Hamas, Fatah say they’re trying for another truce

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Palestinian Truce Collapses as 13 Killed, 170 Hurt in Clashes

(AP)

2 February 2007

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - Fatah fighters stormed a Hamas-affiliated university on Friday, setting buildings on fire and dealing a sharp blow to Hamas’ prestige as a new round of heavy fighting erupted between the two factions throughout the Gaza Strip. Fifteen people, including four children, were killed.

With a total of 22 killed and 245 wounded since Thursday afternoon, Gazans huddled in their homes to escape the crossfire. Hospital officials said were running out of blood to treat the wounded.

On Friday afternoon, leaders of Hamas and Fatah said they had agreed in principle to a new cease-fire, but needed more meetings to work out the details of a pullback of forces, who were battling in the streets with mortar shells, rockets and heavy guns. The deal was announced after a meeting at the Egyptian embassy.

“We, the leaders of the two groups, agreed with God’s help on a cease-fire,” said Nizar Rayan, a regional Hamas leader, after the meeting. “The measures that will be taken on the ground will be discussed in the next few hours.” A Fatah spokesman, Abdel Hakim Awad, confirmed agreement was reached in principle.

An earlier truce unravelled after just two days.

More than 100 Palestinians have been killed in internal violence since Hamas won parliamentary elections last year and formed a Cabinet. In the wake of the election, established its own militia, as a counterweight to the security forces controlled by President Mahmoud abbas. The forces have fought repeatedly in the streets.

In another effort to end the fighting, Abbas was to travel Tuesday to Saudi Arabia for talks with Hamas’ supreme leader, Khaled Mashaal, on forming a national unity government, said Jamal Shobaki, Palestinian ambassador to Saudi Arabia.

Previous rounds of talks have ended in failure and often led to new waves of bloodshed.

On Friday afternoon, in an attack fraught with symbolism, Fatah forces raided a Hamas stronghold, the Islamic University in Gaza City, setting fire to two buildings and sparking a heavy firefight with Hamas forces. Masked men in black uniforms ran through the campus and took up positions on the roof of the school’s mosque.

The university was also a target during a 1996 crackdown on Hamas by the Preventive Security Service, which found weapons and explosives inside the university compound.

Hamas gunmen vowed revenge, and hours later, group members attacked two buildings of the Fatah-affiliated Al-Quds University at two separate locations in Gaza, Palestinian security officials said. A witness said gunmen fired mortar rounds at the lone building at the Gaza City campus, then doused it with fuel. Smoke rose from the building as gunmen clashed outside.

The raid Friday on Islamic University was the second in two days. On Thursday, Fatah said it had burst into the campus and arrested seven Iranian citizens, while an eighth committed suicide. The security official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue. He offered no proof.

The Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, a Fatah-affiliated militant group, said it had carried out the raid of the university with the security forces and accused Hamas of using the campus to manufacture and distribute weapons.

Hamas spokesman Ismail Radwan denied the presence of Iranians at the university and called charges that it was used for military purposes “ridiculous.”

“The university has absolutely no business in politics, or military work,” he said.

In other violence, 50 officers from Abbas’ presidential guard surrounded the Hamas-led Interior Ministry on Friday and exchanged fire with Hamas gunmen guarding the building. Outside of Gaza City, Hamas militants launched mortar shells at a Fatah training base in an attack that wounded 30 recruits, security officials said. One shell missed the base, hitting a nearby house and wounding two children inside.

Three members of the Presidential Guard were killed in Friday’s fighting.

The roads of Gaza were nearly empty, sealed off by makeshift roadblocks of rubble and garbage. Only masked security officers, some with hand grenades clipped to their ammunition vests, were visible in the streets. The sound of gunfire mixed with the call to prayer, but the mosques were mostly empty for Friday afternoon prayers as people stayed at home in fear.

Health officials appealed for blood donors. Ambulances had come under fire and one rescue worker was lightly injured by a ricocheting bullet, they said. A Red Crescent hospital near a security base in Gaza City was hit in crossfire and its windows and gates were pocked by bullet holes.

Hamas gunmen blew up the Fatah-affiliated Voice of Labor radio station in the northern town of Jebaliya after a five-hour siege, according to Rasem Bayri, who heads the Palestinian Federation of Laboor Unions. The Hamas fighters pulled down a Palestinian flag flying on the roof of the building and put up a green Hamas flag, Bayri said.

The latest clashes began Thursday when Hamas gunmen ambushed an official convoy guarded by the Fatah presidential guard in the Bureij refugee camp and hijacked two trucks filled with tents, medical kits and toilets, security officials said. The United States and some Arab countries had pledged to give equipment and training to the security forces loyal to Abbas.

Meanwhile, Israeli troops killed two armed Palestinians near the West Bank city of Ramallah early Friday. Palestinian security officials said the men were police officers on a routine patrol. The army said two armed men in civilian clothes approached troops on an overnight raid, and the soldiers opened fire when the men refused to put down their weapons.