Militants: Gaza headmaster killed in IAF strike was Jihad rocket-maker
By Reuters Last update - 17:52 05/05/2008
www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/980968.html

By day, Awad al-Qiq was a respected science teacher and headmaster at a
United Nations school in the Gaza Strip. By night, Palestinian militants
say, he built rockets for Islamic Jihad.

The Israel Air Force strike that killed the 33-year-old last week also laid
bare his apparent double life and embarrassed a UN agency which has long had
to rebuff Israeli accusations that it has aided and abetted Palestinian
militants.

In interviews with Reuters, students and colleagues, as well as UN
officials, denied any knowledge of Qiq's work with explosives. And his
family denied he had any militant links at all, despite a profusion of
Islamic Jihad posters at his home.

But militant leaders allied to the coastal strip's ruling Hamas group hailed
him as a martyr who led Islamic Jihad's "engineering unit" - its bomb
makers. They fired a salvo of improvised rockets into Israel in response to
his death.

Qiq's body was wrapped in an Islamic Jihad flag at his funeral, pictorial
posters in his honor still bedeck his family home this week, and a
handwritten notice posted on the metal gate at the entrance to the school
declared that Qiq, "the chief leader of the engineering unit", would now
find "paradise".

That poster was removed soon after Reuters visited the Rafah Prep Boys
School, run by the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian refugees.
Staff there said on Monday that UNRWA officials had told them not to discuss
Qiq's activities.

No one from the United Nations attended the funeral or has paid their
respects to the family, relatives said, adding that Qiq's widow and five
children had heard nothing about a pension.

Spokesman Christopher Gunness said UNRWA, which spelled its teacher's
surname al-Geeg, was looking into the matter.

"We have a zero-tolerance policy towards politics and militant activities in
our schools. Obviously, we are not the thought police and we cannot police
people's minds," he said.

He added that staff were also regularly instructed not to engage in
political or militant activities of any kind.

The Israel Defense Forces said the April 30 airstrike at Rafah, close to the
Egyptian border, hit a workshop used for making rockets and other improvised
weaponry. An Israeli intelligence source told Reuters that Qiq was involved
in developing rockets and mortars.

Yet Qiq, a physics graduate with eight years' experience of teaching at
UNRWA schools, was also described by colleagues as a rising star in
education. Relatives said he was promoted to run the school last year, with
the title of deputy headmaster.

Double Life

The case of Awad al-Qiq highlights the complexities of life among the 1.5
million people of the Gaza Strip, where close to half voted for Hamas in
2006. Hamas militants join Islamic Jihad in campaigns of rockets and suicide
bombing attacks on Israel.

Qiq's high profile as both a public figure and in the secret world is
unusual enough to cause considerable interest among those in Gaza who were
surprised by the funeral arrangements.

Israel's current blockade of the coastal strip, in response to Gaza
militants' rocket attacks on Israeli border communities, has set Israel and
UNRWA at odds. The agency, set up to care for Palestinian refugees, has
spoken out against what it calls collective punishment of civilians.

Israel has long alleged that militants use UNRWA vehicles and facilities.
The United Nations has denied those charges, although some UNRWA employees
have had prominent political roles in groups like Hamas - such as teacher
Saeed Seyam, who was interior minister in the Hamas-led government elected
in 2006.

Some Western officials say the agency, as one of the biggest employers in
the Gaza Strip, simply reflects the society it serves. But donors such as
the United States, which fund UNRWA's work, insist on vetting procedures to
ensure their cash does not reach groups they class as terrorists -- such as
Islamic Jihad.

While many in Gaza are open about political allegiances, the threat of the
kind of Israeli action that cost him his life on April 30 meant Qiq's double
role was kept very secret indeed.

Surrounded by Islamic Jihad mourning posters at the family home, his sister
Naima insisted: "He's only a teacher and head of the school. School was his
life. He had no time to work with Islamic Jihad." Other family members
nodded in agreement.

At the school, a 17-year-old who gave his name as Shadi read a poster for
his former teacher and said simply: "Nobody knew."

At the bombed-out workshop 3 km from the school, damaged cars can be seen
through now-locked gates. A 35-year-old man who gave his name as Abu
Mohammed said he had found Qiq dying inside after helicopters fired a
missile at the building.

"He was still alive, but he died shortly after," he said.

Relatives recalled with pride that Qiq had met John Ging, UNRWA's Gaza
operations director. But while fellow teachers had come to pay their
respects, they saw no UN representative.

Qiq's sister said his wife and five children were worried by the lack of
news on any pension payment: "Awad did a lot for UNRWA," she said. "The
family hoped UNRWA would support them."