Tensions were running high in Gaza Strip on Tuesday after Hamas police killed seven people at the biggest protest by the rival Fatah party since it was ousted in June. Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas has declared a three-day period of mourning to "pay homage to the martyrs killed by the bullets of the putschists," referring to Hamas.
Flags will be flown at half-mast on official buildings in the West Bank while families in Gaza Strip mourn those killed on Monday when Hamas-run police opened fire on a rally of hundreds of thousands of people commemorating the death of Yasser Arafat. According to AFP, another 130 people were injured when Hamas gunmen opened fire as crowds threw rocks and chanted "Shiite, Shiite", witnesses and medics said.
The Palestinian Authority's official newspaper Al-Hayat al-Jadida called the shootings a "massacre". "The most recent massacre by the (Hamas-run) Executive Force militia is the product of a cruel mentality that from the very beginning has wanted the situation in Gaza to reach a point of no return," it said.
The Al-Quds newspaper said the rally had unexpectedly become a "referendum" on the Hamas movement's five-month-long rule in the impoverished and increasingly isolated coastal strip. "Everyone who went out into the streets yesterday did so, not for the commemoration of Abu Ammar (Yasser Arafat) but to voice their opposition to the current situation in the Gaza Strip," it said.
Palestinian prime minister Salam Fayyad on Monday blamed top Hamas leaders for the killings. "Senior officials in Hamas ordered these crimes which were carried out by the Hamas militia in order to terrify the people... Now their punishment is a national duty," Fayyad said in a statement.
On official television, Abbas denounced "these horrible crimes committed by a band of rebels... before the eyes of the entire world."
Meanwhile, Hamas has arrested scores of Fatah activists in the Gaza Strip following the rally, officials said on Tuesday. According to Reuters, Islam Shahwan, spokesman of the Hamas-led Executive Force, said it had detained about 50 Fatah members since the rally.
"They are the ones who planned and organised the rally yesterday and are suspected of being responsible for the chaos that took place," Shahwan said.
Fatah official Hazem Abu Shanab said Hamas security forces arrested 400 Fatah members and dozens more were ordered to report to police stations for questioning.
© 2007 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
