9 dead in Gaza as Hamas raids clan loyal to Fatah

Nine people were killed Saturday as Hamas routed a well-armed clan loyal to the rival Fatah group from its urban stronghold in the worst flare-up of internal Palestinian strife this year.

Hospital officials said 72 people, including 12 children, were wounded as mortar shells and machine-gun fire rattled Gaza City’s crowded Shijaiyah neighborhood during the daylong battle. Among the injured was clan leader Ahmed Hillis, who fled into Israel with dozens of his followers.

Hundreds of Hamas policemen raided the neighborhood in predawn fog in search of 11 suspects in a July 25 car bombing that killed five Hamas activists. The suspects are allied with the large Hillis clan, which lives in the area and had refused to hand them over.

Policemen wearing body armor battled fighters and rooftop snipers as loudspeakers at Hamas-controlled mosques urged residents to stay indoors. Electricity was cut to the neighborhood of 45,000 people.

Combat raged for 14 hours, until Hamas forces gained control of the area after Hillis and remnants of his paramilitary group escaped through an Israeli border crossing less than a mile from the family compound.

An Israeli military spokesman said 150 Palestinians, about 20 of them wounded, were allowed to cross.

Hamas Interior Minister Said Siam said police had arrested dozens of people in Shijaiyah and seized large quantities of weapons in house-to-house searches. He said four of the 11 bombing suspects were in custody.

The Interior Ministry said three policemen were killed, two by rocket-propelled grenades and one in an explosion. The dead included three Fatah fighters and three unidentified people, Palestinian medical officials said.

Hamas, a militant Islamic group that won Palestinian elections in 2006, shared power with Fatah in a short-lived Palestinian Authority coalition government that collapsed in June 2007. Hamas seized control of the Gaza Strip after days of heavy fighting, leaving Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, the U.S.-backed Fatah leader, in charge of only the West Bank.

Before Saturday’s fighting, Fatah had put up little armed resistance to Hamas’ rule in the seaside enclave. Last month, the two factions began trying to resolve their differences with the help of Egyptian mediators.

The factional calm ended with the July 25 car bombing, which also killed a 6-year-old girl, on a busy Gaza City beach.

It set off retaliatory crackdowns by Hamas in Gaza and Fatah in the West Bank. Hundreds of Palestinians in both groups have been arrested. Hamas shut down a Fatah- affiliated radio station; Fatah imposed a ban on public assembly in the West Bank.

At the center of the conflict was Hillis, a member of the Revolutionary Council that advises Fatah’s leadership. He was involved in negotiations between Fatah and Hamas before their violent split last year. As other Fatah activists fled Gaza, he stayed put with his paramilitary force and often was the Fatah contact in Gaza for the Hamas leadership.

But when members of his force became suspects in the car bombing, he was accused of hiding them. After days of negotiations, Hillis was given until midnight Friday to hand them over to the police.

The family issued a statement denying involvement in the car bombing and other violence.

Abbas denounced the Hamas raid as a setback for his efforts for Palestinian unity and worked with Israel to arrange safe passage for Hillis and his followers.

Ambulances met the fleeing Palestinians on the Israeli side and took the wounded to hospitals, the Israeli spokesman said. He said the rest were being debriefed about the fighting at an Israeli army installation near the border.

--

boudreaux@latimes.com

Special correspondent Abu Alouf reported from Gaza City and Times staff writer Boudreaux from Jerusalem.