Hamas, Fatah training in arms

RAFAH, Gaza Strip – In a makeshift boot camp, dozens of Palestinians in black masks and military fatigues charged across a field Wednesday, assault rifles aimed at an invisible enemy.

But for the gunmen from the recently defeated Fatah Party, the target was clear: the new security force formed by the Hamas-led government.

“We are going to confront this Hamas unit,” said one 22-year-old Fatah fighter who only gave his nom de guerre, Abu Satter, and proudly posed with his Kalashnikov rifle.

Hamas also has been busy. Just a few miles from the Fatah camp, Hamas fighters on Wednesday ran drills on how to whisk suspects from a car, cuff and guard them. In another sign of readiness, Hamas recently bought a black market shipment of 100,000 bullets after outbidding Fatah, according to one official.

After just weeks in office, Hamas has been backed into a corner.

It can’t pay its 165,000 employees because the West has frozen aid and blocked money transfers from the Arab world. The boycott has cut deep: Shops are empty and streets deserted as Palestinians scrape by on dwindling savings.

At the same time, moderate President Mahmoud Abbas has stripped the Hamas government of some of its powers, assuming control of the border authority and the state-run TV and radio.

And wrangling over control of the security forces has laid bare the deep enmity.

Abbas holds the title of general commander of the 80,000-member security force, which consists of five branches. Three of the branches are under the control of the Hamas-run Interior Ministry, while two report directly to Abbas.

Last month, Abbas appointed a loyalist, Rashid Abu Shbak, as commander of one of the Hamas-controlled branches, the Preventive Security Service. In the 1990s, Abu Shbak had led a crackdown on Hamas, and his appointment was seen by Hamas as a major provocation.

Hamas responded by announcing the creation of a special unit, to consist of some 4,000 of its militants headed by Jamal Abu Samhadana, No. 2 on Israel’s wanted list. Abbas annulled the decision, but Hamas refused to back down, and the standoff continues.

In this charged climate, both sides are mobilizing.

On Wednesday, 80 Fatah-linked gunmen performed military drills for journalists on a sandy lot in the southern Gaza town of Rafah. They marched in formation, charged with their rifles, somersaulted over burning tires and pointed rifles at a kneeling, hooded “prisoner.”

Their commander, a portly man with the nom de guerre Moatassem Bilaa, said the 80 men were the core of a new unit he hoped would grow to 2,000. He said the unit, formed in response to the Hamas force, would “give a tough response to any assault on Fatah members.”

Not to be outdone, Abu Samhadana’s men staged a drill a few hours later and a few miles away.

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