By Xinhua
Ramallah : Israeli police arrested an aide to acting Palestinian Primer Minister Salam Fayyad in northern Jerusalem on Tuesday morning, Palestinian sources said.
Fayyad’s advisor on Jerusalem affairs, Hatem Abdel Qader, was arrested when he left home at Sha’fat suburb in northern Jerusalem and was taken to an Israeli interrogation facility in the holy city, the sources said.
On Monday night, Abdel Qader presided over a meeting, announcing the formation of a reform council to tackle “several phenomena of violations,” according to the sources.
During the meeting, he urged clannish powers not to deal with Israeli police in the occupied city, but the new council instead.
Meanwhile, Israeli troops arrested 14 Palestinians in the West Bank, Palestinian security sources said, giving a breakdown of the arrests that nine Palestinians were taken away from Nablus city, four in Hebron and one in Ramallah.
Israeli radio said that the detainees were wanted by Israeli army for security reasons.
Israeli army also detained five money changers and confiscated money of 14 West Bank exchange houses with an estimated sum of 850,000 U.S. dollars, the sources said.
Israeli radio said the targeted exchange offices were suspected of transferring money to Palestinian armed groups and funding terror acts.
Separately, security forces loyal to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas arrested 11 members of rival Islamic Hamas movement in the West Bank, according to Hamas.