One killed in Fatah-Hamas clash in Gaza

GAZA, Mar 11 (Reuters) A Hamas gunman was killed and one was wounded in a shootout with the rival Fatah group in the Gaza Strip today, officials from both Palestinian factions said.

It was the first fatality in such fighting since leaders of the two sides reached a Saudi-sponsored agreement to form a national unity govenment a month ago.

Each side blamed the other for starting the firefight in the town of Beit Hanoun in the northern part of the coastal strip.

Officials of the Hamas-controlled police said Fatah gunmen in a car had fired on a car carrying a leading Hamas armed activist, killing him and a companion.

Fatah spokesman Abdel-Halim Awad accused gunmen of the ruling Islamist Hamas movement of ambushing members of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, which is linked to President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah faction.

He said Hamas fighters were attacking a Fatah office in Beit Hanoun with rocket-propelled grenades.

Residents said gunfire and explosions were echoing across the town as the Fatah office and a separate Fatah security complex came under mortar fire.

Fatah and Hamas have been negotiating details of a unity government since their February 8 agreement in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, halted weeks of bloody faction fighting centred on the Gaza Strip, where more than 90 people were killed.

The man killed in today's shootout was identified as Mohammad al-Kafarna, a senior Hamas militant and member of the group's Executive Force. Residents said three people had been wounded in the clash, including one Hamas and two Fatah gunmen.

Awad, the Fatah spokesman, said contacts had been made with Hamas to try to halt the fighting, which erupted just hours after Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas said a unity government would be announced in the next few days.

Reuters DKS VP0502