MIDDLE EAST-POLITICS: Hamas in Show of Strength Against Arafat

CAIRO, Nov 25 (IPS) - The Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas put on a show of strength in Palestinian-ruled Gaza Friday as inter- Palestinian fighting erupted in Lebanon killing at least four people.

Thousands of Hamas activists marched through the streets of Gaza City chanting slogans against Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.

Outside the Palestine mosque in the city, Hamas leaders condemned Arafat and his security forces for killing at least 12 people in riots at the site a week ago.

In Lebanon, fighting erupted in the Ein Helwih Palestinian refugee camp in the south of the country between rival factions in Arafat's Fatah group.

No reason was given for the sudden outbreak in violence but reports from the camp spoke of gunmen using rocket-propelled grenades and heavy machine-guns.

In Israel, Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin condemned a decision by a military court to sentence to death a Palestinian convicted of a bus-bombing in the town of Hadera in April in which six people were killed.

Rabin told Israel Radio that carrying out the sentence, passed on 24-year-old Saeed Badarneh, would be a "blunder".

"To this day, Israel has not put a single Palestinian terrorist to death, and I think this was correct," he said.

An Israeli analyst told IPS the sentence would probably be overturned after an automatic appeal to a higher court. Joshua Tietelbaum, an researcher at the Tel Aviv University Jaffa Centre for Middle Eastern and North African Studies, said that if Badarneh was to be executed it would only be the second ever in Israel

In 1962, Israel hanged Adolf Eichmann, an architect of the Nazi Holocaust against the Jews.

"I don't think it will happen," Teitelbaum said by phone. "Badarneh may have killed Jews but he's not in the Eichmann category."

In Sudan, a Hamas leader warned the United States the militant group would attack its interests if it wanted to "start a battle with Hamas".

© Inter Press Service (2014) — All Rights Reserved. Original source: Inter Press Service