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Horrifying video footage captures what appears to be an attempted assassination on Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
The president’s convoy came under a hail of gunfire after he disregarded a menacing ultimatum from renegade Palestinian security forces, urging him to declare war on Israel.
Abbas holds the position of Chairman of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, or PLO, which governs the West Bank territory. Notably, the Palestine Authority president does not endorse the terrorist group Hamas, which controls the besieged Gaza Strip.
Local media reported that
“one of Abbas’ bodyguards was shot, and the attack was claimed by the organization known as ‘Sons of Abu Jandal.'”
This group is alleged to have operated within the Palestinian security establishment in the West Bank. They had previously given President Abbas a 24-hour ultimatum to initiate hostilities against Israel following Israel’s military actions in Gaza, a separate Palestinian territory.
If the attack indeed targeted the president’s life, it signifies an escalation in internal conflicts among Palestinian factions.
International media has shared graphic footage suggesting that a bodyguard was fatally shot while the remaining individuals engaged in a firefight against the attackers.
The ambush strike is believed to be a possible assassination attempt, as reported by the Turkish outlet Turkiye Newspaper.
According to the report, “Sons of Abu Jandal” claimed responsibility for the attack, and it is alleged that this group operates within the Palestinian security establishment in the West Bank.
Previously, the same group had given President Abbas a 24-hour ultimatum to initiate a conflict against Israel following Israel’s military actions in Gaza, a separate Palestinian territory.
The ‘Son of Abu Jandal’ has ordered the president to declare a “global war against the Zionist occupation”.
It comes just a day after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken took his diplomatic push on the Israel-Hamas war to the occupied West Bank on Sunday, trying to assure Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas that the Biden administration was intensifying efforts to ease the plight of Gaza’s civilians and insisting that Palestinians must have a main say in whatever comes next for the territory after the conflict.
Blinken’s meeting with Abbas in the West Bank came on the same day that Israeli planes bombed two refugee camps in Gaza, killing at least 53 people, according to health officials in Gaza. An Associated Press reporter saw the dead bodies of eight children brought in to a nearby Gaza hospital after one of those strikes.
Israel’s military announced its forces had effectively split the Gaza Strip in two before an expected escalated assault on Hamas targets in the north.
As word spread of Blinken’s arrival in Ramallah, Palestinians turned out to protest US support for Israel’s war. Demonstrators held signs showing dripping blood and with messages that included, “Blinken blood is on your hands.”
Neither Blinken nor Abbas spoke as they greeted each other in front of cameras and their meeting ended without any public comment.
The Palestinian Authority administers semiautonomous areas of the Israeli-occupied West Bank. It has not been a factor in the Gaza Strip since 2007, when Hamas seized control after winning in elections there a year earlier. Abbas himself is unpopular among Palestinians.
Blinken said in Baghdad that the Palestinian Authority “is playing a very important role right now in the West Bank in trying to keep stability there. That’s hugely important because no one wants another front in the West Bank or anywhere else, and they’re really stepping up under very difficult conditions to do the necessary work.”
He said that “what we all agree” is that in shaping a future for Gaza, the West Bank and “ultimately” for a Palestinian state, “Palestinian voices have to be at the center of that. The Palestinian Authority is the representative of those voices so it’s important that it play a leading role.’’
Abbas, however, said the Palestinian Authority would only assume power in Gaza as part of a “comprehensive political solution” to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, according to the Palestinians’ official WAFA news agency. He also condemned Israel’s bombardment of Gaza as a “genocidal war” and urged Blinken “to immediately stop them from committing such crimes,” the news agency reported.
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Featured image: An organized attempt to assassinate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas took place on Tuesday (Image: X)
