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Islamist leader among 22 killed in Gaza fighting
2009-08-15
GAZA CITY (AFP) - A radical Islamist sheikh was among 22 people killed and 120 wounded after Hamas police stormed a Gaza mosque when he defiantly declared an Islamic emirate in the Palestinian enclave, medics said on Saturday. The shooting erupted on Friday afternoon following weekly prayers in Rafah, on the Egyptian border, and continued until dawn on Saturday. "Clashes... between Hamas and an extremist group in the southern Gaza Strip left 22 people dead and at least 120 wounded," a spokesman for the Palestinian emergency services told AFP. Abdul Latif Musa, identified by an Internet statement from Jund Ansar Allah (Soldiers of the Partisans of God) as its leader, was killed along with aide Abu Abdullah As-Suri when police blew up his house in Rafah. Also killed in the fighting was Mohammed al-Shamali, the Hamas military chief for southern Gaza, and five policemen. Another 10 police were wounded. A three-year-old Egyptian boy was critically wounded by a bullet from the fighting across the border, and was said to be recovering on Saturday. Friday's incident was one of the most violent in Gaza since Israel's 22-day offensive against the impoverished territory over the new year. Witnesses said that following prayers, Musa announced the formation of the "emirate," defying the authority of Hamas, which has ruled Gaza's 1.5 million people for the past two years. "We are today proclaiming the creation of an Islamist Emirate in the Gaza Strip," said Musa, a 47-year-old paediatrician famed for his fiery sermons in Rafah's "Brazil" district calling for application of Islamic sharia law. US-based monitoring service SITE Intelligence said Jund Ansar Allah announced its allegiance to the "Islamic Emirate in the Heart of Beit al-Maqdis (Jerusalem)" in a message issued on its website and jihadist forums on Friday. A translation of the statement declared that Abu al-Nur al-Maqdisi (Abdul Latif Musa) was the leader. "The soldiers of tawhid (unification) will not rest... until the entirety of Muslim lands are liberated and until our imprisoned Aqsa (mosque in Israeli-occupied east Jerusalem) is purified from the desecration of the accursed Jews," the group's statement said. Rafah is the Gaza stronghold of the Salafist movement, to which Jund Ansar Allah is said to belong and which is ideologically close to Al-Qaeda. Jund Ansar Allah seeks the strict enforcement of sharia law and accuses Hamas of being too liberal. Hamas, also Islamist, is itself viewed as fairly puritanical within the framework of diverse Palestinian politics, with secular nationalists at the other end of the spectrum. Jund Ansar Allah is said to have threatened to burn down Internet cafes and to want greater modesty on Gaza beaches. Palestinian experts say the group consists of a few dozen activists and several hundred sympathisers and operates primarily in southern Gaza. In July, Jund Ansar Allah said Hamas arrested three of its activists and charged them with planting a bomb that wounded 52 people at the wedding of a relative of Mohammed Dahlan, an ex-Gaza strongman of the Fatah group. The group denied any responsibility and warned of reprisals against Hamas if any of its members were killed. On Friday evening, the Hamas interior ministry warned that those violating the law would be pursued and arrested. "Everyone outside the law and carrying arms in order to spread chaos will be pursued and arrested," a ministry statement said. Hamas seized power in Gaza in June 2007 after a week of vicious fighting with forces of the secular Fatah movement of Palestinian Authority president Mahmud Abbas. It is regarded by the United States and Israel as a terrorist group, and Israel maintains a blockade on the territory.
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