Careful calmness dominated the Gaza City on Monday following Sunday's violent armed clashes between Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) militants and Palestinian police forces.

Palestinian security apparatuses were on alert on Monday and mounted security and police guards' presence around police headquarters and security departments in the Gaza Strip in fear of retaliatory actions.

Police and security forces patrols were seen mobilized on vehicles driving all over the City, where the Palestinian Interior Ministry said that it insists to continue with its campaign of ending all acts and phenomena of arming.

Sources in Hamas movement said that several militants opened fire early Monday morning at homes of several Hamas leaders, including Mahmoud al-Zahhar, Hamas prominent leader in Gaza.

The Palestinian highest following-up committee of Islamic and national factions condemned on Monday what happened in Gaza on Sunday, considering it as "an awful crime".

The committee has issued a statement following a series of meetings held at the house of Palestinian Lawmaker Ziad Abu Amer, saying "we are loose out respect by the world and make our enemy happy for what we have."

The statement called on the conflicting parties to stop as immediate as possible, urging that militants should keep their arms hidden.

It also called on civilians, mainly women and children not to gather or crowd before any kind of confrontations in the neighborhoods in the towns and villages.

After the meeting, Ibrahim Abu Najja, head of the committee told reporters early Monday that "when we heard the news that a police station was attacked and burned, we felt very painful."

Sami Abu Zuhri, a Hamas movement's spokesman, held the Palestinian police forces responsible for the clash, saying "the police officers who initiated the shooting at Hamas people."

Samir Mashharwai, a senior member of the ruling Fatah movement, told reporters that Hamas movement had plans in advance to carry out such actions, open fire at the police and cause internal conflict among the Palestinians.

Efforts were made overnight and Monday morning, while concerned parties managed to convince the militants and the police to halt shooting and use dialogue instead of fighting.

Source: Xinhua