Hamas gunman (archives)
Photo: Reuters
Hamas: Activist who died in jail was tortured
Fadi Hamadna, 28, dies in Palestinian Authority prison in Nablus. PA: He committed suicide
Hamas
member Fadi Hamadna, 28, of the West Bank village of Asira al-Shamaliya, died Sunday evening at a prison in Nablus. Both his family members and the Hamas organization say his investigators had tortured him.
Hamdana was arrested by the General Intelligence organization on June 15, and had been held since then in a Nablus prison.
Palestinian Authority officials rushed to claim that Hamdana had committed suicide, but his family strongly denied this. The family members claimed that the PA was attempting to hide the torture.
The Hamas organization pointed a finger at Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, noting that General Intelligence people had in fact acted on threats made by Fatah leaders, during the movement's conference in Bethlehem, to strike Hamas.
Salah Bardawil, a senior Hamas member in Gaza, said that "the assassination in the Nablus prison is an implementation of threats made by the movement's leaders, headed by Azzam al-Ahmad, Fatah's leader in the Palestinian Parliament."
Hamas members noted that Israel had tried to arrest Hamdana, but that the PA was the one to assassinate him. On Sunday evening, PA officials arrested another senior Hamas member in the Ramallah area.
