FASCIST PALESTINIANS EXECUTE 12

Twelve suspected collaborators are killed in W. Bank

By Amira Hass and Amos Harel




Masked gunmen killed 11 suspected Palestinian collaborators who were under arrest in Palestinian Authority jails in three separate West Bank towns. Eight were killed in Tul Karm, two in Qalqiliyah, and one in Beit Jala. In Bethlehem, another man was pulled from his car and killed in front of a Reuters news team, which was then threatened by the gunmen and forced to hand over the tape. Reuters has complained to the Palestinian Authority.

Palestinian jailers abandoned their posts in Tul Karm and Qalqiliyah yesterday as soon as it became clear that the IDF planned to occupy those towns. The gunmen broke into the prisons without facing any challenge.

A Palestinian officer in Tul Karm told Ha'aretz that about a dozen masked and armed men broke into the jails under control of the National Intelligence forces in the city. They killed the eight suspects and dragged their bodies through the streets of the city before hundreds of people who gathered for the spectacle. IDF sources say they considered using a helicopter to fire warning shots to disperse the crowds, but by the time they decided to do so, the incident was over. After the bodies were dragged through the streets, they were hung in the central square in the town. The names of the eight have not been fully clarified.

According to the officer, the gunmen would have managed to break into the prison and kill the eight even if the jailers had not abandoned their posts. "We have total anarchy here," he said, "and nobody can prevent such acts of murder." Not all eight had been put on trial, he said, and none were considered major collaborators. He said that immediately after the eight were killed, ambulances tried to evacuate the bodies, but the gunmen prevented this. Only one leading family in town, managed to capture the body of one of its relatives and take it to the cemetery for burial. An hour before the IDF tanks began rolling into the city, the bodies were collected, but it was not known if they were actually buried yet.

Three masked men yesterday murdered a Bethlehem man, suspected of collaboration. A Reuters TV crew was on hand and filmed the incident but afterward the three masked men threatened the crew and confiscated the video cassette. According to military sources, the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a Tanzim-Fatah-affiliated terrorist group claimed responsibility for the assassination.

In Qalqiliyah, two bodies of suspected collaborators were found in the city. The governor of the town, Mustafa Al Malki, issued a warning to the public against "taking the law into your own hands" and said the two men were due to stand trial in a military court when the investigations into their suspected activities was completed.