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Hamas Palestinian PM Ismail Haniyeh, Sunday (AP)
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Mahmoud Abbas, Tuesday (AP)
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| By Israel Insider staff and partners May 17, 2006 |
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| Palestinians shout anti Israel and pro- Hamas slogans, Saturday. (AP) |
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A defiant Hamas-led government said a new militants' army would start operating Wednesday, disregarding Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' order that no such force be formed, and raising the stakes in their increasingly bellicose power struggle.
Hamas appeared to have been propelled into action by mysterious drive-by shootings, just hours earlier, that killed two of its militants in the Gaza Strip. These and other recent cases of deadly internal fighting have threatened to plunge the Palestinian territories into bloody chaos.
Israeli military officials, meanwhile, said Israel would reopen the main cargo crossing between Gaza and Israel, Gaza's lifeline, on Wednesday. Also Wednesday, two Palestinians terrorists were killed and one wounded during an Israeli arrest raid in the West Bank.
The Hamas-led government and Abbas have been wrangling over power since the Islamic militant group ousted his long-ruling Fatah party in January parliamentary elections.
A key area of dispute is control over the security forces.
Interior Minister Said Siyam's announcement last month of Hamas' plan to create the new force was construed as an attempt to counter Abbas' moves to take over all of the Palestinian security branches.
But Abbas vetoed the force, which is to be headed by Jamal Abu Samhadana, a key player in ongoing rocket attacks on Israel and a suspect in the deadly 2003 bombing of an American convoy in the Gaza Strip.
Confronting Abbas head on, Siyam announced Wednesday that the unit would begin operating that day.
"In line with my authority, I announce the beginning of the work of the executive unit that was formed recently to protect the security of the citizens and their property," he told a news conference.
Siyam activated the force just hours after masked gunmen, shooting from a car, killed a member of Hamas' military wing, Bilal Abu Kouskya, 28, as he walked to predawn prayers.
Abu Obeida, a spokesman for the Hamas military wing, said the killing was carried out by those "trying to take our people into civil war," but did not blame Fatah. "We are not going to allow anyone, to assault our fighters." Abu Obeida wrote in an e-mail to journalists.
No one claimed responsbility for Wednesday's killing, the second in two days. On Tuesday, drive-by shooters killed a Hamas activist on a street in Gaza City, and earlier in the day, in the southern town of Khan Younis, two Hamas activists were wounded by shots from a passing car.
Both Hamas and Fatah suggested Israel was somehow involved, saying it is the only party to benefit from growing chaos, but no evidence was offered.
Fatah's Abbas, who was elected separately last year, has been assuming wider powers in an effort to present himself to Western powers as an alternative conduit for diplomacy and desperately needed funding, cut off because of Hamas' militantly anti-Israel stance.
The sanctions have created deep misery in Palestinian territories, which has been aggravated by Israel's withholding of tax revenues it collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority, and frequent closures of its main cargo crossing with Gaza.
On Wednesday, Israeli Defense Minister Amir Peretz ordered the reopening of the vital Karni cargo crossing between Gaza and Israel, signaling a change in policy toward the Palestinians, Israeli military officials said. Peretz, leader of the dovish Labor Party, became defense minister earlier this month.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the crossing had not yet been opened.
Israel has kept Karni closed for nearly two months so far this year, citing warnings that Palestinian militants were trying to attack the site, which has been targeted in deadly attacks in the past.
But the closures have created food shortages and cost the Palestinians tens of millions of dollars in lost export revenues.
While Palestinians clashed with each other in Gaza, two Islamic Jihad terrorists were killed and another was wounded in a predawn gunbattle in the Samarian town of Nablus, Palestinian security and medical officials said.
Israeli soldiers on an arrest raid circled the terrorists' five-room, one-story hideout and a firefight broke out. Fighting continued for hours, and troops used a bulldozer to raze part of the building,
A large pool of blood stained the ground outside the house. "God is Great" was daubed in blooed on the wall around the building.
Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat condemned the killings "in the strongest possible terms."
A spokesman for Islamic Jihad who gave his name only as Abul Abed said the terror group would not back down from its fight against Israel.
"This gives us more courage to fight them," El-Abed said after viewing the two bodies. "We are fighting with Israel for billions of Muslims in the world."
The Iranian-backed Islamic Jihad has been the faction responsible for all nine suicide bombings against Israeli targets since Palestinian factions agreed to an informal truce in February 2005.
AP contributed to this report.
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