Former Palestinian Security Chief Assassinated

A former Palestinian security chief who was a cousin of Yasser Arafat was dragged from his Gaza home and shot dead by militants today.

Moussa Arafat was shot outside his four-storey home in Gaza City after a half-hour battle between the militants and a dozen bodyguards.

The masked attackers blew off the gate to the 65-year-old's home before dawn, exchanging gunfire with the bodyguards.

Arafat had been Gaza's security chief until he was demoted to the role of military adviser by the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, several months ago.

Mr Abbas vowed to catch the killers, but questions were immediately raised about his ability to enforce law and order.

The military-style assassination, which happened just a block away from the headquarters of Gaza's preventive security service, is a challenge to the power of the Palestinian Authority.

It happened just over a week before Israel is due to complete its withdrawal from the Gaza Strip.

The Popular Resistance Committees, a hardline group made up of former members of the ruling Fatah party and elements of the extremist groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad, claimed responsibility for the killing.

Spokesman Mohammed Abdel Al told the Associated Press that Arafat and his son Manhal - who was kidnapped during the operation - had been targeted for their alleged corruption.

"Now we have huge files about corrupt deals by Arafat and his son, Manhal, who is being interrogated and confessed to some of these corrupt deals," the spokesman said. "We have implemented God's law."

Arafat was a target of previous assassination attempts, and always travelled in a heavily-guarded convoy, using an armoured limousine that had once transported Yasser Arafat.

The Palestinian cabinet minister Sufian Abu Zeideh said the killing was an attack on the government. "He [Arafat] was a symbol of the authority," he told Israel Army Radio.

Arafat was a founder of Fatah, and sat on the party's principal policy-making body, the revolutionary council.