PA police officers destroy parliament

[drdon326]

For the second day running, Palestinian Authority security officers demonstrated in the Gaza Strip in protest against PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas's decision to reconstruct the dozen or so Palestinian security services.

Thursday's protest turned violent when hundreds of officers belonging to the PA's Military Intelligence Force went on the rampage inside the Palestinian Legislative Council building and exchanged gunfire with policemen in Gaza City.

snip

PA officials in Ramallah accused the ousted commander of Military Intelligence, Gen. Musa Arafat, of standing behind the unrest. Gen. Arafat, a cousin of Yasser Arafat, was dismissed from his post two months ago.

According to one official, Gen. Arafat has since been inciting his followers against the PA leadership. "He still hasn't come to terms with the fact that he was sacked," he added.

Eyewitnesses said at least 600 officers and masked gunmen belonging to the ruling Fatah party marched in the streets of Gaza City, chanting slogans against Abbas and his interior minister, Gen. Nasser Youssef.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1117678730510

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Abbas seems to have his finger.......on the pulse of his people.:eyes:

[leveymg]

1. To read the WashPo, Abbas is universally beloved by his people.

The winds of democracratic change are blowing . . . or so it goes.:bounce:

[Jack Rabbit]

2. The headline is a bit misleading (that's not your fault, Doc)

And I am shocked -- shocked, I say -- that in its coverage of Palestinian affairs the Jerusalem Post would try to mislead its readers.

I fail to see in the article how Parliament was "destroyed" by the demonstrators. There was some vandalism, which does not sound minor, and business was disrupted, assuming there was any going on at the time (the article doesn't say). However, this hardly compares to the Spanish franquistas' attempt to reinstate fascism by seizing the Cortes in 1981 or the Reichstag fire in 1933.

I would be more concerned if the demonstrators are not arrested and charged with damaging public property. The article doesn't say whether or not they have been detained; I don't know whether they haven't been or whether they have and JPost just didn't feel it necessary to report it. Neither would surprise me.

[drdon326]

3. Well.....

when hundreds of officers belonging to the PA's Military Intelligence Force went on the rampage inside the Palestinian Legislative Council building and exchanged gunfire with policemen in Gaza City.

Sounds like a lovely rampage.

[Jack Rabbit]

4. The JPost makes it sound like a serious matter

However, is there anything in that article that says if it needs to that Parliament cannot meet today? How extensive was the damage?

I can't find this on the BBC, the Lebanon Daily Star, Haaretz or al-Jazeera. I even looked on Electronic Intifada. Was this really a significant event?