Armed Palestinians fire on PA police station
Photo: Reuters
Fatah gunmen attack PA police station
Clash underscores difficulty in maintaining order in West Bank cities due to Israel's delay in pulling out troops, Abbas says
Fatah gumen fired on a Palestinian police station on Friday in an incident that underscored difficulties Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas faces in trying to impose law and order in the West Bank and Gaza.
The incident began when a member of the al-Awda Brigades, part of Abbas' Fatah faction, came to the station in the West Bank city of Nablus to visit his jailed brother, but was refused permission to see him by police.
The man shouted threats at police and was then beaten by them before he called in other gunmen from the group who began firing at the station, a member of the brigades said.
Return fire from police wounded two of the armed men, he added.
A policeman was also wounded and additional back up forces were called in, witnesses said.
Another brigade member said the incident erupted after police refused to apologize for beating up their man. A policeman at the Nablus station declined to give details other than to say, "We were attacked by gunmen."
Abbas said on Friday his efforts were complicated by Israel's delay in pulling back forces from West Bank cities as part of a ceasefire deal he and Prime Minister Ariel Sharon reached at the Feb. 8 summit
in Sharm el-Sheikh.
"For the Israeli army to have a presence in all West Bank (cities) and then to ask the Palestinian Authority to be responsible, I think this is difficult," Abbas told reporters in Ramallah.
"Therefore there will be many violations but we will deal with them."
Israel froze its commitment to redeploy away from cities in the West Bank after a Palestinian suicide bomber, flouting the truce, killed five Israelis in Tel Aviv last week.
