Kalamity K

The Daily Chaos of Kalamity K
2007-06-15 17:19:15 (UTC)

Palestinians divided as Hamas rules in Gaza

Palestinians divided as Hamas rules in Gaza

2 hours, 27 minutes ago

GAZA CITY (AFP) - Hamas fighters were in full control of
Gaza on Friday, creating an Islamic enclave on Israel's
doorstep and further clouding the chance for peace after
routing their secular Fatah rivals in days of vicious
gunbattles.

With Western-backed president Mahmud Abbas of Fatah naming
a new prime minister for his emergency cabinet,
Palestinians face the prospect of being ruled by two
separate administrations in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.

The Islamist group -- branded a terror outfit by Israel and
the West -- overran Gaza hours after Abbas sacked the Hamas-
led unity government and declared a state of emergency in a
bid to avert all-out civil war.

Sporadic gunfire rattled across the impoverished strip,
sealed off from the outside world by Israel, as looters
took to the streets, masked Hamas gunmen grabbed the spoils
of war from fallen Fatah bastions and scores of Abbas
loyalists fled.

Hamas's action, which has made Palestinian aspirations of
an independent state an ever more distant dream, was
branded a "military coup" by Abbas and triggered alarm in
Israel and among world leaders.

Abbas on Friday tasked independent Salam Fayyad with
forming an emergency government after dismissing Hamas
premier Ismail Haniya and the unity cabinet, a three-month
experiment in power-sharing undermined by raging violence
that killed more than 260 people since December alone.

Hamas snatched the Fatah strongholds one by one on
Thursday, hoisting their green Islamic flags across Gaza
after an explosion of bloodshed that cost at least 113
lives just days despite desperate efforts to broker a
ceasefire.

The international community condemned the seizure and
voiced increasing alarm about the humanitarian situation in
Gaza, where the clashes have cut power and sent many of the
1.5 million residents cowering inside for days.

Israel was grappling with what the press dubbed "Hamastan"
on its border almost two years after it pulled out settlers
and troops from the territory, with Prime Minister Ehud
Olmert heading to Washington on Sunday for talks with US
President George W. Bush on the crisis.

Arab ministers were holding emergency talks in Egypt while
foreign ministers from the international Middle East
Quartet were to discuss the crisis by phone after the
Americans voiced their full support for Abbas in the
standoff.

The European Union condemned the "violent seizure of power"
by Hamas while Britain condemned what it called a "coup
d'etat."

In Gaza, militants made off with furniture, sinks, even
taps and pot plants at the abandoned villa of Mohammed
Dahlan, the former Fatah strongman in Gaza reviled by Hamas.

Inside the battered jewel of the Fatah crown in Gaza --
Abbas's now battled-scarred seafront presidential compound
which was the final stronghold to fall -- Hamas fighters
seized weapons, computers and documents and cars.

Several thousand Hamas supporters gathered outside the
parliament building for a victory rally in Gaza, while in
the southern town of Khan Yunis a Palestinian security
official was shot dead execution-style in a killing blamed
on Islamist fighters.

In the West Bank, shops affiliated with Hamas sympathisers
were torched in Bethelehem.

The takeover leaves Hamas in charge of Gaza, a tiny
overcrowded strip of land bordering Israel and Egypt, while
Fatah retains its powerbase in the occupied West Bank.

"We have destroyed the Palestinian cause and the dream of
the Palestinian state," lamented Abu Said, 45, from the
Shatti refugee camp in Gaza City, home of Haniya.

"This is the worst thing I've seen since 1967," chief
Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat told AFP. "Unfortunately
this pushed us back, it pushed us many years back."

On the ground, Hamas released dozens of Palestinian
security commanders and Fatah officials detained during its
assault, while more than 200 Abbas loyalists fled to Egypt,
by land and sea.

Egypt -- also wary of the emergence of an Islamic entity on
the border as it engages in a crackdown against a strong
Islamic opposition at home -- recalled all its diplomatic
and security personnel from Gaza.

Hamas's election victory in January 2006 over the long-
dominant Fatah triggered a crippling Western aid boycott
which remains largely in place today, plunging the
Palestinians deeper into economic hardship.

The Israeli press was awash with alarmist editorials after
the Hamas victory in what one Islamist leader described as
celebrate victory in what one Hamas leader described as "a
battle between Islam and heresy."

"Hamastan is Here" screamed the top-selling Yediot
Aharonot, while a headline on an editorial in the rival
Maariv declared "Welcome to Hell."

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called Abbas to
voice Washington's "full support" while Russia called on
the Palestinians to end a "fratricidal conflict... in which
there cannot be a winner."

Human Rights Watch has accused both sides of committing war
crimes during the fighting, which has turned hospitals into
battlegrounds, seen ambulances prevented from reaching
wounded and peace demonstrators shot dead.

The UN health agency and the international Red Cross warned
that hospitals were fast becoming overwhelmed by the number
of wounded after being drawn into the fighting.

UN chief Ban Ki-moon held preliminary talks on the idea of
sending an international force to Gaza, but Hamas rejected
the move, saying it would treat foreign troops as
occupation forces.

In Lisbon, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said Israel
would only accept an international force on the corridor of
land between Egypt and Gaza and said it must act to stop
arms smuggling.

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/mideast




Ad: