Fourteen Iraqi Christians were believed dead last night and at least 60 wounded after car bombs were detonated at five churches in Baghdad and Mosul crowded with congregations at evening services. The despised “outsiders” returned from exile a decade ago and have grown fat in office. One of his associates told The Independent yesterday: “He believes the time has come to lead the rebellion calling for reform.” Western diplomats see him as a pragmatist who could yet lead the Palestinians to a state co-existing with Israel.Palestinian unrest is spreading. A dozen Arafat loyalists burst into a conference in Nablus yesterday, firing over the heads of 50 Fatah members discussing reform. “What has happened in Gaza is an expression of our demand for reform.”Mr Dahlan represents the younger generation of Fatah leaders. He is an “insider”, who cut his teeth under Israeli occupation. “The casualties are countless and Palestinian life is in ruins.” Mr Dahlan said $5bn (£2.7bn) in foreign aid had vanished.Implicitly, he confirmed suspicions that he ordered last month’s anti-Arafat riots in Gaza, where he retains the loyalty of the preventive security service and won an overwhelming majority for reform in recent Fatah elections “We decided to take action in the field,” he said.

It is the most explicit challenge to Mr Arafat, who is rapidly losing control of competing Fatah militias. Mr Dahlan, in his mid-forties, accused the 75-year-old Mr Arafat of leading his people to disaster.”Arafat is sitting on the corpses and destruction of the Palestinians at a time when they are desperately in need of a new mentality,” he said. A smouldering revolt within Yasser Arafat’s Fatah movement began to glow red yesterday when one of the Palestinian leader’s most influential critics threatened to bring 30,000 demonstrators on to the streets of Gaza if he did not implement security and financial reforms by 10 August.
Mohammed Dahlan, a former security minister, issued his ultimatum in an interview with Al Watan, a Kuwaiti newspaper. The store quickly caught fire and filled with smoke, triggering total confusion,” he said sobbing “I lost my wife and kids as I rushed to get out Now I’m desperately trying to find them.”. “There was an explosion inside and the heat forced the bottom floor supporting the basement to give way crushing dozens of people,” he said.Francisco Barrios, who was shopping in the complex but managed to get out after the fire broke out, described the confusion as people rushed for the exit “There were sparks as if fireworks were going off. “I’ve come here to provide support to the injured and the families of the deceased.”Television footage showed several levels of the multi-level supermarket covered in soot, including a lower-level parking garage.

The supermarket is part of a shopping complex located in an Asuncion suburb.Orlando Fiorotto, the Interior Minister, ordered off-duty police and firefighters to the scene and urged hospitals to prepare for the injured. Julio Cesar Velazquez, the Public Health Minister, told reporters: “I have never seen a disaster like this. The firefighters were taking out, as best as they could, the bodies, the injured and people suffering from smoke inhalation. It’s horrible.”A metropolitan area police chief, Aristides Cabral, said an explosion was heard before the fire swept through the building. Some of the charred bodies were found inside the supermarket hugging each other, including a woman with a small child in her arms, a firefighter told local radio. Others were burned alive in their cars as the blaze swept though a parking lot underneath the supermarket, local television reported.One woman wept outside the supermarket, waiting for news of her missing 14-year-old son “I need information on my son.