GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip – The Palestinian intelligence chief, an ally of moderate President Mahmoud Abbas, was seriously wounded by a bomb packed with metal pellets at his headquarters Saturday in what security officials called an assassination attempt.
There was no claim of responsibility for the attack on Palestinian intelligence chief, Tareq Abu Rajab, a top official in Abbas' Fatah movement. But the explosion in an elevator shaft of the heavily guarded compound in Gaza City came at a time of growing friction between Abbas and the Hamas-led government over control of the security forces.
Fatah did not openly accuse Hamas, but Abu Rajab's deputy did not rule out the Islamic militant group's involvement.
Later in the day, the Israeli army fired missiles at a car in Gaza City, killing at least two Hamas militants and wounding five people, the army and Palestinian officials said. The car was traveling near the house of Hamas' Foreign Minister Mahmoud Zahar when it was targeted. The bodies were completely burned and could not immediately be identified
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