Hamas aired purported confessions on Saturday that it said proved Palestinian rivals had plotted to kill Hamas leader in the Gaza Strip. However, aides to President Mahmoud Abbas dismissed the allegations as lies produced under torture.
"I was told that if I blew myself up against ... Haniyeh, they would take care of my family," a young man named as Ahmed al-Dbaki and described as a would-be suicide bomber said in a film clip shown at a televised Hamas news conference in Gaza.
Among nine others whose edited video statements were screened to journalists by Hamas' security chief, one described as a senior security officer for Fatah faction spoke fluently for several minutes of how he oversaw a plot to kill Ismail Haniyeh. "I was ordered to form an armed cell to strike the Hamas movement," the man, named as Hassan al-Zant, said, according to Reuters. "I was instructed to find a martyr to carry out the task."
Other detainees were younger and appeared hesitant.
Saeed Siyam, a former interior minister who now runs security forces in Gaza, accused senior presidential aide Tayeb Abdel-Rahim and Abbas' intelligence chief Tawfiq Tirawi. "This dirty crime was plotted at the highest level of leadership within the Palestinian Authority," Seyam said. "It proved they did not want dialogue and wanted civil war when they planned to kill an official like Ismail Haniyeh."
