pardus
Verified Military
- Joined
- Sep 7, 2006
- Messages
- 10,534
http://http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/06/15/news/mideast.php?page=2
GAZA: On its first day in full control in Gaza, Hamas on Friday both mocked and reached out to its defeated Fatah rivals, offering them amnesty but also rifling through President Mahmoud Abbas's bedroom, stripping a former Gaza strongman's home down to the flowerpots and throwing a Fatah gunman off a rooftop.
Safe in the West Bank, the moderate Abbas moved quickly to cement his rule there, after losing control in Gaza in a swift five-day Hamas assault on his forces. He replaced the Hamas prime minister, Ismail Haniya, with Finance Minister Salam Fayyad, an internationally respected economist, and a new moderate government was to be formed later in the day.
Hamas, overwhelmingly elected in a 2006 Parliament vote, denounced Abbas's decisions as a coup. But the sparring made little difference on the ground: The Palestinian territories, on either side of Israel, are now separate entities with two different governments - one run by Hamas and backed by radical Islamic states and the other controlled by the Western-supported Fatah.
Abbas received immediate pledges of support from Israel, the United States, Egypt, Jordan, the United Nations and Saudi Arabia. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel told the Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak, by phone that he would take steps to bolster Abbas. Officials in Olmert's office said he will consider releasing hundreds of millions of dollars in tax funds, frozen after Hamas came to power.
Palestinians in both territories were struggling to adjust to the new reality, which crushed their longstanding hopes of a Palestinian state. With Hamas largely neutralized in the West Bank, some expected renewed Western aid there, after a yearlong embargo had crippled their economy. Many Gazans feared they would be driven even deeper into isolation and poverty.
In a West Bank hotel, several Fatah loyalists who had fled Gaza sat in the lobby, chain-smoking, and worked the phones to set up their new lives, and heard from family back in Gaza that their homes had been searched. In Gaza City, Hani, a former security officer who had run the operations room in the main police compound called his old office, now controlled by Hamas, and pleaded with the new rulers to take care of his computer equipment.
Several thousand Hamas supporters in Gaza cheered as a small armored personnel carrier - seized from Abbas's forces - rolled into the Palestinian legislature building, where a victory march was held. The jubilant crowd chanted slogans and waved green Hamas flags as gunmen fired in the air. Excited children climbed over the vehicle, and bearded gunmen strutted around the parliamentary building, grinning from ear to ear.
Hamas was both cocky and conciliatory Friday.
It released nine senior Fatah leaders and many lower-ranking activists, saying it was granting amnesty to its rivals. A Hamas spokesman, Abu Obeideh, also promised to get the BBC journalist Alan Johnston, held since March, released quickly, and a mediator said the kidnappers, believed to have ties to Hamas, pledged to free him within a day.
Yet Hamas gunmen also entered the seaside compound of Abbas, rifling through the president's belongings in his bedroom, adjacent to his office. They lifted the mattress and searched drawers. One gunman sat down at the Fatah leader's desk, picked up the phone and pretended to be calling Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
"Hello, Rice?" the gunman said. "Here we are in Abu Mazen's office. Say hello to Abu Mazen for me."
Gaza's streets, deserted in the past week of fighting, were crowded with cars, pedestrians and triumphant Hamas fighters, some driving in jeeps and firing in the air.
Crowds converged on former Fatah strongholds and looted them.
The house of Fatah strongman Mohammed Dahlan was overrun, and looters stripped it of everything from windows and doors to flowerpots. "This was the house of the murderer Dahlan that was cleansed by the holy warriors," read graffiti sprayed on the wall. Donkey carts outside the house waited to take on more loot. Dahlan had been in Egypt when the fighting erupted, and arrived in the West Bank on Thursday.
Gaza City's main Shifa Hospital was still grappling with the aftermath of battle. More than 90 people were killed in five days of fighting, and dozens wounded. The morgue was overflowing, with four bodies lined up on the floor, and some of the wounded were sleeping on cardboard on the floor, instead of mattresses or beds.
Two men were killed in revenge slaying, including a Fatah gunman thrown from a roof, in what Hamas described as a family grievance. The gunman had previously killed a member of that Hamas-allied family. Another Fatah loyalist was shot dead in southern Gaza. Since Hamas's victory late Thursday, about a dozen Fatah gunmen were killed in gangland-style executions, Fatah said.
Before word came of the amnesty, 97 Fatah officials fled in a fishing boat to Egypt. Others reached Israel via the Erez crossing, and were heading to the West Bank.
An Egyptian security delegation left Gaza after failing in its mediation efforts between the warring Palestinian factions.
Hamas's military takeover of Gaza, after five days of battle, formalized the separation between Gaza and the West Bank.
It was a major setback to dreams of Palestinian statehood because it divided the two territories, but could also restore the flow of foreign aid to the Fatah-run West Bank. With a larger middle class, more foreign-passport holders and more contact with the outside world, many West Bank residents have long felt they have little in common with Gaza.
"I expect to have economic development here and poverty there in Gaza," Salah Haniyeh, a government employee, said Friday, as he watched masked Fatah gunmen parading through the streets of Ramallah in pickup trucks.
Across the West Bank, Fatah gunmen backed by Abbas-allied security force expanded an anti-Hamas sweep. Dozens of Hamas supporters were seized by gunmen or arrested by police since Thursday.
GAZA: On its first day in full control in Gaza, Hamas on Friday both mocked and reached out to its defeated Fatah rivals, offering them amnesty but also rifling through President Mahmoud Abbas's bedroom, stripping a former Gaza strongman's home down to the flowerpots and throwing a Fatah gunman off a rooftop.
Safe in the West Bank, the moderate Abbas moved quickly to cement his rule there, after losing control in Gaza in a swift five-day Hamas assault on his forces. He replaced the Hamas prime minister, Ismail Haniya, with Finance Minister Salam Fayyad, an internationally respected economist, and a new moderate government was to be formed later in the day.
Hamas, overwhelmingly elected in a 2006 Parliament vote, denounced Abbas's decisions as a coup. But the sparring made little difference on the ground: The Palestinian territories, on either side of Israel, are now separate entities with two different governments - one run by Hamas and backed by radical Islamic states and the other controlled by the Western-supported Fatah.
Abbas received immediate pledges of support from Israel, the United States, Egypt, Jordan, the United Nations and Saudi Arabia. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel told the Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak, by phone that he would take steps to bolster Abbas. Officials in Olmert's office said he will consider releasing hundreds of millions of dollars in tax funds, frozen after Hamas came to power.
Palestinians in both territories were struggling to adjust to the new reality, which crushed their longstanding hopes of a Palestinian state. With Hamas largely neutralized in the West Bank, some expected renewed Western aid there, after a yearlong embargo had crippled their economy. Many Gazans feared they would be driven even deeper into isolation and poverty.
In a West Bank hotel, several Fatah loyalists who had fled Gaza sat in the lobby, chain-smoking, and worked the phones to set up their new lives, and heard from family back in Gaza that their homes had been searched. In Gaza City, Hani, a former security officer who had run the operations room in the main police compound called his old office, now controlled by Hamas, and pleaded with the new rulers to take care of his computer equipment.
Several thousand Hamas supporters in Gaza cheered as a small armored personnel carrier - seized from Abbas's forces - rolled into the Palestinian legislature building, where a victory march was held. The jubilant crowd chanted slogans and waved green Hamas flags as gunmen fired in the air. Excited children climbed over the vehicle, and bearded gunmen strutted around the parliamentary building, grinning from ear to ear.
Hamas was both cocky and conciliatory Friday.
It released nine senior Fatah leaders and many lower-ranking activists, saying it was granting amnesty to its rivals. A Hamas spokesman, Abu Obeideh, also promised to get the BBC journalist Alan Johnston, held since March, released quickly, and a mediator said the kidnappers, believed to have ties to Hamas, pledged to free him within a day.
Yet Hamas gunmen also entered the seaside compound of Abbas, rifling through the president's belongings in his bedroom, adjacent to his office. They lifted the mattress and searched drawers. One gunman sat down at the Fatah leader's desk, picked up the phone and pretended to be calling Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
"Hello, Rice?" the gunman said. "Here we are in Abu Mazen's office. Say hello to Abu Mazen for me."
Gaza's streets, deserted in the past week of fighting, were crowded with cars, pedestrians and triumphant Hamas fighters, some driving in jeeps and firing in the air.
Crowds converged on former Fatah strongholds and looted them.
The house of Fatah strongman Mohammed Dahlan was overrun, and looters stripped it of everything from windows and doors to flowerpots. "This was the house of the murderer Dahlan that was cleansed by the holy warriors," read graffiti sprayed on the wall. Donkey carts outside the house waited to take on more loot. Dahlan had been in Egypt when the fighting erupted, and arrived in the West Bank on Thursday.
Gaza City's main Shifa Hospital was still grappling with the aftermath of battle. More than 90 people were killed in five days of fighting, and dozens wounded. The morgue was overflowing, with four bodies lined up on the floor, and some of the wounded were sleeping on cardboard on the floor, instead of mattresses or beds.
Two men were killed in revenge slaying, including a Fatah gunman thrown from a roof, in what Hamas described as a family grievance. The gunman had previously killed a member of that Hamas-allied family. Another Fatah loyalist was shot dead in southern Gaza. Since Hamas's victory late Thursday, about a dozen Fatah gunmen were killed in gangland-style executions, Fatah said.
Before word came of the amnesty, 97 Fatah officials fled in a fishing boat to Egypt. Others reached Israel via the Erez crossing, and were heading to the West Bank.
An Egyptian security delegation left Gaza after failing in its mediation efforts between the warring Palestinian factions.
Hamas's military takeover of Gaza, after five days of battle, formalized the separation between Gaza and the West Bank.
It was a major setback to dreams of Palestinian statehood because it divided the two territories, but could also restore the flow of foreign aid to the Fatah-run West Bank. With a larger middle class, more foreign-passport holders and more contact with the outside world, many West Bank residents have long felt they have little in common with Gaza.
"I expect to have economic development here and poverty there in Gaza," Salah Haniyeh, a government employee, said Friday, as he watched masked Fatah gunmen parading through the streets of Ramallah in pickup trucks.
Across the West Bank, Fatah gunmen backed by Abbas-allied security force expanded an anti-Hamas sweep. Dozens of Hamas supporters were seized by gunmen or arrested by police since Thursday.
