Israeli troops have killed a fighter belonging to the Fatah movement of Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, in a raid in the city of Nablus in the West Bank.

An Israeli army spokesman confirmed that troops operating in the Balata refugee camp shot two armed men.

The Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, Fatah's armed wing, said the fighter who was killed, Yusuf al-Asi, had belonged to their group.

Israeli soldiers also detained Ayman Mabrouk, a third fighter, after he was injured in the Beit al-Maa refugee camp in Nablus.

The Israeli raid has signalled that Tel Aviv is prepared to continue to pursue Fatah fighters, despite its pledges to bolster Abbas as he tries to consolidate his hold in the West Bank.

In a previous raid in June, Salam Fayyad, the Palestinian prime minister, accused Israel of trying to undermine Abbas's Western-backed emergency cabinet despite the Palestinian leader's vow to take his own steps to disarm fighters.

Bomb 'defused'

Meanwhile, a Hamas-led security force has said that it found a bomb outside the parliament building in the Gaza Strip.

Islam Shahwan, a spokesman for Hamas' Executive Force said: "We have thwarted a bombing attack against the parliament headquarters."

He said the bomb contained 15kg of explosives and was placed at the gate of the parliamentary compound.

"The engineering unit of the Executive Force defused the device.

The Executive force is searching for the perpetrators."

PHOTO CAPTION

Palestinian gunmen from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PLFP) shoot in the air during a rally to mark the 6th anniversary of the assassination of Abu Ali Mustafa, the former leader of the PFLP, in the West Bank city of Nablus, Sunday, Sept. 2, 2007. (AP)

Al-Jazeera