Fatah says Hamas 'courting Palestinian civil war'

Mehdi Lebouachera
AFP

------------------------------------------------------------------------GAZA CITY --  The Fatah party of Mahmoud Abbas accused Hamas on Saturday of courting civil war, as relations between the moderate Palestinian leader and the government hit crisis point less than a month after the radical Islamists took power.

The war of words spilled over into violence later in the day, when some 15 people were wounded as student supporters of the two factions hurled stones at each other in Gaza City.

However, Fatah and Hamas leaders planned on meeting Saturday night in order to pull the sides back from the brink.

As tensions mounted, Fatah accused Hamas supremo Khaled Meshaal of being hysterical for saying on Friday, in a thinly veiled reference to Abbas, that the Palestinian president was part of a plot to remove Hamas from power.

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