Unrest flares in Gaza

2004-07-23 12:11

Gaza Strip - Violence flared in the Gaza Strip as three Palestinians were killed, including two Islamic militants, and fresh protests erupted against Yasser Arafat's appointment of his cousin as local security chief.

A Palestinian teenager was killed on Friday morning in Beit Hanun, in the northern Gaza Strip, as he and other residents were protesting against militants attempting to plant a roadside bomb to blow up Israeli armour, several witnesses said.

The sources said Hassan al-Zaanin has been killed by Palestinian fire.

They said residents feared that an anti-Israeli attack would lead to harsh and collective army reprisals.

But security sources said the youth had been killed by Israeli troops that indiscriminately opened fire at both the gunmen and the angry residents.

Israeli troops took over Beit Hanun late last month after a rocket attack from there killed two people in southern Israel, just a few kilometres across the Gaza border.

The army has vowed to stop militants from using Beit Hanun as a launch pad for firing rockets and bulldozed agricultural fields where attackers typically hid.

Palestinian security sources and the army both said that land levelling had been stepped up in the past few days.

Late on Thursday night in Gaza, two Palestinian militants including a leader of the armed wing of the Islamic Jihad were killed in an Israeli air strike, Palestinian and Israeli sources said.

Thousands demonstrated in streets

Rahim, 27, of Islamic Jihad's Al-Quds Brigade had been sought by Israeli forces for alleged involvement in several attacks. The other militant was identified as Rauf Abu Afi.

In May, Rahim walked through the streets of Gaza City with what he said were the remains of six Israeli soldiers who had been killed.

The army said Rahim organised suicide bombings and was responsible for other attacks against targets in Israel or on soldiers and settlers in the Gaza Strip.

Islamic Jihad said the two militants were travelling in the eastern Zeitun area of Gaza City when rockets fired by helicopters destroyed their vehicle.

Also in Gaza City, several thousand demonstrators flanked by masked gunmen took to the streets to protest Arafat's appointment of his cousin Musa as security chief in the Gaza Strip.

The angry crowd had rallied late on Thursday in response to a call from the radical Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades and from a section of Arafat's Fatah movement.

Violent protests erupted last weekend after Arafat appointed Musa as the new overall head of general security following a breakdown in order and a string of kidnappings in Gaza.

Demonstrators led by the Brigades then denounced him as the epitome of corruption.

Reacting to the protests, Arafat announced Monday that Musa would only head up the general security branch in the Gaza Strip, rather than the whole of the Palestinian territories as initially indicated.

- AFP