Palestinians fleeing Hamas controlled area

Reuters:

Hundreds of Fatah supporters fled the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip by land and sea on Saturday and the Islamist group threatened to take its fight against Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's forces to the West Bank.

Abbas, who leads the secular Fatah faction, is set to swear in an emergency government on Sunday at 1 p.m. (1000 GMT) that will bring an end to a U.S.-led aid embargo.

Prime Minister-designate Salam Fayyad has selected 14 ministers to serve in his cabinet, officials said. Hamas says the cabinet's appointment amounts to a coup.

Abbas sacked a Hamas-led unity government after Islamist forces routed Fatah in the Gaza Strip and began imposing a new order and making key security appointments.

Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri said 150 Hamas supporters were "abducted" in the occupied West Bank in what he called acts of "real terrorism" by Fatah forces there. "We will not stand handcuffed against these crimes in the West Bank. We will take all steps to secure an end to these crimes," he said.

The U.S. consul-general who handles relations with the Palestinians said Washington would lift a ban on direct financial aid to the new emergency government, clearing the way for the European Union and Israel to follow suit.

"There won't be any obstacles economically and politically in terms of re-engaging with this government ... They will have full support," Jacob Walles told Reuters after meeting Abbas at his West Bank headquarters in Ramallah, near Jerusalem.

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Hamas will have no chance of repeating this show in the West bank. for one thing the Israelis are still occupying the West bank and can destroy the Hamas forces if they tried such an act. It appears that Abbas is well on his way to doing that already with a purge of known Hamas supporters.