GAZA CITY, 19 May 2007 — Chaos reigned in Gaza yesterday as residents reeled from Israeli assassinations and Palestinian infighting. Life was at a standstill with shops shuttered, schools closed, mosques empty on a Friday and masked gunmen roaming the streets.
“For one week, death strikes us from everywhere,” said Um Hossam, a 29-year-old resident of Gaza City. “Israel is killing us from the air and Hamas and Fatah are killing us from the ground.”
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, whose Fatah faction has been accused by Hamas of siding with Israel, called US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and asked her to halt an Israeli “military escalation,” a Palestinian news agency said.
A Palestinian hospital official said at least one man was killed and others were wounded when Israeli helicopter gunships fired on them after they fired a rocket into Israel.
The Israeli military said it attacked a rocket crew in the northern Gaza Strip and that eight missiles had struck Israel yesterday morning. One hit a house in the town of Sderot. Medics said there were only minor injuries.
Hours later, Israeli aircraft bombed a Hamas-owned van in Gaza City. At least two Palestinians were killed, one of them a Hamas fighter. The other’s identity was not immediately known.
A senior Israeli Army source said: “We are targeting the group’s (Hamas’) infrastructure, headquarters and rocket-launching capabilities. For the time being we will carry on operating in this pattern.”
Around a dozen Israeli tanks have taken up positions inside Gaza and the army redeployed a battery of 155mm artillery facing the Strip for the first time since a truce with the fighters in late November.
Fatah and Hamas forces, locked in week-old fighting, battled in Gaza City. Two people were killed, one of them a civilian caught in crossfire, doctors said. Three rocket-propelled grenades were fired at the pro-Hamas Islamic University.
Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh called on Palestinians to unite against “Israeli aggression” and cease internal fighting. “All members of the security services should abide by the instructions of the political leadership and return to their positions and bases, and also all gunmen should pull out of the streets,” Haniyeh told reporters.
Truces agreed by the Hamas and Fatah over the past week have collapsed swiftly. Nearly 50 people have died in the deadliest internal violence since the two rival groups formed a unity government in March.
The head of Abu Dhabi satellite television in Gaza City was briefly abducted. Abdel Salam Abu Askhar was freed unharmed after mediation by Egypt’s security delegation in Gaza City and Palestinian factions, sources said. Abu Askhar is a close associate of Fatah strongman Mohammad Dahlan.
Israel said yesterday it might agree to international peacekeepers being deployed in Gaza as long as they were ready to crack down on Palestinian fighters — a view one foreign diplomat said amounted to a polite “No.”
Israel has long resisted Palestinian calls for peacekeepers in Gaza and the occupied West Bank, saying their deployment would interfere with Israeli security measures.
Meeting senior Western diplomats yesterday, Israel Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said any Gaza force would have to be willing to search for “terrorists” and arms, and play other “executive” roles in order to be acceptable. A diplomat who attended said he doubted European countries would be willing to sign onto such a mandate.
— Additional input from agencies
