(Ha'aretz) Avi Issacharoff - Hamas and Fatah are preparing for war. Militants are gathering intelligence ahead of an operation against each other, rather than Israel. Both sides are monitoring the movements of rival senior officials with roadblocks on the routes taken by military commanders. The recruitment, training, and arming of more than 4,000 Palestinians in forces associated with Fatah are meant to send a message to Hamas. "For every one of our men who is hit by Hamas fire, we will hit two of yours," a senior Fatah official told Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh last week. The Hamas leadership abroad and the Hamas government in Gaza are not on the same page. Hamas' Damascus-based political bureau leader Khaled Mashal, his Gaza spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri, Mushir al-Masri, Adnan Asfour, and most of the Hamas foreign leadership are not interested in the survival of the Hamas-led government. They believe the government is at the end of the line and that it will be easier for Hamas to return to terror if it is not in power.
2006-06-19 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive