Fearing assassinations, Hamas boosts security around leaders — report
Terror group concerned over possibility of attempts on lives of Ismail Haniyeh and other top officials, according to Arab daily
Stuart Winer is a breaking news editor at The Times of Israel.
The Hamas terror group has increased security around its top figures in the Gaza Strip amid fears they might be assassinated by rival groups within the Palestinian enclave.
Security around Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh and others was boosted after information indicated that attempts might be made on their lives, the pan-Arab daily Asharq Al-Awsat reported Sunday.
The past several months have seen attempted assassinations of visiting Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah and the head of the Hamas security operation Tawfik Abu Naim.
A March 13 attack targeted a convoy in which Hamdallah and the PA’s intelligence chief, Majed Faraj, were traveling. Neither Hamdallah nor Faraj were hurt in the blast, though 10 security guards and staff accompanying the two, who were in non-armored vehicles, were lightly wounded.
Hamas later claimed the PA had orchestrated the entire episode to end efforts at reconciliation between the two groups, which have been deeply divided ever since Hamas violently seized control of Gaza from the Ramallah-based PA in 2007. The PA in turn said Hamas was responsible.
Hamas has also accused the PA officers who ostensibly masterminded the attack on Hamdallah’s convoy of being behind an attempt on the life of Hamas’s security chief Abu Naim in October.
Hamas maintains that it killed the main suspect in the attempt to assassinate Hamdallah, Anas Abu Khoussa, a week after the attack, along with one of Abu Khoussa’s aides. Two Hamas police officers were killed in a shootout, the group said.
The Palestinian Authority has dismissed Hamas’s claims to have killed the main suspect, saying its story was “flimsy.”
The episodes have served to further fray ties between the Palestinian groups.
Several rounds of efforts to reconcile Hamas and the PA, which is dominated by the Fatah party, have failed.
Hamas has recently organized several weeks of Friday protests along the Israeli-Gazan border leading to deadly clashes with Israeli security forces.
Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.
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