Hamas has accused its rival Fatah party of souring the atmosphere, saying the forces enlisted with the Ramallah-based party collaborate with Israel.

The forces functioning under Fatah’s leader, Mahmoud Abbas, are working "in close coordination with those of the Israeli occupation" in the occupied West Bank, Hamas said on Monday, AFP reported.

On Sunday, gunmen with the Palestinian Authority (PA), which is similarly headed by Abbas, stormed the house of Hamas parliamentarian Fathi al-Qarawi, capturing his son and confiscating computers.

The arrest campaign “against symbols of national action and representatives of the Palestinian people is poisoning the atmosphere," the Gaza-based resistance movement said.

Hamas won the Palestinian parliamentary elections in 2006, but since a major dispute with Fatah in 2007, it only rules in the Gaza Strip.

The captures were "raising new obstacles to Palestinian national reconciliation," the movement noted.

Such actions "prove Mahmoud Abbas is not serious in wanting to achieve a reconciliation," it noted.

Earlier in the year, PA security forces arrested a number of Hamas members, accusing them of being involved in the death of four Israelis in the West Bank city of al-Khalil (Hebron).

Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhum described the arrests as a “criminal campaign” and "national treason," calling for the detainees’ immediate release.

(Press TV)