Last update - 00:00 26/03/2007
Sliding toward Somalia in Gaza
By Avi Issacharoff
The bullet-riddled body - 30 slugs in all - of Arafat Nufal, an officer in the Palestinian Preventive Security Service, was found Friday morning hanging from a pole in the Al Moraka district near Gaza. The details of his murder tell the story of the Gaza Strip since the Mecca agreement was signed in early February.
This is the story of how Gaza is becoming a Palestinian Somalia, as Palestinian politicians celebrate the artificial unity deal.
Like the cars of many Palestinian officers, Nufal's Mitsubishi was stolen two months ago. Since the disengagement, the vehicles of the Palestinian security forces have become all the rage for the car thieves of the Strip, who often sell them to Hamas.
Three weeks ago, Nufal located his car in the hands of Hamas militiamen. He asked them to return his car, but they refused. Then he sent "dignitaries" to talk to them: some of the prominent families' elders, to no avail.
Two weeks ago, upon seeing his car again, he addressed the driver of the stolen vehicle. An argument ensued, which developed into a gunfight. In the conflagration, Nufal killed one of the men inside his car, Alah al-Khadad, a militant of Hamas' Iz a Din al-Kassam Brigades.
Friday, his relatives, also active members in the Brigades, killed Nufal to avenge Khadad's death.
The number of gunfights between Fatah and Hamas loyalists has drastically dropped since the Mecca agreement has been signed, but they still occur. Killings such as Nufal's have become common.
The Strip is being run by a mixture of bloodshed, retribution killings, poverty, unemployment and violent confrontations over political and family loyalties.
According to human rights group B'Tselem, 36 Palestinians were killed in infighting in February alone. There are still no official figures on killings in March, but seven people were killed in the past weekend.
A UN worker who recently visited the Strip says the situation there has deteriorated. "You see militants every other junction," he says.
Z., a Fatah leader in the northern part of the Gaza Strip, says that nothing has changed since the creation of the national-unity government. "The abductions, the assassinations, the shooting, everything is still gong on," he says. "I don't think things will change even after the new government has had a chance to establish itself."
Z. told Haaretz he believed the worst was yet to come. "Pretty soon there will be militants in each and every junction. Everybody knows who's holding Alan Johnston, the BBC correspondent kidnapped two weeks ago. It's a large family, and they're after money. Instead of surrounding the premises and acting against them, the security forces are negotiating with them," he complains. "Breaking in their will cost lives, but there's no alternative. You have to move in with force to restore order."
What Z. doesn't say is that all the large organizations, Fatah included, are trying to dissuade the renowned family from joining the rival faction. Foreign journalists who have been kidnapped and then released by the family say they were treated in an especially demeaning manner. They go on to say that the Iraqi influence was obvious in the clothing of their captors, their language and their methods of handling prisoners, including forced conversions to Islam.
While the anarchy and chaos were contained in past years to the ranks of the Fatah and the prominent families, it has now reached the ranks of Hamas as well.
Thursday, Hamas and Fatah officials met in the home of newly appointed Interior Minister Hani Kawasmeh to try to reach an agreement toward resolving the conflict. They agreed to create a joint operations room operating around the clock to handle all instances of violence.
Shortly after the meeting, Hamas militia men broke into the home of a prominent Fatah operative, killing a 2-year-old child. The assault was opposed by both the military and political leadership of the organization.
Security officials say internal groups within Hamas are working independently to ensure the interests of Hamas leaders who have had to step aside following the power-sharing agreement. The wounding of an Israeli Electric Corporation employee has been another result of the in-fighting within Hamas.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon arrived yesterday to meet Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas in a second visit to Ramallah. He was followed by U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who arrived for yet another of her numerous visits.
It was the less-versed visitor who spoke also of the Authority's commitment to restore order in the Palestinian street. Perhaps Rice, his experienced partner, understands that even a peace agreement between Israel and the Arab world is a more realistic prospect than the restoration of peace to the streets of Gaza.