GAZA, Feb 6 (Reuters) - Palestinian gunmen opened fire on a car in Gaza City on Tuesday, killing a Hamas commander and wounding three other group members, hospital officials said. Hamas officials accused gunmen from Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah faction of opening fire at the vehicle from a checkpoint near a heavily-guarded security complex and the residence of Fatah strongman Mohammed Dahlan. A Fatah spokesman, Abdel-Hakim Awad, denied any involvement in the shooting. Factional warfare has persisted in the Gaza Strip despite a truce called at the weekend in anticipation of talks hosted by Saudi Arabia, between Abbas and Damascus-based Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal, over a possible unity government. More than 90 Palestinians have been killed in the internal clashes which escalated in December, when Abbas proposed holding early elections after the breakdown of talks to forge a joint government with Hamas. Abbas, a moderate whose presidential guard receives U.S.-funded training and non-lethal equipment, said of his talks in Mecca he would give negotiations one last chance to form a coalition government with Hamas. Tensions have spiralled in the Gaza Strip since Hamas, an Islamist group whose charter calls for Israel's destruction, trounced Fatah in elections last year, prompting the West to suspend aid unless it moderates its stand.
