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Armed Fatah militants standing at the municipal building in Nablus on Sunday. (AP)
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| Last update - 19:25 23/04/2006 |
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| Hamas-Fatah unrest persists in territories despite bid to end tension |
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| By , Haaretz Correspondent, and Agencies |
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Hamas gunmen backed by police came to the rescue of the new Palestinian health minister - a top Hamas official - after angry gunmen raided his office Sunday and sparked a shootout that left three people wounded.
The shootout was the latest explosion of violence in the Gaza Strip and it marked the first time a Hamas Cabinet minister turned to his group's gunmen to help restore order. It also underscored Palestinians' growing dissatisfaction with the Hamas-led government as it confronts a crippling financial crisis.
The clash erupted hours after the Hamas-led Palestinian government and Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement had pledged to work to diffuse tensions between them after a weekend in which their supporters clashed in the worst internal fighting in months.
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The fighting Sunday came a day after Health Minister Bassem Naim announced that he was cutting $2 million (-1.6 million) from the monthly health budget to help alleviate the financial crisis by halting payments for patients to get treatment abroad. The state of Gaza's health care system is poor, and Palestinians routinely travel to Israel and other countries for complicated procedures.
On Sunday, a group of men, some of them armed, whose relative needed treatment abroad came to Naim's office and asked him to authorize the trip, Health Ministry spokesman Khaled Radi said.
Naim's bodyguards called for backup from Hamas and the two groups engaged in a brief shootout that wounded three people, witnesses and Palestinian security forces said. One wounded man bleeding from his leg lay outside the office compound before he was evacuated in a taxi.
Palestinian police and masked Hamas militants surrounded the building. When they tried to approach, the gunmen inside fired at them. After a 45-minute standoff, the police and the militants retook the building, arresting four of the gunmen. Naim left surrounded by 10 Hamas militants.
The four of gunmen were tied up and placed into a police car as people in the street cheered, witnesses said.
"The time has passed when our institutions and our police can be attacked. Whoever holds a gun against one of our institutions, or one of our policemen, opens himself for death," said Khaled Abu Hillel, spokesman for the Interior Ministry.
The efforts to secure minimal stability also failed to prevent dozens of Fatah gunmen from venting their anger at Hamas as they stormed the municipal building of the West Bank city of Nablus on Sunday.
The militants, with assault rifles slung over their shoulders, entered the building and escorted some of the government employees outside.
They gave the mayor, who is member of the rival Hamas group, half an hour to shut down his offices. When the mayor refused to close the offices immediately, they gave him an extra 30 minutes to shut them down.
The incident ended quietly only after a Fatah lawmaker intervened and diffused the confrontation.
Earlier Sunday, Fatah spokesman Mahar Meqdad told officials from both groups that the factions "have agreed to call on our people to stop all forms of tension and to cement national unity."
Hamas and Fatah leaders began their talks Saturday night after protest marches and armed clashes erupted between student supporters of Hamas and Fatah at the Islamic and Al-Azhar universities in Gaza.
The violence, which resulted in injuries to some 40 students and activists, included stone- and furniture-throwing, setting fire to offices, attacking passing cars and marches by armed Fatah supporters in the streets of the Gaza Strip's towns.
In Khan Yunis in southern Gaza, 6,000 Fatah protesters turned out.
The clashes broke out following attacks on the PA leadership by the head of the Hamas political wing Khaled Meshal, in Damascus, and the announcement Thursday by PA Interior Minister Said Sayem that he was setting up a new security force that would encompass the Hamas military wing.
Protests were more subdued in the West Bank, where thousands of Fatah loyalists gathered in major towns to skewer Meshal and express their support for Abbas.
In Nablus, about 15 Fatah-affiliated gunmen stormed a courthouse while firing in the air. They ejected dozens of employees, ordered guards to lock up the building, and vowed not to reopen it until Meshal apologized for his remarks.
Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas issued a presidential order cancelling Sayem's appointment, and convened the PLO executive committee in Ramallah, which condemned the new force. It did not rule out the possibility that members of the Hamas military wing would be absorbed into existing PA military bodies.
On Friday, Meshal lashed out in response to senior figures in Fatah, comments that were understood as veiled attacks on Abbas himself. At a rally in the Yarmukh refugee camp in southern Damascus marking the two-year anniversary of the assassination of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin by the Israel Defense Forces, Meshal told thousands of supporters and representatives of the Syrian government that senior Fatah officials were "conspiring" to deprive Hamas of the government and that there was a "plot" to overthrow the government.
He also said, "Very soon we will uncover the true face of these criminals who are sacrificing the national interest for their personal interests. The criminals have left the coffers empty and have even stolen the furniture from the ministries before they transferred them to us."
Meshal called Abbas' condemnation of last week's Tel Aviv suicide bombing "contemptible." He called on the new government to extend its protection over groups that continue "military resistance." He also said it was the "right of the new government to establish new armed groups to protect the people, without financial reward, instead of the existing forces that are bought and sold by enemies of our people."
Almost across the board, senior Fatah members called for Meshal to publicly apologize and took advantage of them to initiate a series of public protests, including calls to bring down the government by force.
Nasser a-Din Shaar, PA Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh's deputy, tried Saturday to calm things down by releasing a statement that Meshal's declarations "do not necessarily reflect the position of the Hamas government but rather only of the Hamas organization."
The Palestinian Interior Ministry also tried to defuse the tension by stating that the security force was not a new one but was based on the Palestinian Police and would operate under its authority.
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