Image Credit: Rafah Today - Mohammed Omer 2007-02-03.
Violence in Gaza Strip Increasing
Rafah Today via BBSNews 2007-02-04 -- By Mohammed Omer. Not yet 24 hours had passed on the cease-fire agreement between political factions Hamas and Fatah before clashes again erupted throughout the Gaza Strip.
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Violence in Gaza is increasing in the last 48 hours.
Image Credit: Rafah Today - Mohammed Omer 2007-02-03. |
This time, however, the infighting has resulted in 290 dead and injured Palestinians within a span of 24 hours, according to medical sources in Gaza. Most of the victims were civilians.
The deadly clashes re-began when Hamas gunmen ambushed a convoy carrying US-funded and manufactured weapons to US-backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' guard unit in the Gaza Strip. Hamas gunmen managed to confiscate two trucks, loaded with weapons, tents, and generators, heading to Abbas. Even so, presidential guards managed to get the other trucks into Gaza City, via Kerem Shalom crossing, three kilometers away from Rafah.
Fatah and the Palestinian Authority (PA) claim that these trucks carried only supplies for the PA, and not weapons.
This has created tension and worsened the situation all over, as the militant build-up lies in the middle of the Gaza Strip, where the two trucks were confiscated. Fighting between Hamas and Fatah militants has broken out throughout Gaza, where all roads were closed.
A Palestinian intelligence chief loyal to Fatah was killed Friday in a Hamas attack against security service headquarters in the north of the Gaza Strip.
General Abdelqader Salim, in charge of intelligence in northern Gaza and deputy commander for the entire Gaza Strip, died in the attack in Jabaliya.
"Between 40 and 50 new recruits of the presidential guard were wounded and there are perhaps some killed," an official of the elite, Fatah-loyal Force 17 security service said by phone interview, on condition of anonymity.
Around 500 new recruits of Palestinian president and Fatah party leader Mahmoud Abbas' force are being trained at the base, the same source added.
Abbas' guards occupy Palestine's largest university, the Islamic University in Gaza city.
PA president Abbas' guards late Thursday occupied Gaza's Islamic University.
The forces destroyed many areas of the Islamic University, including the largest conference hall and classrooms, as well as setting fire to the university campus. Different political factions clashed immediately with the presidential guards. Hamas' main radio station claims the presidential guards stole equipment, computers, and university campus assets.
The presidential guard decided to move in on Hamas after they and other factions' militants fired mortar shells and rocket-propelled grenades at the offices of the Palestinian presidency in Gaza City.
Eight ceasefire agreements have left both sides smiling and shaking hands for TV cameras. But on the ground, the situation is getting much worse, as both sides provoke each other; one bullet is more than enough to shatter the truce.
Umm Kamal, a 48 year old mother, said while in a taxi "Oh God, they are all our sons, Hamas or Fatah, they are ours."
"This is helping Israel, for the sake of God, I'm asking all our sons not to let the Israeli agenda succeed, enough blood shedding—I'm not able to go to walk in the streets because of such clashes," she added.
"You see, America is sending weapons to Abbas to fight Hamas and Palestinians, and this is the allegation of what the US called democracy," the taxi driver commented in response, with a tone of frustration, stopped where he was by gunmen's in-fighting on the way from Khan Younies refugee camp, in the south of Gaza.
Mohammed Omer is a young journalist/photographer in the Gaza Strip. He and his family have a very rough time in living day to day and they have lost much. In October of 2003, one of Mohammed's younger bothers, Issam, was injured and had to have a leg amputated. Later in the same month another younger brother, Hussam Al-Mouhagir, was killed in his home; shot to death by the Israeli Army that occupies and regularly devastates Palestine. These stories are written by Mohammed who knows no peace, only the continued devastation forced upon civilians who have little voice in the world. Mohammed has covered the Occupied Territories for several years. In 2006 Mohammed won the New American Media National Ethnic Media Award for best Youth Voice. Visit Mohammed's Web site, or write to him to get a more complete picture of what is really happening that main-stream news sources rarely brings to its audience. We are proud to feature articles from Mohammed Omer here at BBSNews, his reporting is some of the only original, on the ground reporting available from the Israeli Occupied Territories.
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