By Nabil El-Mulhem – Damascus
& Jihad Abu Falah - Amman
A Palestinian group said to be the Islamic Resistance movement Hamas has distributed a communiqué in Damascus accusing a breakaway Fatah faction of claiming responsibility for its resistance operations against the Israeli occupation inside the Palestinian lands.
A copy of this communiqué received by Albawaba.com indicated that a crisis has erupted between Hamas and the breakaway group led by Colonel Saeed Mussa, known as Abu Mussa, over the resistance operations led by the Omar El-Mukhtar group. Abu Mussa has claimed that the Mukhtar force is a military wing of his group, but Hamas declined to divulge any details on this issue.
Informed sources, however, have said that the force is linked to Hamas and has nothing to do with Fatah which broke away from the PLO main faction in 1983.
The sources cited two accounts based on statements from two Hamas leaders to remove the ambiguity surrounding the issue.
The first account indicated that Izzeddin El-Qassam, the military wing of Hamas, has decided that it needed to ensure further security precautions for its men in the wake of a series of painful blows that led to the assassination of some of its members by the Israeli military, and arrest of others by Palestinian security men.
The Qassam faction later proposed in contacts with the political leadership of Hamas that statements claiming responsibility for attacks it launches against the Israeli army should be issued in another name such as that of Omar El-Mukhtar force.
The sources said that Hamas later agreed to the proposal and started to issue statements in the name of ‘Quat Omar Al-Mukhtar’, adding that since then, neither Israeli nor the Palestinian security men were able to arrest or locate any of those who carried out the attacks.
With the start of the second Intifada in late September, the sources added, Hamas political leadership was taken by surprise when the breakaway Fatah faction announced that ‘Omar Al-Mukhtar Forces’ was one of its military arms.
They noted that although the announcement was meant to fool the security services, Hamas found it necessary to deny any link between the group and Fatah. They feared that Fatah could use such claim to obtain assistance it doesn’t deserve from any Arab party without launching any field operations.
Izzeddin El-Qassam which voiced dissatisfaction with Fatah’s move and decided to announce that Al-Mukhtar does not belong to this group.
The breakaway Fatah has continued to issue statements in the name of Omar Al-Mukhtar claiming responsibility for any operation launched by a Palestinian individual who does not belong to any group. This led Hamas to consider issuing a statement in the name of Al-Mukhtar that denies that there is any link between the group and Fatah.
The issue, however, remains under careful study by Al-Qassam wing.
The second account, quoted in the communiqué by another member of Hamas political bureau said that Omar Al-Mukhtar group was led by one of Al-Qassam leaders. Its active members, according to this communiqué remained unknown to others except for their leader. This individual was later captured by either Israeli or Palestinian security men and this led to a halt in the contacts between the two groups.
The group, however, continued to launch attacks against Israeli soldiers in the name of Omar Al-Mukhtar, a move that confused the political and military wings of Hamas who were unable to restore contacts with the group.
Hamas officials said that when Fatah announced that Al-Mukhtar was one of its military arms, Al-Mukhtar hinted of its link with Hamas in a statement in which it announced that it was following in the footsteps of the ‘Palestinian martyr Yahya Ayyash and his companions.’
The communiqué, noting the contradiction in the two accounts, said each of the two sides might have struggled to introduce further security precautions without affecting the core of their work.
For his part, Assistant Secretary of Fateh-Intifada told Albawaba.com that the miltary group belongs to his movement, but denied there has been a rift with Hamas over Omar Mukhtar’s afiliation.
“We have seen media reports about that, but Hamas has not officialy confirmed them. We and Hamas will soon issue a statement denying these rumors,” said Abu Khaled Emleh.
“We will not comment on these nonesensical rumors that aim at harming the close and intimate relationship with Hamas at a time when our people are exposed to Israeli atrocities.”
© 2000 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
