The latest cease-fire agreement between Fatah and Hamas fell apart early Wednesday as factional fighting in the Gaza strip was renewed.

Gunmen stormed the home of Fatah's top security chief in Gaza early Wednesday killing six guards in fresh factional fighting, a Fatah official reported.

Earlier, mortars struck near the office of President Mahmoud
Ab

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Abbas of Fatah but caused no injuries after grenades were thrown
at a Hamas position at the Interior Ministry in Gaza.

Gunmen shot and wounded a top Egyptian official in Gaza on Wednesday as he tested whether a shaky ceasefire deal between feuding Fatah and Hamas loyalists was holding, a Palestinian security official said.

The Egyptian was shot in the hand as he walked along a Gaza street with the Palestinian cabinet secretary Ghazi Hamad of Hamas and a Fatah official, in a bid to see whether the armed rivals were sticking to the truce agreed on late Tuesday.

The Egyptian was among a team involved in mediating the truce and trying to put an end to the fighting.

Fighting between Fatah and Hamas in the Gaza Strip reached new heights Tuesday, claiming the lives of at least 15 Palestinians in the worst single day of clashes since the two parties agreed to form a unity government in February.

Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas said late Tuesday that the factions had agreed to a new cease-fire, and would pull their gunmen off the streets at midnight. The accord was the third such agreement in as many days.

Most of the dead were members of the Presidential Guard affiliated with Fatah, killed in an incident that took place near the Karni cargo crossing.

Hamas gunmen riddled a Fatah police jeep with gunfire at close range, killing eight. The incident took place after the shelling of a police camp as Fatah reinforcements were speeding to the area.

Hamas had attacked a training camp of the Palestinian National Security force, another pro-Fatah organization, using machine guns, mortars and missiles.

Sources said the vehicle overturned and the Hamas gunmen approached and executed the wounded at close range. "It was unbelievable. May God help us," said an eyewitness working in a nearby factory.

Two Palestinian policemen who fled toward the border fence were mistakenly identified by Israel Defense Forces troops as militants trying to attack the Israeli side of the Karni crossing.

The IDF Spokesman's Office confirmed that the IDF soldiers shot at two armed men who approached the security fence, killing one and wounding the other.

The attack was the deadliest single incident in the recent surge of factional fighting, which has claimed 23 lives.

In the early morning, a Hamas militant was killed at the hands of Fatah gunmen.

Later in the afternoon a Fatah member was killed during an attack against the Preventive Security headquarters in the neighborhood of Tel al-Hawa.

Two hours later, two members of Hamas were shot dead, and another Hamas man was killed in Gaza City.

A Palestinian man who was critically injured in the fighting later succumbed to his wounds.

A total of 27 Palestinians were wounded in Tuesday's fighting.

In a conversation with Abbas on Tuesday, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak told the Palestinian Authority chairman that the clashes in Gaza had 'crossed a red line' and said that both sides must put an end to violence.

Later in the day, Western sources said hundreds of fighters loyal to the Fatah faction crossed into Gaza from Egypt as possible reinforcements in fighting against Hamas militants. Fatah said the group that crossed into Gaza did not do so to fight Hamas.

The Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt was briefly opened to readmit a 450-strong Fatah contingent into the coastal strip, according to the sources, who spoke in Israel on condition of anonymity. The sources said the crossing was opened, with Israeli consent, in only one direction to allow in the Fatah contingent. Once they crossed into Gaza, the crossing was re-closed.

Gazans: Latest violence more ominous
At the center of the new Palestinian fighting is a dispute over who controls the security forces. A majority of the 80,000 security officers in the West Bank and Gaza Strip are loyal to Abbas, while Hamas set up its own 6,000-strong militia last year.

The Fatah men killed Tuesday were members of the unit responsible for guarding the Karni border crossing under an agreement with Israel.

Fighting in the Gaza Strip between rival Palestinian forces had already entered into a third day Tuesday, with a Hamas man killed in a separate clash with Fatah, as a truce unraveled and a fragile unity government agreement appeared to fall apart.

Gazans found the latest violence more ominous than the previous round, saying it signaled the failure of the power-sharing deal between Hamas and Fatah.

"Now they are starting from where they left off," said Jamal Abu Shabaan, 21, who witnessed a gunbattle outside his furniture store Sunday. "If they get to each others' throats, they won't let go this time."

Abu Shabaan said he had made up his mind after the last round of bloodshed to emigrate to Saudi Arabia and expected to leave in the coming days. Universities were closed because of the violence, and many worried parents kept their children home from school.

"It's a curfew out there, masked men everywhere and kidnappings," said Shereen Abu Hassira, 36, who made her five school-age children stay inside Monday.

Palestinians awoke to the sound of gunfire at different points around the coastal strip Tuesday as the warring factions, Fatah and Hamas, accused each other's forces of breaking a cease-fire reached late Monday. Gunmen exchanged heavy gunfire at a security compound in Gaza City and a nearby junction was empty except for a few cars hurriedly abandoned by passengers.

The violence followed the resignation of a frustrated top security official whose appointment as an independent was a keystone of the unity agreement reached two months ago to put an end to months of bloody clashes.

In many places the violence centered around roadblocks set up by the Fatah-affiliated Palestinian security and began when cars containing Hamas gunmen were stopped.

With the death toll mounting, Interior Minister Hani Kawasmeh resigned on Monday and accused leaders on both sides of thwarting his efforts to halt the violence.

The career civil servant was a compromise candidate for the top security post when the more moderate Fatah movement and the Islamic radicals of Hamas formed the unity government in March after months of fighting.