MOSCOW, August 15 (RIA Novosti) - Hamas said on Saturday violence between Hamas security forces and radical groups, which killed 22 people and injured around 150 overnight, was now under control.
The fighting erupted after Abdel-Latif Moussa, the leader of an Islamic group, announced the Palestinian enclave to be an "Islamic emirate" and called for stricter Islamic laws during prayers Friday in a mosque in the southern town of Rafah.
Moussa is believed to have died when an explosive belt that he was wearing detonated in the mosque, where he had been holed up along with dozens of other armed members of radical group Army of Allah.
A representative of the health ministry in Gaza, said 22 people, including six police officers and an 11-year-old girl, had been killed in the violence, which also injured over 150 people.
Ihab Hussein, a Hamas interior ministry spokesman, said the operation in Rafah was now over.
Unlike the Army of Allah, Hamas bills itself as a more pragmatic political force seeking a Palestinian statehood, rather than a global jihad. The group seized control of Gaza, ousting President Abbas's Fatah movement in a bloody five-day war in June 2007.
