Gaza civil war escalates; bush,jr's destabilization of the Middle East spreads

June 13, 2007

Attacks Escalate as Palestinians Fight for Power

By STEVEN ERLANGER and ISABEL KERSHNER

JERUSALEM, June 12 - Gunmen of rival Palestinian factions Hamas and Fatah

sharply escalated their fight for supremacy on Tuesday, with Hamas taking

over much of the northern Gaza Strip in what is beginning to look

increasingly like a civil war.

Five days of revenge attacks on individuals - including executions,

kneecappings and even tossing handcuffed prisoners off tall apartment

towers - on Tuesday turned into something larger and more organized: attacks

on symbols of power and the deployment of military units. About 25

Palestinians were killed and more than 100 wounded, Palestinian medics said.

In one Hamas attack on a Fatah security headquarters in northern Gaza near

Jabaliya Camp, at least 21 Palestinians were reported killed and another 60

wounded, said Moaweya Hassanein of the Palestinian Health Ministry.

After a senior Fatah leader in northern Gaza, Jamal Abu al-Jediyan, was

killed Monday, Fatah's elite Presidential Guards, who are being trained by

the United States and its allies, fired rocket-propelled grenades at the

house of Prime Minister Ismail Haniya, of Hamas, in the Shati refugee camp

near Gaza City.

An hour later, Hamas's military wing fired four mortar shells at the

presidential office compound of Mahmoud Abbas, of Fatah, who is in the West

Bank, a Fatah spokesman, Tawfiq Abu Khoussa, said in a telephone interview.

"Hamas is seeking a military coup against the Palestinian Authority," he

said.

Hamas made a similar accusation against Fatah. Hamas, which has an Islamist

ideology, demanded that security forces loyal to Fatah, the more nationalist

and secular movement, abandon their positions in northern and central Gaza.

Fatah's leaders said Tuesday night that they would suspend participation in

the unity government with Hamas, which began in March, until the fighting

ends.

That agreement to govern jointly, negotiated under Saudi auspices, put Fatah

ministers into a Hamas-led government in an effort to secure renewed

international aid and recognition and to stop what was already serious

fighting between the two factions.

But the new government has failed to achieve either goal, and it appeared to

many in Gaza that the gunmen were not listening to their political leaders.

Mr. Abbas is under increasing pressure to abandon the unity government he

championed and to try once again to order new elections, which Hamas has

said it will oppose by any means.

The head of the Egyptian mediation team, Lt. Col. Burhan Hamad, said neither

side responded to his call on Tuesday to hold truce talks. "It seems they

don't want to come," said Colonel Hamad, who has brokered several brief

cease-fires between the two. "We must make them ashamed of themselves. They

have killed all hope. They have killed the future."

He said neither side had the weaponry required to produce "a decisive

victory."

Talal Okal, a Gazan political scientist, described what could be coming.

"Tonight, we may find ourselves at the beginning of a civil war," he said.

"If Abbas decides to move his security forces onto the attack, and not to

only defend, we'll find ourselves in a much wider cycle."

Fatah forces were ordered Tuesday evening to defend their positions and

counter "a coup against the president and against the Palestinian Authority

and national unity government."

The streets of Gazan cities were once again empty of pedestrians and cars.

People ventured out to buy food, but only to the next building, and parents

kept children out of school.

At Shifa Hospital in Gaza, which Hamas gunmen patrolled, bodies of four

Hamas fighters lay on the floor of the emergency room, including Muhammad

al-Mqeir, 25. His closest friend called him a martyr, even though he was

killed by another Palestinian, from Fatah. "They are not Palestinians, they

are lost people," the friend said of Fatah. Doctors said that the emergency

room was overloaded and that the hospital was running short of blood.

After warning Fatah, Hamas attacked a Fatah-affiliated security headquarters

in Gaza City, and declared northern Gaza "a closed military zone."

An estimated 200 Hamas fighters surrounded Fatah security headquarters

there, firing mortar shells and grenades at the compound, where some 500

security officers were positioned. The headquarters fell to Hamas. Hamas

gunmen also exchanged fire with Fatah forces at the southern security

headquarters in the town of Khan Yunis. There, the two sides fought a gun

battle near a hospital. Fifteen children attending a kindergarten in the

line of fire were rushed into the hospital, which is financed largely by

European donations.

Angering Hamas, Fatah militants abducted and killed the nephew of Abdel Aziz

Rantisi, the Hamas leader assassinated by Israel in April 2004.

Hamas gunmen attacked the home of a Fatah security official with mortars and

grenades, killing his 14-year-old son and three women inside, security

officials said. Other Fatah gunmen stormed the house of a Hamas lawmaker and

burned it down.

Fatah forces also attacked the headquarters, in Gaza, of Hamas's television

station, Al Aksa TV, and began to broadcast Fatah songs, but Hamas said

later that it had repelled the attack.

In the West Bank, where Fatah is stronger and the Israeli occupation forces

keep Hamas fighters underground, the Fatah Presidential Guards took over the

Ramallah offices of Al Aksa TV and confiscated equipment.

Also in the West Bank, Fatah men kidnapped a deputy minister from Hamas, one

of the few Hamas cabinet members and legislators not already in Israeli

military jails, part of Israel's effort to keep pressure on Hamas.

Since Monday morning, at least 43 Palestinians have died in the renewed

fighting. More than 50 had died in the previous outburst last month that

ended in a brief cease-fire mediated by the Egyptians.

A Hamas spokesman, Fawzi Barhoum, accused Fatah, in alliance with Israel and

the United States, of trying to destroy Hamas and overturn the results of

elections held in January 2006, in which Hamas won a legislative majority.

"They crossed all the red lines," he said of Fatah after the second straight

day that Prime Minister Haniya's house was fired upon.

Sami Abu Zuhri, another Hamas spokesman, said: "Those we sit with from Fatah

have no control on the ground. These groups have relations with the U.S.

administration and Israel." Hamas says it believes that Mr. Abbas's aide,

Muhammad Dahlan, is controlling the Fatah forces, and Mr. Zuhri said, "It's

an international and regional plan aiming to eliminate Hamas."

Israeli officials are debating whether Fatah can stand up to Hamas in Gaza.

They say they have been asked by Washington recently to approve another

shipment of armored vehicles, weapons and ammunition to the Presidential

Guards. But a senior Israeli official said Israel was worried that the

weaponry would just be seized by Hamas, as much of the last shipment was.

"Hamas now has two million bullets intended for Fatah," he said.

Israeli officials are explicit privately about their intention to damage

Hamas and its military infrastructure in Gaza and try to give Fatah a boost

at the same time. Israel, in retaliation for rocket fire into Israel from

Gaza, has been bombing the buildings and facilities of Hamas's Executive

Force, a parallel police force in Gaza, that has not been firing rockets.

Israeli officials argue, however, that the Executive Force and the Hamas

military wing "share a command headquarters."

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency, which deals with the 70 percent

of Gaza's 1.5 million people who are refugees or their descendants, said its

ability to provide needed aid had been severely hampered by the fighting.

Three of its 5 food distribution centers and 7 of its 18 health clinics were

forced to close Tuesday, said its Gaza director, John Ging.

"The violence is compounding an already dreadful humanitarian situation," he

said, with 80 percent of the refugee population already dependent on aid.

Mr. Okal, who is now on the board of trustees of the Fatah-affiliated Azhar

University in Gaza, said he would oppose Fatah's pulling out of elected

institutions, but added that he was not optimistic about Gaza. "We are

heading toward a collapse - of both the political system and society," he

said.

=============================================

These assholes used to have jobs in Israel!

Now they starve their children and kill each other!

"Sid9" <sid9@bellsouth.net> wrote in message

news:84Jbi.5820$K8.5024@bignews7.bellsouth.net...

> June 13, 2007

> Attacks Escalate as Palestinians Fight for Power

> By STEVEN ERLANGER and ISABEL KERSHNER

> JERUSALEM, June 12 - Gunmen of rival Palestinian factions Hamas and Fatah

> sharply escalated their fight for supremacy on Tuesday, with Hamas taking

> over much of the northern Gaza Strip in what is beginning to look

> increasingly like a civil war.

>

> Five days of revenge attacks on individuals - including executions,

> kneecappings and even tossing handcuffed prisoners off tall apartment

> towers - on Tuesday turned into something larger and more organized:

> attacks on symbols of power and the deployment of military units. About 25

> Palestinians were killed and more than 100 wounded, Palestinian medics

> said.

>

> In one Hamas attack on a Fatah security headquarters in northern Gaza near

> Jabaliya Camp, at least 21 Palestinians were reported killed and another

> 60 wounded, said Moaweya Hassanein of the Palestinian Health Ministry.

>

> After a senior Fatah leader in northern Gaza, Jamal Abu al-Jediyan, was

> killed Monday, Fatah's elite Presidential Guards, who are being trained by

> the United States and its allies, fired rocket-propelled grenades at the

> house of Prime Minister Ismail Haniya, of Hamas, in the Shati refugee camp

> near Gaza City.

>

> An hour later, Hamas's military wing fired four mortar shells at the

> presidential office compound of Mahmoud Abbas, of Fatah, who is in the

> West Bank, a Fatah spokesman, Tawfiq Abu Khoussa, said in a telephone

> interview.

>

> "Hamas is seeking a military coup against the Palestinian Authority," he

> said.

>

> Hamas made a similar accusation against Fatah. Hamas, which has an

> Islamist ideology, demanded that security forces loyal to Fatah, the more

> nationalist and secular movement, abandon their positions in northern and

> central Gaza.

>

> Fatah's leaders said Tuesday night that they would suspend participation

> in the unity government with Hamas, which began in March, until the

> fighting ends.

>

> That agreement to govern jointly, negotiated under Saudi auspices, put

> Fatah ministers into a Hamas-led government in an effort to secure renewed

> international aid and recognition and to stop what was already serious

> fighting between the two factions.

>

> But the new government has failed to achieve either goal, and it appeared

> to many in Gaza that the gunmen were not listening to their political

> leaders. Mr. Abbas is under increasing pressure to abandon the unity

> government he championed and to try once again to order new elections,

> which Hamas has said it will oppose by any means.

>

> The head of the Egyptian mediation team, Lt. Col. Burhan Hamad, said

> neither side responded to his call on Tuesday to hold truce talks. "It

> seems they don't want to come," said Colonel Hamad, who has brokered

> several brief cease-fires between the two. "We must make them ashamed of

> themselves. They have killed all hope. They have killed the future."

>

> He said neither side had the weaponry required to produce "a decisive

> victory."

>

> Talal Okal, a Gazan political scientist, described what could be coming.

> "Tonight, we may find ourselves at the beginning of a civil war," he said.

> "If Abbas decides to move his security forces onto the attack, and not to

> only defend, we'll find ourselves in a much wider cycle."

>

> Fatah forces were ordered Tuesday evening to defend their positions and

> counter "a coup against the president and against the Palestinian

> Authority and national unity government."

>

> The streets of Gazan cities were once again empty of pedestrians and cars.

> People ventured out to buy food, but only to the next building, and

> parents kept children out of school.

>

> At Shifa Hospital in Gaza, which Hamas gunmen patrolled, bodies of four

> Hamas fighters lay on the floor of the emergency room, including Muhammad

> al-Mqeir, 25. His closest friend called him a martyr, even though he was

> killed by another Palestinian, from Fatah. "They are not Palestinians,

> they are lost people," the friend said of Fatah. Doctors said that the

> emergency room was overloaded and that the hospital was running short of

> blood.

>

> After warning Fatah, Hamas attacked a Fatah-affiliated security

> headquarters in Gaza City, and declared northern Gaza "a closed military

> zone."

>

> An estimated 200 Hamas fighters surrounded Fatah security headquarters

> there, firing mortar shells and grenades at the compound, where some 500

> security officers were positioned. The headquarters fell to Hamas. Hamas

> gunmen also exchanged fire with Fatah forces at the southern security

> headquarters in the town of Khan Yunis. There, the two sides fought a gun

> battle near a hospital. Fifteen children attending a kindergarten in the

> line of fire were rushed into the hospital, which is financed largely by

> European donations.

>

> Angering Hamas, Fatah militants abducted and killed the nephew of Abdel

> Aziz Rantisi, the Hamas leader assassinated by Israel in April 2004.

>

> Hamas gunmen attacked the home of a Fatah security official with mortars

> and grenades, killing his 14-year-old son and three women inside, security

> officials said. Other Fatah gunmen stormed the house of a Hamas lawmaker

> and burned it down.

>

> Fatah forces also attacked the headquarters, in Gaza, of Hamas's

> television station, Al Aksa TV, and began to broadcast Fatah songs, but

> Hamas said later that it had repelled the attack.

>

> In the West Bank, where Fatah is stronger and the Israeli occupation

> forces keep Hamas fighters underground, the Fatah Presidential Guards took

> over the Ramallah offices of Al Aksa TV and confiscated equipment.

>

> Also in the West Bank, Fatah men kidnapped a deputy minister from Hamas,

> one of the few Hamas cabinet members and legislators not already in

> Israeli military jails, part of Israel's effort to keep pressure on Hamas.

>

> Since Monday morning, at least 43 Palestinians have died in the renewed

> fighting. More than 50 had died in the previous outburst last month that

> ended in a brief cease-fire mediated by the Egyptians.

>

> A Hamas spokesman, Fawzi Barhoum, accused Fatah, in alliance with Israel

> and the United States, of trying to destroy Hamas and overturn the results

> of elections held in January 2006, in which Hamas won a legislative

> majority.

>

> "They crossed all the red lines," he said of Fatah after the second

> straight day that Prime Minister Haniya's house was fired upon.

>

> Sami Abu Zuhri, another Hamas spokesman, said: "Those we sit with from

> Fatah have no control on the ground. These groups have relations with the

> U.S. administration and Israel." Hamas says it believes that Mr. Abbas's

> aide, Muhammad Dahlan, is controlling the Fatah forces, and Mr. Zuhri

> said, "It's an international and regional plan aiming to eliminate Hamas."

>

> Israeli officials are debating whether Fatah can stand up to Hamas in

> Gaza. They say they have been asked by Washington recently to approve

> another shipment of armored vehicles, weapons and ammunition to the

> Presidential Guards. But a senior Israeli official said Israel was worried

> that the weaponry would just be seized by Hamas, as much of the last

> shipment was.

>

> "Hamas now has two million bullets intended for Fatah," he said.

>

> Israeli officials are explicit privately about their intention to damage

> Hamas and its military infrastructure in Gaza and try to give Fatah a

> boost at the same time. Israel, in retaliation for rocket fire into Israel

> from Gaza, has been bombing the buildings and facilities of Hamas's

> Executive Force, a parallel police force in Gaza, that has not been firing

> rockets. Israeli officials argue, however, that the Executive Force and

> the Hamas military wing "share a command headquarters."

>

> The United Nations Relief and Works Agency, which deals with the 70

> percent of Gaza's 1.5 million people who are refugees or their

> descendants, said its ability to provide needed aid had been severely

> hampered by the fighting. Three of its 5 food distribution centers and 7

> of its 18 health clinics were forced to close Tuesday, said its Gaza

> director, John Ging.

>

> "The violence is compounding an already dreadful humanitarian situation,"

> he said, with 80 percent of the refugee population already dependent on

> aid.

>

> Mr. Okal, who is now on the board of trustees of the Fatah-affiliated

> Azhar University in Gaza, said he would oppose Fatah's pulling out of

> elected institutions, but added that he was not optimistic about Gaza. "We

> are heading toward a collapse - of both the political system and society,"

> he said.

>

>

>

> =============================================

>

> These assholes used to have jobs in Israel!

>

> Now they starve their children and kill each other!

>

>

Gee, the Middle East was so stable before Bush liberated Iraq.

"Taylor" <Taylor@nospam.com> wrote in message

news:466ffbff$0$14940$4c368faf@roadrunner.com...

>

> "Sid9" <sid9@bellsouth.net> wrote in message

> news:84Jbi.5820$K8.5024@bignews7.bellsouth.net...

>> June 13, 2007

>> Attacks Escalate as Palestinians Fight for Power

>> By STEVEN ERLANGER and ISABEL KERSHNER

>> JERUSALEM, June 12 - Gunmen of rival Palestinian factions Hamas and Fatah

>> sharply escalated their fight for supremacy on Tuesday, with Hamas taking

>> over much of the northern Gaza Strip in what is beginning to look

>> increasingly like a civil war.

>>

>> Five days of revenge attacks on individuals - including executions,

>> kneecappings and even tossing handcuffed prisoners off tall apartment

>> towers - on Tuesday turned into something larger and more organized:

>> attacks on symbols of power and the deployment of military units. About

>> 25 Palestinians were killed and more than 100 wounded, Palestinian medics

>> said.

>>

>> In one Hamas attack on a Fatah security headquarters in northern Gaza

>> near Jabaliya Camp, at least 21 Palestinians were reported killed and

>> another 60 wounded, said Moaweya Hassanein of the Palestinian Health

>> Ministry.

>>

>> After a senior Fatah leader in northern Gaza, Jamal Abu al-Jediyan, was

>> killed Monday, Fatah's elite Presidential Guards, who are being trained

>> by the United States and its allies, fired rocket-propelled grenades at

>> the house of Prime Minister Ismail Haniya, of Hamas, in the Shati refugee

>> camp near Gaza City.

>>

>> An hour later, Hamas's military wing fired four mortar shells at the

>> presidential office compound of Mahmoud Abbas, of Fatah, who is in the

>> West Bank, a Fatah spokesman, Tawfiq Abu Khoussa, said in a telephone

>> interview.

>>

>> "Hamas is seeking a military coup against the Palestinian Authority," he

>> said.

>>

>> Hamas made a similar accusation against Fatah. Hamas, which has an

>> Islamist ideology, demanded that security forces loyal to Fatah, the more

>> nationalist and secular movement, abandon their positions in northern and

>> central Gaza.

>>

>> Fatah's leaders said Tuesday night that they would suspend participation

>> in the unity government with Hamas, which began in March, until the

>> fighting ends.

>>

>> That agreement to govern jointly, negotiated under Saudi auspices, put

>> Fatah ministers into a Hamas-led government in an effort to secure

>> renewed international aid and recognition and to stop what was already

>> serious fighting between the two factions.

>>

>> But the new government has failed to achieve either goal, and it appeared

>> to many in Gaza that the gunmen were not listening to their political

>> leaders. Mr. Abbas is under increasing pressure to abandon the unity

>> government he championed and to try once again to order new elections,

>> which Hamas has said it will oppose by any means.

>>

>> The head of the Egyptian mediation team, Lt. Col. Burhan Hamad, said

>> neither side responded to his call on Tuesday to hold truce talks. "It

>> seems they don't want to come," said Colonel Hamad, who has brokered

>> several brief cease-fires between the two. "We must make them ashamed of

>> themselves. They have killed all hope. They have killed the future."

>>

>> He said neither side had the weaponry required to produce "a decisive

>> victory."

>>

>> Talal Okal, a Gazan political scientist, described what could be coming.

>> "Tonight, we may find ourselves at the beginning of a civil war," he

>> said. "If Abbas decides to move his security forces onto the attack, and

>> not to only defend, we'll find ourselves in a much wider cycle."

>>

>> Fatah forces were ordered Tuesday evening to defend their positions and

>> counter "a coup against the president and against the Palestinian

>> Authority and national unity government."

>>

>> The streets of Gazan cities were once again empty of pedestrians and

>> cars. People ventured out to buy food, but only to the next building, and

>> parents kept children out of school.

>>

>> At Shifa Hospital in Gaza, which Hamas gunmen patrolled, bodies of four

>> Hamas fighters lay on the floor of the emergency room, including Muhammad

>> al-Mqeir, 25. His closest friend called him a martyr, even though he was

>> killed by another Palestinian, from Fatah. "They are not Palestinians,

>> they are lost people," the friend said of Fatah. Doctors said that the

>> emergency room was overloaded and that the hospital was running short of

>> blood.

>>

>> After warning Fatah, Hamas attacked a Fatah-affiliated security

>> headquarters in Gaza City, and declared northern Gaza "a closed military

>> zone."

>>

>> An estimated 200 Hamas fighters surrounded Fatah security headquarters

>> there, firing mortar shells and grenades at the compound, where some 500

>> security officers were positioned. The headquarters fell to Hamas. Hamas

>> gunmen also exchanged fire with Fatah forces at the southern security

>> headquarters in the town of Khan Yunis. There, the two sides fought a gun

>> battle near a hospital. Fifteen children attending a kindergarten in the

>> line of fire were rushed into the hospital, which is financed largely by

>> European donations.

>>

>> Angering Hamas, Fatah militants abducted and killed the nephew of Abdel

>> Aziz Rantisi, the Hamas leader assassinated by Israel in April 2004.

>>

>> Hamas gunmen attacked the home of a Fatah security official with mortars

>> and grenades, killing his 14-year-old son and three women inside,

>> security officials said. Other Fatah gunmen stormed the house of a Hamas

>> lawmaker and burned it down.

>>

>> Fatah forces also attacked the headquarters, in Gaza, of Hamas's

>> television station, Al Aksa TV, and began to broadcast Fatah songs, but

>> Hamas said later that it had repelled the attack.

>>

>> In the West Bank, where Fatah is stronger and the Israeli occupation

>> forces keep Hamas fighters underground, the Fatah Presidential Guards

>> took over the Ramallah offices of Al Aksa TV and confiscated equipment.

>>

>> Also in the West Bank, Fatah men kidnapped a deputy minister from Hamas,

>> one of the few Hamas cabinet members and legislators not already in

>> Israeli military jails, part of Israel's effort to keep pressure on

>> Hamas.

>>

>> Since Monday morning, at least 43 Palestinians have died in the renewed

>> fighting. More than 50 had died in the previous outburst last month that

>> ended in a brief cease-fire mediated by the Egyptians.

>>

>> A Hamas spokesman, Fawzi Barhoum, accused Fatah, in alliance with Israel

>> and the United States, of trying to destroy Hamas and overturn the

>> results of elections held in January 2006, in which Hamas won a

>> legislative majority.

>>

>> "They crossed all the red lines," he said of Fatah after the second

>> straight day that Prime Minister Haniya's house was fired upon.

>>

>> Sami Abu Zuhri, another Hamas spokesman, said: "Those we sit with from

>> Fatah have no control on the ground. These groups have relations with the

>> U.S. administration and Israel." Hamas says it believes that Mr. Abbas's

>> aide, Muhammad Dahlan, is controlling the Fatah forces, and Mr. Zuhri

>> said, "It's an international and regional plan aiming to eliminate

>> Hamas."

>>

>> Israeli officials are debating whether Fatah can stand up to Hamas in

>> Gaza. They say they have been asked by Washington recently to approve

>> another shipment of armored vehicles, weapons and ammunition to the

>> Presidential Guards. But a senior Israeli official said Israel was

>> worried that the weaponry would just be seized by Hamas, as much of the

>> last shipment was.

>>

>> "Hamas now has two million bullets intended for Fatah," he said.

>>

>> Israeli officials are explicit privately about their intention to damage

>> Hamas and its military infrastructure in Gaza and try to give Fatah a

>> boost at the same time. Israel, in retaliation for rocket fire into

>> Israel from Gaza, has been bombing the buildings and facilities of

>> Hamas's Executive Force, a parallel police force in Gaza, that has not

>> been firing rockets. Israeli officials argue, however, that the Executive

>> Force and the Hamas military wing "share a command headquarters."

>>

>> The United Nations Relief and Works Agency, which deals with the 70

>> percent of Gaza's 1.5 million people who are refugees or their

>> descendants, said its ability to provide needed aid had been severely

>> hampered by the fighting. Three of its 5 food distribution centers and 7

>> of its 18 health clinics were forced to close Tuesday, said its Gaza

>> director, John Ging.

>>

>> "The violence is compounding an already dreadful humanitarian situation,"

>> he said, with 80 percent of the refugee population already dependent on

>> aid.

>>

>> Mr. Okal, who is now on the board of trustees of the Fatah-affiliated

>> Azhar University in Gaza, said he would oppose Fatah's pulling out of

>> elected institutions, but added that he was not optimistic about Gaza.

>> "We are heading toward a collapse - of both the political system and

>> society," he said.

>>

>>

>>

>> =============================================

>>

>> These assholes used to have jobs in Israel!

>>

>> Now they starve their children and kill each other!

>>

>>

>

> Gee, the Middle East was so stable before Bush liberated Iraq.

>

>

Relatively, yes, it was

more stable before

bush,jr created his

world class mess

with his lies.