Israel Matzav

Fatah's enemies list

The 'good terrorists' from Fatah have been arresting their enemies in Judea and Samaria. It should not surprise any of you that many of them are not 'bad terrorists' from Hamas.

Fatah gunmen in Nablus set fire to a car belonging to Prof. Abdel Sattar Kassam, a former presidential candidate and outspoken critic of the PA leadership.

A Fatah militia operating in Nablus issued a statement in which it claimed responsibility for the torching of the car. The PA security forces in the city said they have launched an investigation.

It was the second time that Kassam's car had been torched in recent years. The political science professor was recently detained by the PA security forces on charges of expressing solidarity with Hamas during Operation Cast Lead and criticizing PA President Mahmoud Abbas and his senior aides.

One of the journalists arrested by the PA security forces is Khaled Amayreh, a resident of Hebron who has long been reporting about financial corruption in the PA.

Amayreh was arrested on suspicion of being affiliated with Hamas and Islamic Jihad, a PA security commander told The Jerusalem Post. "His arrest had nothing to do with the fact that he's a journalist," the commander said. "He was arrested because of his links to Islamic organizations."

Amayreh spent 55 hours in a cell inside a prison belonging to the PA's much-feared Preventative Security Service in Hebron. He said that while he himself had not been physically abused, he heard the screams of other detainees who were apparently being tortured.

The other four journalists who were arrested by various branches of the PA security forces work for Hamas's Al-Aksa television station.

One of them, Samer Khawireh, was arrested on Sunday for reporting about the torching of Kassam's car in Nablus.

Ahmed al-Bikawi, the station's correspondent in Jenin, was arrested on Monday by agents belonging to the PA's Military Intelligence Service in the West Bank.

Also this week, the PA security forces briefly detained Ibrahim al-Rantisi, who works for Al-Aksa TV in Ramallah, and Mamdouh Hamamreh, the station's reporter in Bethlehem.

Rantisi and Hamamreh were released after being questioned about their alleged ties to Hamas.

Not everyone who opposes Fatah is affiliated with Hamas. The allegations of ties to Hamas sound to me like an excuse for Fatah to round up its critics.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 1:13 PM