GAZA, 1 January 2005 — Israeli soldiers have killed twelve Palestinians during a major operation in Gaza Strip as Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas vowed to remain faithful to the legacy of the late Yasser Arafat.
A spokesman said a military aircraft fired a missile near Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip at armed Palestinians who were planting a bomb. Palestinian sources said at least two militants were killed. Nine members of the militant Hamas group had been killed during fighting Thursday in Khan Younis. The operation was aimed at preventing Palestinian attacks on nearby Jewish settlements, officials said. Israeli forces also shot two other militants in the West Bank town of Nablus in a gun battle yesterday, killing at least one and wounding another, Israeli sources said. Army sources said the clash broke out after residents opened fire on an Israeli patrol.
In the West Bank, the body of an alleged Palestinian spy for Israel was found riddled with bullets near a mosque in Ramallah while a second Palestinian man was found dead at the offices of the Palestinian intelligence services in Jericho. Security sources said he had hanged himself.
On the political front, PLO chief Mahmoud Abbas pledged to remain faithful to late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat’s legacy yesterday as he commemorated his Fatah party’s 40th anniversary in the Gaza Strip.
In Israel, the formation of a new national unity government to carry out the planned withdrawal from Gaza next year appeared likely to be delayed when a small religious party set out tough conditions for its participation in the coalition.
“We will remain faithful to your (Arafat’s) legacy until freedom,” Abbas told a 20,000-strong crowd that had gathered in Gaza City’s Unknown Soldier square.
Abbas, who is Fatah official candidate and great favorite to win the Jan. 9 presidential polls, went on to light a torch to launch festivities marking the 40th anniversary of the political movement created by Arafat.
Fatah dates back its official birth to the first attack it staged against Israel on Jan. 1, 1965, although the group was actually founded five years before in Kuwait.
Abbas also reiterated his support to the Palestinian “national imperatives” that were defined by Arafat, citing “the creation of an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital, the end of the occupation and of the apartheid wall (Israel’s West Bank barrier) and the right of return for the Palestinian refugees.”
Abbas’ insistence to carry on with Arafat’s heritage has angered the Israeli government which views the late leader as a “terrorist” and squarely rejects the return of millions of Palestinian refugees that were either expelled or fled their home after the creation of the Jewish state in 1948. Abbas is due to stay in the Gaza Strip until Monday afternoon where he will campaign for the January polls. The impoverished territory is known to be the stronghold of the radical Islamist Hamas and Islamic Jihad groups which said they would boycott the elections. Both groups did however field candidates to the municipal elections last week in the West Bank where they came only second after Fatah and have announced their intention to run for the legislative polls next year. They are forecast to win many village and town councils during the second tranche of the municipal polls in Gaza next month.
