As one of Gaza’s most seasoned television news correspondents, Lana Shaheen has braved everything from Israeli airstrikes to Palestinian sniper fire to get her story.

But in ten years of reporting from one of the world’s most dangerous war zones, she has never felt fear like the kind that gripped her when a chilling text message was sent to her mobile phone.

“You are without shame or morals,” it read. “We will cut your throat from vein to vein if needed to protect the spirit and moral of this nation.”

The threat was an excerpt from a longer letter sent by a radical Palestinian group to more than a dozen women television broadcasters working in Gaza and the West Bank.

If the women refused to wear strict Islamic dress, it read, they would be beheaded.

“We are really afraid and our families are afraid,” said Ms Shaheen, who typically reports from the field wearing jeans and a T-shirt.

“I have told myself ‘you have to be courageous’ but every time I leave my house I feel frightened,” she said.

The letter was just the latest threat delivered by the Swords of Islamic Righteousness, a shadowy militant group that has also claimed responsibility for bombing dozens of internet cafés, music stores and pharmacies in recent months, punishing them for promoting an “impure” Western lifestyle.

With Fatah and Hamas – the main Palestinian political parties – locked in a bitter power struggle, security in Gaza has all but collapsed, transforming the coastal strip into a breeding ground for fundamentalist groups seeking to impose their own brand of strict Islamic law.

Jihadist groups have recently attacked US and United Nations schools. A radical group called the Army of Islam has claimed responsibility for kidnapping Alan Johnston, the BBC’s Gaza correspondent.

Life in Gaza has always been more culturally conservative than in the secular West Bank: there are no bars or nightclubs and most women wear hijabs.

But even though most of the 15 women broadcasters who work on government-run Palestinian television also wear veils by choice, they say that religious law is now being imposed on them by force.

Most said that, despite feeling intimidated, they would continue to work. However, they would take extra precautions, travelling with male relatives for safety. “I do not wear the hijab and I do not intend to do so through any kind of pressure,” said Samah Nassar, a presenter at Palestine TV.

The broadcaster, financed by the secular Fatah party of President Abbas, has previously been criticised by its rival, Hamas, for being biased.

Some suspect factional rivalry to be behind the recent threats levelled against the women employees – a charge denied strongly by Hamas.

But some Palestinian security officials say that Hamas is secretly funding the Swords of Islamic Righteousness, which is believed to have fewer than 100 members and surfaced only after Hamas won parliamentary elections last year. They accuse Hamas of using the group as a front to impose a hardline version of Islam.

Yesterday the women broadcasters staged demonstrations in front of the Mr Abbas’s office, calling for his protection.

But even their employer said that it was powerless to ensure their security. “We are trying to send a message to these gangs to stop their campaign against us, but what else can we do?” asked Basem Abu Sumaya, head of the Palestinian Broadcasting Corporation, which runs Palestine TV.

Ms Shaheen knows that in Gaza’s current climate of lawlessness, nobody is safe. “The whole Gaza Strip is in chaos. We are so scared. Nobody knows when they will be killed,” she said.

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