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A hooded Hamas gunmen leads away Fatah prisoners (AlJazeera)
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| By Israel Insider staff June 14, 2007 |
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Hamas gunmen completed the conquest of the main building of the headquarters of the Palestinian Preventive Security Service, long associated with Fatah strongman Mohammed Dahlan, as additional bastions of Fatah support fell to the Islamist forces. Hamas seized the vehicles and weapons in the compound, wrapping up a broad sweep which has almost completely vanquished the forces of PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas.
The gunmen who entered the compound held a prayer there and waved a flag on the building's rooftop. At least 10 people were killed in the takeover. Hamas' television station is now broadcasting from within the compound, where Hamas members had been interrogated. Hamas announced that it was changing the name of the neighborhood to "Tel al-Islam."
Hamas officials announced that the building would become a madrasa for religioous studies, and that the Sariya -- the PA's government office building -- would turn into a massive religious center.
The Hamas TV broadcast displayed weapons, jeeps, mortar shells and bulletproof vests seized in the compound, YnetNews reported, much of which was transferred to Fatah by Israel and the Americans in recent months through the border with Egypt, confirming Israeli fears that the war materiel would fall into the hands of the jihadists. That fall came far faster than even the most pessimistic observers had predicted.
Hamas terrorists also fired mortar shells at the PA Intelligence Service and the Presidential Guard, as well as Abbas's main compound. Hamas and Fatah men took control of rooftops throughout the city Wednesday and fired at each other.
Moean Hammad, 34, said life had become a nightmare at his high-rise building near the Preventive Security headquarters/ "We spent our night in the hallway outside the apartment because the building came under cross-fire," Hammad said. "We haven't had electricity for two days, and all we can hear is shooting and powerful, earth-shaking explosions.
"The world is watching us dying and doing nothing to help. God help us, we feel like we are in a real-life horror movie," he said.
The city's mosques broadcast via loudspeaker calls by Hamas for Fatah to surrender and hand in their weapons.
Fatah headquarters in Khan Younis was blown up by a one-ton bomb planted beneath it in a tunnel, a technique previously used against the IDF. Terrified Fatah men fled the building, handed over their arms and even their clothes to Hamas men outside. Another large bomb was uncovered by Fatah forces underneath the road used by Abbas when in Gaza. Currently, and probably for the near future at least, he is keeping his distance.
Also in Rafah, Hamas blew up Fatah headquarters and declared its conquest of the town. Egyptian reports said that forty PA officers broke through the Gaza-Egypt border fence and fled for their lives to Sinai. The Hamas-affiliated Popular Resistance Committee said that it had seized control of the border to prevent weapons from being brought into Gaza and mass emigration by local Gazans as well as Fatah officials and fighters.
Fatah even blew up several of its own bases in central Gaza to prevent them and their contents from falling into Hamas?s hands.
Hundreds of Fatah gunmen were seen surrendering to Hamas in Gaza, caving into to a Hamas ultimatum to surrender by Friday or die. Hundreds of members of the mercenary local Bakr clan fighting for Fatah also surrendered. Clan members, following their surrender, were taken to a local mosque. Hamas blew up the homes of clan members. Women of the clan were shot dead after they tried to transport a sick girl to the hospital, the PA reported.
Nearly 80 people have been killed in the most recent wave of Fatah-Hamas clashes.
What has emerged is, in effect, a two-state solution, though not the one envisioned by the Quartet and the Israeli government. Hamas will rule Gaza and attempt to turn it into an Islamic state, while Abbas will try to cling to power in the West Bank and turn it into a "Fatahland."
"This is the first step in the establishment of the Islamic state," a Hamas member told Ynet from inside the Preventive Security Service building. "This is Islam's victory, Allah's victory, and we pray to Allah for bringing us this victory."
Hospitals in Gaza were operating without water, electricity and blood. Patients were being killed at close range by rival factions as they arrived to the hospital.
Shaher Hatoum, a nurse at Al Quds Hospital, said that the wounded were propped up on ward floors. Fighters ignored the hospital's pleas to hold fire long enough to repair the generator and water pipes, Hatoum said. Hundreds of bullets kept flying through the windows. "We are waiting here for our end," Hatoum said.
Hamas' media outlets announced that among the next targets after the Prevent Security compound would be Fatah and the PA's official radio and telelvision stations. The station announced the names of senior Fatah officials and said that they had been marked for execution. "We will reach you," Hamas members told the Fatah leaders.
Hamas gunmen collected weapons and ammunitions from Fatah members' homes -- in some cases shooting men point blank in front of their families.
In general, Fatah offered weak resistance, with its forces often surrendering without a fight and handing over their weapons.
Aides to Abbas said Thursday that he had ordered his elite presidential guard to strike back against Hamas fighters. But the efficacy of the force was in doubt and most observers considered the attempt to stop Hamas to be a lost cause. On Thursday afternoon, Abbas met with the PLO's Executive Committee, which recommended that he disband the unity government and declare a state of emergency in Gaza. Fatah broadcast security oders to Palestinian security officers via television, calling on them not to surrender to Hamas. But many preferred to surrender rather than risk instant death at the hands of the Hamas killing squads.
Fatah is trying to assert its dwindling authority in the West Bank, launching a wave of more than 30 arrests there. On Wednesday night, and has so far arrested 30 Hamas members. The Palestinian president is also considering declaring the Gaza Strip a "rebelling district" and continues to say that the only legal and official rule in the Palestinian Authority resided in Ramallah.
Hamas was not impressed by the threats and declarations, but it will force the Islamic militants to decide whether it wants to run the Strip on its own, with all the political and economic consequences.
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At least 25 Palestinians were killed and 80 were wounded as Hamas fighters overran two of Fatah's most important security installations in the Gaza Strip on Thursday. Witnesses said the victors dragged vanquished gunmen from the building and shot them to death gangland-style in the street in front of their families.
The headquarters of the General Security Service, commanded by Ramallah-based General Tawfik Tirawi, fell to Hamas gunmen. Hamas said documents it found there prove that the Fatah-affiliated security apparatus has close ties with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Hamas said it would show the documents on television in the coming hours.
Elsewhere, the capture of the Preventive Security headquarters was a major step forward in Hamas's attempts to complete its takeover of all of Gaza. Hamas followed up that victory by demanding Fatah surrender another key security installation.
Hamas victory could be opportunity for Israel
Where is Fatah's strongman Dahlan?
Egypt's difficult task in Gaza
Hamas also overran the southern city of Rafah, the second of Gaza's four main towns to fall into the Islamic group's hands.
Later Thursday, an explosion rocked Gaza City, and smoke was seen rising from a security post. Fatah security officials said forces positioned at the post had redeployed elsewhere and blown it up as they left, rather than let Hamas take it over.
Earlier, Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah, for the first time in five days of fierce fighting, ordered his elite presidential guard to strike back. But his forces were crumbling fast under the onslaught by the better-armed and better-disciplined Islamic fighters.
A Hamas military victory in Gaza would split Palestinian territory into two, with the Islamic extremists controlling the coastal strip and Fatah ruling the West Bank. Israel was watching the carnage closely, concerned the clashes might spawn attacks on the southern border.
Defense Minister Amir Peretz told a weekly meeting of security officials that Israel would not allow the violence to spread into attacks on southern Israel, meeting participants said.
The battle for the Preventive Security complex brought the day's death toll to 25 by mid-afternoon, hospital and security officials said. About 90 people, most of them gunmen but including children and other civilians, have been killed since a spike in violence Sunday sent Gaza into civil war.
Fatah said Hamas shot to death seven of its fighters outside the Preventive Security building. A doctor at Shifa Hospital, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal, said he examined two bodies that had been shot in the head at close range.
A witness, who identified himself only as Amjad, said men were killed before their wives and children.
"They are executing them one by one," Amjad said in a telephone interview, declining to give his full name for fear of reprisals. "They are carrying one of them on their shoulders, putting him on a sand dune, turning him around and shooting."
As Hamas took this major battle spoil, the Palestine Liberation Organization's top body recommended that Abbas declare a state of emergency and dismantle Fatah's governing coalition with Hamas. Abbas said he would review the recommendations and make a decision within hours, said an aide, Nabil Amr.
After the rout at the Preventive Security complex, some of the Hamas fighters kneeled down outside, touching their foreheads to the ground in prayer. Others led Fatah gunmen out of the building, some shirtless or in their underwear, holding their arms in the air. Several of the Fatah men flinched as the crack of gunfire split the air.
"We are telling our people that the past era has ended and will not return," Islam Shahawan, a Hamas spokesman, told Hamas radio. "The era of justice and Islamic rule have arrived."
Sami Abu Zuhri, another Hamas spokesman, heralded what he called "Gaza's second liberation," after the 2005 disengagement.
Gunmen and civilians were looting the compound, hauling out computers, documents, office equipment, furniture and TVs.
Hamas had been tightening its ring around the Preventive Security complex for three days, stepping up its assault late Wednesday, with a barrage of bullets, grenades, mortar rounds and land mines that continued until the compound fell. Electricity and telephone lines were cut, and roads leading to the complex were blocked. Hamas claimed it confiscated two cars filled with arms sent as reinforcements.
The Islamic group was also training its guns Thursday at three other key command centers in Gaza City.
In a broadcast on Hamas radio, the Islamic fighters demanded that Fatah surrender the National Security compound by mid-afternoon. Light clashes were taking place there when the ultimatum was delivered.
Rocket-propelled grenades were also being fired toward Abbas's Gaza compound, provoking return fire from his presidential guard. For the first time since the fighting began, Abbas ordered his guard to go on the offensive against Hamas at the compound, and not simply maintain a defensive posture, an aide said.
The intelligence service compound was under siege as well, with Hamas firing dozens of rocket-propelled grenades in its direction.
In Gaza's south, Hamas trounced Fatah in Rafah, taking over the Preventive Security building in that town. It was the second main Gaza city to fall to the Islamists, who captured nearby Khan Younis on Wednesday.
"I can see the Preventive Security building in front of me. Hamas has raised its green flags over it," a civilian resident, who identified himself only as Raed, said by telephone. "There are men carrying away equipment from inside. ... (The Fatah-allied) National Security men ran away."
Hospitals were operating without water, electricity and blood. Even holed up inside their homes, Gazans weren't able to escape fighting that turned apartment buildings into battlefields.
Moean Hammad, 34, said life had become a nightmare at his high-rise building near the Preventive Security headquarters, where Fatah forces on the rooftop were battling Hamas fighters.
"We spent our night in the hallway outside the apartment because the building came under cross-fire," Hammad said. "We haven't had electricity for two days, and all we can hear is shooting and powerful, earth-shaking explosions.
"The world is watching us dying and doing nothing to help. God help us, we feel like we are in a real-life horror movie," he said.
Shaher Hatoum, a nurse at nearby Al Quds Hospital, said the facility had no electricity, water or blood, and that wounded were propped up on ward floors. Hundreds of bullets flew through windows, and fighters ignored the hospital's appeals to hold fire just long enough to have the generator and water pipes fixed, Hatoum said.
"We are waiting here for our end," Hatoum said.
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