Hamas preacher’s death in Ramallah to be probed

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas opened an investigation into the death of a Hamas preacher who the Islamist group said was tortured by Fatah security services in a Palestinian Authority-run prison in Ramallah, officials said on Saturday.

Hamas Islamists have accused security agents from Abbas's Fatah faction of torturing to death imam Majed al-Barghouthi, a local Hamas leader.

Abbas's security force said on Friday that Barghouthi had died of a stroke. The 45-year-old father of nine had been detained for a week before his death.

President Abbas has demanded the attorney general investigate into the issue and give a report as soon as possible," the official WAFA news agency said.

Meanwhile a group of Palestinian MPs called for an independent investigation into Barghouti’s death.

"We as members of the Palestinian Legislative Council... have initiated an investigative committee to look into the real reason for the death of Majed al-Barghouti," MP Bassam al-Salhi told a news conference in Ramallah.

The group is composed of MPs from several smaller Palestinian factions and does not include any members the Hamas movement the rival Fatah party

A Hamas spokesman blamed Fatah for the death. "We consider this a grave event that reflects the ugly crimes Abbas's forces commit against Hamas," the faction's spokesman, Sami Abu Zuhri, said in Gaza.

On Friday, members of the Barghouthi clan closed a major West Bank road near Ramallah, rioted and set ablaze tires in protest at the death.

Tension between Hamas and Fatah has increased since the Islamists took control of the Gaza Strip in a brief but bloody civil war in June. Fatah still holds sway in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

Fatah officials accuse Hamas of torturing Fatah detainees in the Gaza Strip.

Barghouthi's death is the first case of a detainee dying in the custody of Palestinian security forces since Hamas took control of Gaza.