Palestinian mob storms court

JERUSALEM - Rising internal tensions among the Palestinians of the West Bank exploded yesterday when a large mob, led by members of the security forces, smashed their way into a military court and murdered three defendants.

The three men, two of them teenagers, had been found guilty of the revenge killing of a Palestinian security officer when their killers - disguised as police who were supposed to be guarding the court - burst in and shot them dead in the court's lavatories, where police had hidden them.

The gunmen dragged their corpses onto the streets while shooting in the air in triumph.

The killings, in the northern West Bank town of Jenin, occurred after the mob heard the court had commuted death sentences against two of the men. The roots of the crowd's fury lies in a blood feud within one Palestinian clan.

"This proves the lack of a working judiciary in areas under the Palestinian Authority," said Bassem Eid, of the Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group.

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