Hamas urged the world's media on Monday to publicize what its leader called the suffering of the people of Gaza under an international embargo, after a tour for journalists aimed at showing the Islamists had brought peace.

"Gaza today is better," Ismail Haniyeh, still calling himself Palestinian Authority prime minister, told dozens of foreign reporters who joined a bus tour of the coastal enclave that took in a prison, a church, border posts and security installations...

...The former deputy speaker of the Palestinian parliament said human rights were secure - and condemned a brief seizure of West Bank newspapers by officials in Gaza earlier in the day.

Manuel Musallam, a priest, told reporters at his church that Hamas was "not a religious movement" hostile to the Christian minority but a "political movement" dedicated to the Palestinian people. "I am the best friend of Mr. Haniyeh," he added...

Hamas militiamen on Monday prevented the distribution of three Fatah-affiliated newspapers in the Gaza Strip and briefly detained the local agents of the dailies.

This is the first time that the newspapers, published in the West Bank, were prevented from distribution in the Gaza Strip.

Palestinian journalists said thousands of copies from the three newspapers were seized by Hamas's paramilitary Executive Force on the Palestinian side of the Erez border crossing. The newspapers were taken aboard a truck to a Hamas security installation nearby in the town of Beit Hanan.

According to the journalists, six Palestinians working for the newspapers were detained by Hamas for questioning. Two of them, Hatem Kishawi and Samir Jaber, work for the Fatah-controlled Al-Ayyam, which serves as a mouthpiece for the Palestinian Authority. The other four work for the PA-funded Al-Hayat Al-Jadeeda and Al-Quds, a pro-Fatah newspaper owned by a family from east Jerusalem...

..."Of course we're afraid," said a local journalist. "Hamas does not accept criticism. If you write something that they don't like, you will get into trouble. Unfortunately, the situation wasn't much better when Fatah was here. Both of them don't respect the freedom of the media."...