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Fatah activists from Gaza to be sent to West Bank, officials |
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Written by THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
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Thursday, 07 August 2008 |
Masked Palestinian Fatah members deliver a statement about the recent factional fighting between Hamas and Fatah in the Gaza Strip, in the West Bank city of Nablus, Monday, Aug. 4, 2008. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS/Majdi Mohammed
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JERUSALEM - Israel said Monday that it will send dozens of Fatah fighters to the West Bank after they fled the Gaza Strip, reversing an earlier plan to return them because the Palestinian fighters face "immediate danger" in Hamas-controlled Gaza.
On Sunday, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas ordered nearly 200 of his Fatah fighters to return to Gaza from Israel, insisting that his forces must retain a presence in Gaza despite the danger of reprisals from territory's Islamic rulers.
Hamas took over rule of Gaza by force from Abbas' West Bank-based government in June 2007.
The first group of 32 fighters were indeed sent back to Gaza. Hamas detained them upon arrival.
Israel's Defense Ministry said in a statement that it halted the process as it received information that "they were being arrested by Hamas and that their lives were in immediate danger."
The drama followed the bloodiest weekend of Hamas-Fatah fighting since the Hamas takeover of Gaza. Eleven people were killed and dozens wounded during a Hamas raid on a Fatah stronghold in Gaza City on Saturday.
The latest round of internal fighting began on July 25 with a car bomb that killed five Hamas members in Gaza City. Hamas, blaming Fatah, rounded up dozens of Fatah activists, and Fatah, which controls the West Bank, responded with arrest sweeps of Hamas supporters.
On Saturday, Hamas raided a Gaza City stronghold of the Hilles clan, whose leaders support Fatah but have also forged ties with Hamas in the past year. The two sides battled for hours, firing mortars, rocket-propelled grenades and machine guns.
As Hamas forces took control of the area Saturday afternoon, dozens of Hilles clan members fled toward the nearby Israeli border crossing of Nahal Oz.
Col. Ron Ashrov, an Israeli military commander in the area, said that when Israeli soldiers went to open the gate, heavy fire erupted from Hamas forces. He said 22 of those who crossed were injured, and they remained hospitalized in Israel on Monday.
Sufian Abu Zaydeh, a Gaza native and former Palestinian Cabinet minister from Fatah, said the incident marked a new low.
"When a man stands between two choices: to be killed by his people or to be arrested by his enemy, and he reaches a conclusion that it is better to be arrested by his enemy, it shows you how cruel the situation is in Gaza," he told Israel's Army Radio.
Abbas asked Israel to take in the Hilles clan and planned to transfer them to the West Bank, before he reversed his decision non Sunday. Monday's announcement marked another about face, highlighting the tricky dilemma the escape posed for Abbas.
After the Hamas takeover of Gaza last summer, he had agreed to resettle some 250 of his Gaza loyalists in the West Bank.
It's been a costly arrangement - the refugees each get $350 a month, in addition to government salaries, and Abbas' cash-strapped government covers rent for dozens of the most senior among them. The 2007 exodus also sent a message that Fatah is abandoning Gaza to Hamas.
Abbas wanted to send a different message this time, aides said.
"Fatah officials in Gaza should stay in their posts and should not leave Gaza to Hamas," Fahmi Zaghrir, a West Bank spokesman for Fatah, said Sunday. An exception would be made for those wanted by Hamas, added Nimr Hamad, an Abbas adviser.
Last week, two human rights groups reported that torture is widespread in lockups of both Hamas and Fatah. The immediate arrests in Gaza sparked fear that the Hilles clan would meet a similar fate.
Ahmed Hilles, a clan leader, was recovering in an Israeli hospital Sunday from a bullet wound in his leg.
Speaking from his hospital bed in Israel, he said Hamas "will quickly discover it committed a very big act of stupidity" in going after his clan, but he did not elaborate.
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Last Updated ( Thursday, 07 August 2008 )
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