Gunmen set fire to the Palestinian prime minister's office and parliament this evening as clashes escalated between followers of the ruling Hamas militant group and President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah movement.
In the latest sign of a deepening political crisis in the Palestinian territories, Mr Abbas ordered security forces to take control of the streets in the wake of the fighting between rival gunmen from Fatah and Hamas.
Hamas and Abbas have been locked in an intensifying power struggle since the Islamists took over the government in March after trouncing Fatah in parliamentary elections.
Witnesses said the Ramallah office of Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, a senior Hamas leader, was empty when gunmen from the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, part of Fatah, entered.
Mr Haniyeh is based in Gaza and does not have access to the city of Ramallah in the occupied West Bank because of Israeli curbs on his travel.
The gunmen burned an upper floor of the multi-storey building and tossed furniture out the windows before police arrived and removed them. They also set fire to parliament in Ramallah.
Fire engines rushed to both buildings to douse the flames as gunfire echoed around the streets.
At the core of the current tension is a referendum Mr Abbas has called for July 26th on a manifesto for Palestinian statehood that implicitly recognises Israel. Hamas, which seeks to destroy the Jewish state, has labelled the referendum a coup attempt.