In Gaza, 2 wounded as Hamas clashes with hardliners
Salafist lobs grenade at security forces, is wounded in return fire, as Hamas tries to crack down on ultra-conservatives
A police officer and a youth were hospitalized on Tuesday after Hamas forces clashed with hard-line Islamists in the Gaza Strip, a medical source and witnesses said.
Both men suffered bullet wounds during an attempt by Gaza security forces to arrest two men from a Salafist group, followers of an ultra-conservative form of Islam, a witness said.
The young man, believed to be a Salafist, was in serious condition, while the policeman’s condition was not life-threatening, the medical source said.
The witness said a grenade was thrown at security forces raiding a house in Al-Fukhari in the southern Gaza Strip, sparking clashes.
Hamas, which rules Gaza, is an Islamist party avowedly committed to destroying Israel but is frequently criticized by more conservative Islamists, including hardliners who sympathize with the Islamic State group.
The hardliners sporadically fire rockets at Israel, prompting retaliation against Hamas targets.
Israel holds terror group Hamas responsible for all rocket fire, regardless of who launches it.
In October Israel carried out airstrikes on Hamas sites in Gaza after a rocket hit the Israeli border town of Sderot. The Islamic State-affiliated Ahfad al-Sahaba-Aknaf Bayt al-Maqdis terrorist group took responsibility for the rocket launch, saying in a statement the attack on Sderot was in response to Hamas’s arrest of several of its members.
In that rocket attack, three people in Sderot “suffered anxiety attacks” and were treated by medical teams, but no one was physically hurt, according to the Magen David Adom medical service.
In an unrelated incident, a fighter of Hamas’s military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, was killed accidentally.
“Ahmad Mansour, 30 and from Jabalia in northern Gaza, died on Monday night when a grenade exploded by accident,” a Qassam statement said.
