Ex-Fatah official named in Libya arms deal

RAMALLAH, West Bank, April 6 (UPI) -- Fatah is investigating reports former Palestinian security chief Mohammed Dahlan supplied Israeli-made weapons to Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi.

"The committee will take measures that suit the size of these allegations," The Jerusalem Post quoted a Fatah spokesman saying. The spokesman noted the Fatah Central Committee had already suspended Dahlan's membership because of "political and organizational trespasses."

Rebel forces battling the Libyan leader said they seized Israeli arms smuggled into the country and named Dahlan a suspect, the Ma'an news agency reported Tuesday.

The Algerian newspaper al-Shuruq, which first reported the affair, said Dahlan was one of a number of Palestinians "involved in a deal to supply weapons from Israel to Moammar Gadhafi," the British weekly Middle East Monitor said.

Al-Shuruq, quoting Libyan dissident Omar el-Khadraoui, said a Greek ship transferred the weapons, the Monitor reported.

"The former leader of the Fatah movement, Mohammed Dahlan, and someone known as Muhammad Rashid, a Kurd from Iraq whose real name is Khalid Salam and who used to be an adviser to the late Yasser Arafat, are behind a deal to supply internationally proscribed weapons to Colonel Gadhafi who uses them to shell civilians in Misurata in western Libya," the Monitor quoted a cable from el-Khadraoui as saying.

Dahlan denied the allegations, Ma'an said.

A Fatah Central Committee spokesman told the Palestinian agency it is against Fatah's principles and the Palestinian people's interests to interfere in the internal affairs of other countries. The spokesman also said Salam is not a member of Fatah.