The Palestinian president and prime minister, locked in a violent power struggle, agreed in an emergency meeting yesterday to pull back their forces, after a senior security commander and six of his bodyguards were killed in one of the bloodiest battles in weeks of internal fighting.
Thursday's violence in Gaza -- along with an Israeli raid in the West Bank that killed four Palestinian civilians -- prompted Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas and President Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah to hold late-night talks, despite the angry accusations the two have traded in recent weeks.
"We are going to end all armed displays in the streets," Haniyeh said after the meeting.
Abbas had no comment.
Previous truce deals quickly collapsed, though, because of the political deadlock. The Islamic militant Hamas controls the government, but the moderate Abbas wields power as a separately elected president.
The meeting came several hours after Colonel Mohammed Ghayeb, head of the Abbas-allied Preventive Security Service in northern Gaza, was killed when Hamas gunmen assaulted his home with home-made rockets and grenades. The killing of the officer was likely to spark reprisal raids.
Ghayeb was on the phone to Palestine TV just moments before his death and appealed for help.
"They are killers," he said of the Hamas gunmen.
"They are targeting the house, children are dying, they are bleeding. For God's sake, send an ambulance, we want an ambulance, somebody move," he said.
The battle outside the house raged for much of the day, leaving eight dead -- Ghayeb, six of his bodyguards and one Hamas gunman. About three dozen people, including eight children and Ghayeb's wife, were wounded.
Yesterday morning, hundreds gathered outside Ghayeb's battered two-story house, its walls blackened and pocked with bullet holes, ahead of a funeral procession for the seven dead Fatah men.
In several places in the West Bank late Thursday, Fatah militants attacked Hamas offices and vehicles. One Hamas activist was wounded, Palestinian security officials said.
Earlier Thursday, Israeli forces entered the West Bank town of Ramallah, the first major army raid since Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Abbas had agreed two weeks earlier to try to ease tensions between the sides.
The two-hour raid, accompanied by heavy gun battles, turned downtown Ramallah into a battlefield with dozens of cars smashed and vegetable carts overturned. Four Palestinians were killed and 20 wounded in the fighting. The Israelis eventually left after detaining four suspects.
According to Israeli security officials, the government did not know ahead of time about the Ramallah raid, which was supposed to be a routine arrest operation and so did not have to be approved by the defense minister. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
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