Middle East: UN secretary general Kofi Annan yesterday expressed doubt over the findings of an Israeli military probe determining that an Israeli shell was not the cause of a blast that killed seven Palestinian civilians on a Gaza beach last Friday.
A military expert working for Human Rights Watch also contested the Israeli assertions, saying "all the evidence" pointed to an Israeli shell having caused it.
In comments published in the London-based al-Hayat daily, Mr Annan described Israel's version of events as "strange".
The Israeli military team investigating the explosion announced its findings on Tuesday, asserting the blast was either the result of an explosive device placed by Palestinian militants in the sand, or "some form of unexploded ordinance". (One possibility was that the blast had been caused by an old, unexploded Israeli shell.)
The head of the Israeli investigation, Maj Gen Meir Kalifi, said tests conducted on shrapnel removed from a Palestinian girl injured in the blast and being treated in an Israeli hospital, proved that an Israeli shell had not caused the injuries.
But Marc Garlasco, of Human Rights Watch, who inspected the scene of the blast, said Israeli shelling was "the likeliest cause".
Mr Garlasco, a former battle-damage assessment officer for the Pentagon, said shrapnel collected from the scene, as well as X-rays of Palestinians wounded in the blast, had led him to conclude an Israeli 155mm shell had been the cause of the explosion.
He could not determine, he said, whether the shell had been fired by an Israeli gun or whether it had been buried in the sand.
He said Human Rights Watch was calling for "an independent investigation, since the Israelis are not here to investigate and the Palestinians are incapable of doing it technologically".
In Gaza, Palestinian sources said President Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas prime minister Ismail Haniyeh agreed to incorporate a Hamas militia into the Palestinian Authority security forces.
The creation of the militia, which has deployed on the streets of Gaza, has sparked several weeks of bloody clashes between Hamas and Mr Abbas's Fatah faction, which largely controls the security forces.
But despite the Abbas-Haniyeh talks, internal violence continued. A Hamas gunman was killed in southern Gaza yesterday in clashes that ensued after militants from the Islamic group attacked the commander of a Palestinian police force.
In Ramallah, civil servants stormed the parliament building in protest over non-payment of their salaries by the Hamas-led government, which has been facing a boycott by western countries since winning elections in January.
The civil servants, who have not been paid for several months, disrupted parliament, hurling water bottles at Hamas law-makers. Hamas officials accused Fatah of starting the riot.
Hamas's desperate search for funding was vividly illustrated yesterday by scenes at the Gaza border where foreign minister Mahmoud Zahar returned home from a trip to Muslim countries with four suitcases containing a total of $20 million (€16 million).
Palestinian officials said Mr Zahar, a Hamas leader, transferred the money to the treasury.