Fatah says Hamas arresting its men in Gaza

[oberliner]

GAZA, June 6 (Reuters) - Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's faction accused Hamas Islamists on Saturday of arresting some 150 Fatah activists in Gaza, in apparent retaliation for raids that killed four Hamas men in the West Bank this week.

Fahmi al-Zarir, a spokesman for Western-backed Fatah in the occupied West Bank, said Hamas had made the arrests since Friday. He said some men were being held in schools and hotels in the Gaza Strip, territory the Islamists seized in 2007 from Fatah.

Hamas officials declined any comment, but a statement posted on Hamas's Interior Ministry website said "some" Palestinians loyal to Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, a Fatah-backed leader, were arrested as suspected informers for Israel.

The arrests came days after four Hamas men and a civilian died in deadly raids by Abbas's Western-backed security forces against Hamas Islamists in the West Bank town of Qalqilya.

http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSL6236035