Hamas has accused the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority of caving to Israel after PA security personnel arrested hundreds of terrorists in Judea and Samaria.
“Power and occupation are two sides of the same coin. Stop betrayal,” read banners waved by protesters at a rally organized Tuesday by Gaza’s ruling Hamas terrorist group. “Political arrests and power are a stigma on the forehead of its president.”
The rally was organized to protest the security sweep conducted by Palestinian Authority security officials throughout Judea and Samaria over the past several weeks.
Mushir al-Masri, an organizer of the rally, said the arrests were a failed attempt by PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas to “eliminate the resistance.”
He warned the campaign of political arrests and security coordination “with the occupation” signaled a “blow to reconciliation efforts” in the ongoing but largely fruitless move to create a so-called “unity government” between the two factions.
Since the beginning of June, more than 200 members of Hamas have been arrested in Judea and Samaria, according to the Gaza-based terror group.
In addition, at least 40 Hamas operatives were arrested by the Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) earlier this month in a separate sting that foiled an attempt to set up a parallel shadow government aimed at toppling the Ramallah-based PA government led by Abbas’s Fatah faction.