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Palestinian collaborator killed in bed
Five masked men broke into a hospital Monday and shot dead a convicted Palestinian collaborator who had been wounded in a grenade attack in his prison cell just hours earlier.
After the shooting, police questioned one of the suspected gunmen who claimed to be a relative of the victim avenging the shame the collaborator had brought to his family, police said.
Assassinations like that of Mahmoud al Sharef, accused of helping Israel, are relatively common. But this one came amid growing lawlessness in the Palestinian territories that has highlighted police helplessness to rein in violence.
In the West Bank town of Ramallah, hundreds of Palestinians rallied Monday in support of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, who has been under attack for the lawlessness and corruption in the Palestinian territories.
The rally occurred a day after Arab newspapers published unusually sharp comments against Arafat by Mohammed Dahlan, a former Gaza security chief campaigning for reform in Arafat's Palestinian Authority.
"You are the defenders of the sacred land," Arafat told the crowd, praising his supporters for "thwarting the conspiracy" against him.
Dahlan was quoted Sunday by a Kuwaiti newspaper as threatening huge demonstrations in Gaza unless Arafat reforms his government within 10 days.
"Arafat now sits on the bodies and ruins of Palestinians at a time when they most need support," he was quoted as saying.
The Jerusalem daily Al Quds, however, reported Monday that Dahlan denied giving any interview to the Kuwaiti paper.
In the northern Gaza Strip overnight, Israeli troops shot dead three armed Palestinians next to a Jewish settlement.
The Israeli military said a group of men were spotted approaching the settlement's perimeter fence and soldiers opened fire. A joint announcement from militant groups Islamic Jihad and Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades said three of their men were killed in what they called a "heroic operation."
There were no Israeli casualties.
The funeral procession for one of the militants, including mourners carrying assault rifles, gathered outside Gaza's Shifa Hospital when five masked gunmen entered the building unnoticed and broke into the room of al Sharef, 52.
One of the gunmen shot al Sharef twice in the head with a pistol as he lay in his hospital bed, police said.
Al Sharef was convicted in 1999 of being involved in the killing of Mahmoud Al Khawja, the founder of Islamic Jihad's military wing, four years earlier.
He was one of seven prisoners wounded earlier Monday in Gaza Central Prison when two crude hand grenades exploded in the prison, Palestinian security officials said.
One of the wounded, Musa Ouda, 30, later died of his wounds, they said. The explosions were in a wing reserved for men convicted of collaborating with Israel. Earlier Monday, Israeli forces entered the Khan Younis refugee camp, in the south of the coastal strip, and demolished six buildings. Troops opened fire, and a woman was killed when a bullet came through her window, residents said. Doctors said six civilians were wounded. Military officials said the operation was aimed at the "terrorist infrastructure" in the camp. The officials said Palestinians used the location to fire mortars and rifles at a nearby Jewish settlement. They said helicopters fired warning shots at an open area to keep gunmen away. |
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