Fatah force seizes Hamas TV in West Bank

[Eugene]

Source: Reuters

Fatah force seizes Hamas TV in West Bank
12 Jun 2007 10:20:26 GMT
Source: Reuters

RAMALLAH, West Bank, June 12 (Reuters) - Palestinian
Presidential Guards stormed the offices of a Hamas-
controlled television station in the West Bank city of
Ramallah on Tuesday and seized equipment, a Palestinian
security source said.

The raid on al-Aqsa Television by a force loyal to
President Mahmoud Abbas of the Fatah movement was
a first clear instance of factional conflict in the West
Bank since fighting between Fatah and Hamas broke out
in the Gaza Strip on Saturday.


Link: http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L1247458.htm

---

Also:
Gunmen target buildings of Palestinian PM, president - Reuters
FACTBOX-Security developments in Gaza, June 12 - Reuters

[Eugene]

1. Hamas raids Fatah security HQ after ultimatum

Source: Reuters

Hamas raids Fatah security HQ after ultimatum
12 Jun 2007 11:14:58 GMT
Source: Reuters

GAZA, June 12 (Reuters) - Hamas's armed wing attacked
a Fatah security compound in Gaza City on Tuesday,
minutes after a deadline expired for the evacuation of
several security facilities controlled by the rival faction,
witnesses said.


Link: http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L12114594.htm

[maddezmom]

2. Abbas forces ordered to suppress Hamas "coup"

Abbas forces ordered to suppress Hamas "coup"

GAZA, June 12 (Reuters) - Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's largest security force ordered its men on Tuesday to defend their positions and counter a "coup" by Hamas Islamists.

"Advance, our forces! Confront the seekers of the coup. Defend your dignity and your military honour. Defend the security of your people," the command of Abbas's National Security Forces said in a statement issued in Gaza.

The statement giving the order described Hamas as a "bloody party which is launching a coup against the president and against the authority and national unity government".

Witnesses said they saw vehicles carrying members of the National Security Forces (NSF) to battles waging in western and northern Gaza City.

more:http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N918373612.htm

[maddezmom]

3. OPT: Patients killed as gunmen storm Gaza hospitals

OPT: Patients killed as gunmen storm Gaza hospitals
12 Jun 2007 15:36:56 GMT
More TEL AVIV, 12 June 2007 (IRIN) - Patients are dying in crossfire as hospitals have been overrun by gunmen in a new wave of Gaza violence, which the UN has warned is jeopardising the delivery of essential humanitarian aid.

The violence has claimed 17 lives and ambulance teams are being prevented from evacuating the wounded from combat zones by checkpoints manned by armed fighters across the Strip, medical organisations said.

Hamas stormed the hospitals because it was worried Fatah would target its wounded fighters. Gaza hospitals have often been the scenes of firefights as the wounded from both sides receive treatment.

Four patients, including one in the operating theatre, died and 10 more were injured in a hospital in Beit Hanoun, northern Gaza Strip, in violence that has led to the hospital's effective closure, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said.

more:http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/IRIN/f66bddd03c4f970fcb251f4c379c799d.htm

[maddezmom]

4. Gaza battles raise fears of full civil war

Gaza battles raise fears of full civil war
12 Jun 2007 16:27:08 GMT

GAZA, June 12 (Reuters) - Palestinians battled across Gaza on Tuesday in what looked ever more like civil war as the forces of President Mahmoud Abbas rounded on those of the Islamist prime minister and their unity government headed for collapse.

The biggest security force loyal to Abbas, favoured by the West, was ordered onto the streets to defeat what his secular Fatah supporters called a "coup" by Hamas Islamists after Hamas gunmen stormed a key Fatah security base in Gaza.

At least eight men were killed and 50 wounded, hospital officials said, taking to 28 the number of dead in the coastal enclave since Saturday. Early on Tuesday, the Gaza homes of both Abbas and Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas were fired on.

Accounts varied on how far Hamas fighters had taken control of the Fatah security base, one of several that they ordered evacuated three hours earlier in an unprecedented ultimatum.

Fatah officials said their men held their ground.

more:http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L1298802.htm

[barb162]

5. It appears to be an all-out war.

[maddezmom]

6. Palestinian PM calls for immediate negotiations

GAZA, June 12 (Reuters) - Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh called on Tuesday for an to the fighting in the Gaza Strip and an immediate resumption of negotiations between his Hamas Islamist movement and the rival Fatah faction.

"He urges restraint and an end to this chapter of conflict, an immediate return to the negotiating table and an end to sedition," an official in Haniyeh's office said, reading from a statement.

He also accused Fatah, a secular movement led by President Mahmoud Abbas, of not believing in political partnership and of seeking to disrupt Palestinian society.

more:http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/B464086.htm

[barb162]

7. This gets weirder by the hour.

More calls for restraint to which none of the fighters seem to be listening as the fighting escalates.

[maddezmom]

8. Palestinians battle on in Gaza, toll now 55 dead

By Nidal al-Mughrabi

GAZA, June 13 (Reuters) - Palestinians battled on across the Gaza Strip early on Wednesday and eight more factional fighters were killed, raising the death toll to 55 in four days of the fiercest internal fighting in months, hospital officials said.

Gunmen from the Islamist Hamas movement attacked an area near the home of an official of President Mahmoud Abbas's secular Fatah movement, killing six of the group's men in fighting that went of for several hours, Fatah officials said.

The two groups are locked in a bloody power struggle that threatens the three-month-old unity government and has pushed the Gaza Strip to the brink of civil war.

In the latest clashes two more Fatah gunmen were killed in separate clashes with Hamas in central Gaza, and 10 other people were wounded, hospital officials said.

more:http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L13217465.htm

[Eugene]

9. HRW: Gaza: Armed Palestinian Groups Commit Grave Crimes

Source: Human Rights Watch

Gaza: Armed Palestinian Groups Commit Grave Crimes

Fighters Execute Captives, Attack Hospital,
Put Journalists at Serious Risk

(New York, June 13, 2007) – During recent fighting in the
Gaza Strip, armed Palestinian groups have committed serious
violations of international humanitarian law, in some cases
amounting to war crimes, Human Rights Watch said today.

In internal Palestinian fighting over the last three days, both
Fatah and Hamas military forces have summarily executed
captives, killed people not involved in hostilities, and
engaged in gun battles with one another inside and near
Palestinian hospitals. On Saturday, armed Palestinians from
Islamic Jihad and the Fatah-affiliated Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade
used a vehicle with a “TV” insignia to attack an Israeli
military position on the border with Gaza.

“These attacks by both Hamas and Fatah constitute brutal
assaults on the most fundamental humanitarian principles,”
said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director for Human Rights
Watch. “The murder of civilians not engaged in hostilities and
the willful killing of captives are war crimes, pure and simple.”

-snip-

Read more: http://hrw.org/english/docs/2007/06/13/isrlpa16156.htm

[maddezmom]

10. Gunfire erupts at Gaza peace rally; 1 dead

Gunfire erupts at Gaza peace rally; 1 dead
GAZA CITY (CNN) -- Palestinian gunmen Wednesday opened fire on a peaceful demonstration calling for a cease-fire in Gaza, killing one person and sending dozens of other demonstrators running for cover Wednesday, according to Gaza hospital officials and video of the scene.

The head of the Egyptian delegation to Gaza that is trying to broker a truce between Hamas and Fatah fighters was at the demonstration, but was not injured in the melee.

Video showed unarmed residents -- men, women and children -- waving Palestinian flags and chanting for an end to the violence. Heavy gunfire echoed in the streets, prompting the demonstrators to run. -- From CNN's Avivit Dalgoshen in Jerusalem (Posted 6:20 a.m.)

http://edition.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/06/13/wednesday/index.html?section=cnn_latest

[maddezmom]

11. Gaza blast kills 13 Abbas force members -aide

GAZA, June 13 (Reuters) - Hamas militants blew up a tunnel under a security headquarters in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday killing 13 members of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's preventive security service, an aide to Abbas told Reuters.

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L13847347.htm