Mere Rhetoric: Palestinian Non-Civil War Watch - Hamas In Control Of Gaza, "This Is the First Step In the Establishment Of An Islamic State"

* Happy Thursday:

Hamas members held a prayer in the compound, which they referred to as the "heresy compound." Hamas also changed the name of the neighborhood where the building is located from "Tel al-Hawa" to "Tel al-Islam." Hamas' media outlets threatened to reach Fatah and the PA's official radio and telelvision stations, and provided the names of senior Fatah officials they planned to execute. "We will reach you," Hamas members told the Fatah leaders... "This is the first step in the establishment of the Islamic state," a Hamas member told Ynet from inside the Preventive Security Service building. "This is Islam's victory, Allah's victory, and we pray to Allah for brining us this victory."

If there are any Hamas members in the West Bank, we have a feeling that these most recent threats may well have cost them their lives.

* Hamas took over Fatah's Preventative Security HQ - or, as we like to call it, Fatah's filled-from-wall-to-wall-with-Western-weapons-and-armor Preventative Security HQ - killing at least 14 people along the way.

Hamas gunmen were bringing Preventive Security men out of the building and executing them in the street. Soon after, the southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah also fell to Hamas fighters, Fatah-allied security officials and witnesses said. As the key security command was taken over, aides said that Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas gave his first order to his elite presidential guard to strike back against Hamas rivals. The coup de grace to Fatah sovereignty occurred a day after 35 Palestinians were killed in factional fighting in the Gaza Strip.

The rest of that JPost article is some of the purest "they're totally batshit crazy" copy we've read in a while. Make sure you get to the part where they're going to transform Abbas's old office into a mosque - and remind yourself, this is what the popularly elected Palestinian government did with the land given to them to start a state.

* Fatah-allied clan in Gaza surrenders to Hamas - That would be thousands of people and about 200 armed men. Part of that surrender involved this outrage, which will soon to be forgotten in a wave of diplomatic calls to negotiate with Hamas:

On Wednesday afternoon, Hamas forces entered the area and led hundreds of men, women and children, their hands raised behind their heads, to a nearby mosque, said local resident, Nael Ghoben. Witnesses reported that after the surrender, two Bakr women tried to leave the area and take a sick girl to a hospital, and were shot on the street by Hamas gunmen.

* 40 Fatah men cross into Egypt, fleeing Gaza factional fighting - Egyptian weapons go into Gaza, Gazans who are supposed to use them go into Egypt. What happens to the weapons is best left to the imagination and to silence in the context of future requests for security aid.

References:
* Hamas TV: We'll execute Fatah leaders [YNet]
* At least 14 killed in battle for last Fatah stronghold in Strip [JPost]
* Hamas takes fight to Gaza City; 27 killed in clashes
* Fatah-allied clan in Gaza surrenders to Hamas [JPost]
* 40 Fatah men cross into Egypt, fleeing Gaza factional fighting [Ha'aretz=

Previously:
* Palestinian Non-Civil War Watch - Insanity (Updated: Content Warning)
* Palestinian Non-Civil War Watch - Fatah Soldiers Trying To Kill Hamas Prime Minister (Updated and Bumped: Hamas Militarily Conquering Gaza, Abbas Calls It A "Coup")
* Palestinian Non-Civil War Watch (Bonus: It's the Jews' Fault. Of Course It Is)