'New guard' to lead Fatah

Jailed activist Marwan Barghouti is to head a newly unified list of Fatah candidates in a move designed to strengthen the faction's chances of defeating Hamas in crucial parliamentary elections next month.

The Palestinian Authority's dominant but deeply divided Fatah yesterday finally managed to produce a single candidates' list strongly weighed in favour of the "new guard".

The move came as Israel began shelling a "buffer zone" in northern Gaza to curb Qassam rocket attacks after dropping leaflets warning Palestinian residents their lives would be at risk if they strayed into the zone.

The new list meets most of the "new guard" conditions for a merger by excluding most members of the institutions dominated by the "old guard" - including the powerful Central committee and Fatah Revolutionary Council - whose composition dates back to 1989.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said: "It was a good opportunity for Fatah to unite in one list agreed upon by all ... it is important now to go towards the election united."

The decision represents a significant victory by Barghouti and his supporters over a raft of ageing Arafat appointees led by the Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia.

Qureia announced he would not be a candidate in the Palestinian Legislative Council elections after being told he would have to stand for his district rather than on a national list. The popularity of Qureia and many of his "old guard" has waned since the 1990s.

The newly unified list will make it easier for Fatah to disown the corruption which Palestinians widely associates with the old guard within the PA.

Opinion polls show Barghouti's group has a better chance against Hamas, which scored a notable success in local elections this month by fighting on an anti-corruption formula of "reform and change."

Meanwhile, a British human rights worker and her parents were kidnapped yesterday close to the Gaza border with Egypt in the latest of a series of seizures by militants of foreigners in the Strip.

Kate Burton, and her parents were apparently forced out of the car they were using in Rafah and into another vehicle, said to have been a white Mercedes, which drove northwards.

Burton, has worked for the Al-Mezan, a human rights organisation in Gaza for three months as co-ordinator for international affairs.

The majority of kidnap victims in Gaza have been released unharmed after a few hours though the Foreign Office this month upgraded earlier warnings by advising Britons against "all travel" to Gaza because of the earlier kidnappings of foreigners.

A British diplomat said he remained "optimistic" that the Burton family would be freed soon.

Al-Mezan issued a strong statement calling on the PA to "bring kidnappers to justice under any circumstances."

One al-Mezan staff member said there was no clear information about Burton's wellbeing.

- INDEPENDENT