hamas blamed on members of the security forces from the ruling Fatah party.
Hamas and Palestinian officials traded blame for the clashes, which erupted in the Jabalya refugee camp as Abbas was in nearby Gaza City. Abbas had earlier warned militants he would not tolerate further fighting with his security forces or attacks on Israel.
The resumption of clashes threatened to complicate Egyptian efforts to restore order following bloody internal fighting last week that erupted when Palestinian security forces tried to stop Hamas gunmen from firing rockets into Israel.
Hamas, following yesterday’s clash, said it had resumed firing mortars at Jewish settlements in Gaza after a lull. Hamas said the mortar fire was in response to Israeli military actions.
Meanwhile, Israeli right-wingers clashed yesterday with police who blocked thousands of protesters from marching on Gaza settlements and trying to disrupt Israel’s pullout from the occupied strip.
Demonstrators ignored orders to disperse as security forces penned them inside the southern Israeli farming village of Kfar Maimon to prevent them from advancing any further toward the Gush Katif settlement bloc, about 15 km to the west.
It was the biggest showdown so far with protesters opposed to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s pullout plan and could be a preview of confrontations expected when Israel begins evacuating 21 settlements in Gaza and a pocket of the West Bank next month.
Sixteen people were arrested and several injured when demonstrators shouting “Police state!” and vowing to defy a ban on their march tried to push through a police cordon. Police and angry youths traded punches. Officers on horseback moved into the crowd. Water cannon were brought in but not used. “This protest is illegal. The event is over. We are offering bus rides back to your homes,” police shouted through loudspeakers at the protesters. However, there was no immediate sign that anyone was taking heed and some settlers responded defiantly dancing and singing.
