Palestinian police in fierce gun battle with Hamas

Palestinian police and Hamas militants exchanged gunfire in a crowded Gaza City neighbourhood today, and at least nine people were wounded in some of the worst fighting among Palestinians in recent years. Palestinian security forces were placed on high alert throughout Gaza.

Some of the wounded were taken to hospitals in private cars. One young man, his shirt bloodied, was carried away by a group of people. A teenager and a child were killed in the fighting, hospital officials said, adding that the victims’ ages were not known.

The clashes erupted in Gaza City’s Zeitoun neighbourhood, after security forces searched for militants suspected of firing rockets at Israeli towns.

Witnesses said they heard a steady sound of gunfire in Zeitoun. Nearby Palestine Square, normally crowded with market shoppers, was deserted. Thick black smoke from burning tyres rose into the air, and militants set a Palestinian police 4x4 on fire.

The internal fighting came just hours after a rocket fired from Gaza killed an Israeli woman and Israel retaliated with helicopter missile strikes on several targets in Gaza. This morning, six more rockets hit in and around the Israeli border town of Sderot, causing no injuries.

The recent escalation, set off earlier this week by a suicide bombing that killed five Israelis, is threatening to collapse a five-month-old truce. If fighting spins out of control, it could also endanger the rule of Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas and overshadow the planned Israeli withdrawal from Gaza next month. Israel has said it would not pull out of Gaza under fire.

The cease-fire is the pillar of Abbas’ policy. He has said he will not confront the militants, and instead persuade them to halt attacks on Israel.

However, today’s police action indicated a shift in direction. The top security official, Interior Minister Nasser Yousef, placed security forces on high alert and ordered police to prevent rocket fire.

The confrontations between police and militants began in northern Gaza on Thursday evening, when police said they tried to stop a Hamas squad from firing rockets at nearby Israeli towns. A firefight erupted, and five Hamas militants were wounded.

In response, dozens of Hamas gunmen attacked a Palestinian police post in a different area, firing machine guns, hurling grenades and setting two police cars on fire.

Later Thursday, in Gaza City, armed and masked Hamas men talked to reporters in Gaza City, warning that the fighting could escalate into civil war. “We shall cut off the awful hand that attacked our fighters,” one of the masked men said. When Palestinian police arrived, the militants ran off, some shooting in the air.

Before dawn today, Israeli helicopters fired missiles at four targets in three locations in Gaza, including buildings the army said were used for making rockets. The raids were Israel’s first concerted action against Hamas, and the most widespread since the truce. No one was hurt.

The strikes came in response to a rocket attack on Nativ Haasara, an Israeli communal farm just outside Gaza. A rocket crashed through a porch roof and killed Dana Glakowitz, 22. Hamas and the Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, a group linked to Hamas’ Fatah movement, both claimed responsibility.

The militants said they were retaliating for Israeli military operations. Earlier this week, a Palestinian police officer and a militant were killed by army fire. The army raids came after a suicide bomber from the Islamic Jihad group killed five Israelis in an attack in the coastal city of Netanya.

After the fatal rocket attack yesterday, David Baker, an official in Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s office, charged the Palestinian Authority was responsible because of its “refusal to fight terror.” He added: “We will not allow our citizens to be murdered, and if the Palestinian Authority doesn’t take necessary steps to prevent terror, we will.”

Hamas has said it is honouring the cease-fire, but reserves the right to retaliate for perceived Israeli violations. Israel has renewed its operations against Islamic Jihad, responsible the Netanya bombing.