Hamas, Fatah gunmen battle over results

GAZA - Hamas and Fatah gunmen exchanged fire today in political turmoil as the long-dominant Palestinian faction was threatened with a violent backlash to its crushing election defeat by the Islamic militant group.

Hamas, whose shock parliamentary election victory changed the face of Palestinian politics and put Middle East peacemaking deeper in limbo, said it would hold talks soon with President Mahmoud Abbas on "political partnership".

But Fatah leaders have rejected a coalition with Hamas and thousands of Fatah supporters, including gunmen firing into the air, marched in the Gaza Strip in protest at the idea. Thousands of Hamas backers celebrated their victory in separate rallies.

The militant al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, part of Fatah, issued a statement threatening to "liquidate" the faction's leaders if they changed their minds and joined a Hamas-led administration.

Acknowledging Hamas' new standing as a political powerhouse, Abbas told reporters: "We are consulting and in contact with all the Palestinian groups and definitely, at the appropriate time, the biggest party will form the cabinet." In the first armed clash between Hamas and Fatah militants since Wednesday's vote, three people were wounded in a gun battle near the southern city of Khan Younis, witnesses said.

The violence erupted, they said, after Hamas militants were angered by a sermon by a Fatah-appointed Muslim preacher during Friday prayers.

With Middle East peace talks frozen since 2000, Israel ruled out negotiations with any Palestinian administration involving Hamas, which is sworn to Israel's destruction and has been behind dozens of suicide bombings.

Israeli interim Prime Minister Ehud Olmert repeated that message, along with a US-backed peace "road map's" call for the disarming of Palestinian gunmen, in telephone conversations with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Jordan's King Abdullah, Olmert's office said.

At the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Israel threw into doubt its willingness to continue the transfer of customs revenue to an aid-dependent Palestinian Authority.

"We will face practical problems of how you deal with people that call for the destruction of Israel," said Joseph Bachar, director general of the Israeli Finance Ministry.

Palestinian Economy Minister Mazen Sinokrot, sitting on the same panel as Bachar, said the Israeli transfers amounted to monthly revenues exceeding US$40million ($59.21 million) to US$50 million, money needed to help pay salaries for 135,000 government employees.

An opinion poll in Israel's Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper showed 48 per cent of Israelis favoured talking to a Hamas-led Palestinian government, while 43 per cent were opposed.

Israel holds a general election on March 28 and Olmert, whose centrist Kadima party is the front-runner, has hinted at unilateral moves to set a border with the Palestinians on Israeli terms.

Israel has already pulled its settlers out of the Gaza Strip without negotiations, citing the current Palestinian government's failure to rein in militants.

"In the Gaza disengagement, Israel opened a window of opportunity. With these elections, the Palestinians have slammed it shut," Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni told reporters in Tel Aviv.

Speaking in Damascus, Moussa Abu Marzouk, a senior Hamas official, said the movement had a "clear vision for a government of unity -- one in which everyone joins".

But some 10,000 Fatah supporters, including gunmen who fired in the air, marched in a series of rallies in the central Gaza Strip in rejection of a coalition with Hamas and Fatah's veteran leadership.

"Corrupt Fatah leaders who caused the election defeat must resign. Fatah must renew itself," a protester shouted through a loudspeaker.

In a sea of Islamic green flags and hats, some 20,000 Hamas supporters held a celebration rally in Khan Younis refugee camp.

Hamas' capture of 76 seats in the 132-member parliament against 43 for Fatah was widely seen as a political earthquake in the Middle East, triggered by voter disenchantment with corruption and the failure of peace efforts.

Ismail Haniyeh, who headed Hamas' list of candidates, said in Gaza City he had telephoned Abbas and they had agreed to meet when the president visits the city in about two days.

"We will talk about several issues including the shape of the political partnership in the coming stage," he told Reuters.

In remarks to reporters later in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Abbas made no reference to a meeting with Haniyeh.

At a news conference in Washington yesterday, US President George W Bush said "a political party that articulates the destruction of Israel as part of a platform is a party with which we will not deal".

Hamas has mostly respected a truce for nearly a year, but says it will not give up its guns or its charter demand for an Islamic state to encompass Israel, the West Bank and Gaza.

- REUTERS