GAZA CITY: Israel tentatively welcomed a proposal yesterday from Egypt and France for a Gaza cease-fire and briefly halted its offensive to allow aid to reach civilians, but top Israeli ministers yesterday approved an even tougher war to press ahead with its assault on Hamas.
Defense Minister Ehud Barak was given the green light by Israel’s security Cabinet to order a deeper offensive into Gaza towns as part of the campaign to halt Hamas cross-border rocket attacks, a senior defense official told AFP.
But Barak has also decided to send an envoy to Cairo today to get details on an Egyptian cease-fire plan, which secured widespread international backing amid growing anxiety over the civilian toll now close to 700 dead.
The Cabinet meeting in Jerusalem “approved continuing the ground offensive, including a third stage that would broaden it by pushing deeper into populated areas,” the official said.
The final decision will be left with Barak, the official added.
Israel said it needs guarantees that any cease-fire will halt rocket fire and prevent Hamas from rearming, while Hamas demands that Gaza’s blockaded border crossings be opened.
Despite the reservations, the proposal from Egypt and France could mark the first sign of a possible exit from 12 days of bloodshed in Gaza, accompanied by continued Hamas rocket fire on southern Israel.
Israeli strikes have killed at least 688 Palestinians since Dec. 27, including around 350 civilians, according to Palestinian health officials. Among the dead are 130 children age 16 and under, said the Palestinian Center for Human Rights, which has researchers at Gaza’s nine hospitals and tracks casualties.
Israel says it has killed at least 130 Gaza fighters since it launched its ground offensive Saturday. Ten Israelis have been killed during the offensive, including three civilians. Yesterday, 29 Palestinians were killed, including at least 22 civilians and two Islamic Jihad fighters, medics said. In one incident, a family of four was killed in an airstrike on their car, medics said.
Residents on the Gaza-Egypt border said Israel dropped leaflets in the area, urging them to leave immediately because of planned Israel strikes. Hamas’ tunnels are located in the area, and Israel has already destroyed dozens of them in repeated airstrikes.
The leaflet addressed the residents of a strip of neighborhoods that runs parallel to the Egypt border.
“Because Hamas uses your houses to hide and smuggle military weapons, the IDF will attack the area, between the Egyptian border until the beach road,” the leaflet said, according a local UN official.
After the leaflets were dropped, more than 800 families fled to two UN schools turned into temporary shelters. With fighting going forward, a truce deal still seemed distant. There are also wide gaps between the demands raised by Israel and Hamas.
Israel is likely to send an envoy, senior Defense Ministry official Amos Gilad, to Cairo today to hear more about the French-Egyptian truce proposal, whose terms still remain unclear.
The plan calls for an immediate cease-fire by Israel and Palestinian factions for a limited period to allow humanitarian aid into Gaza. It also calls for an urgent meeting of Israel and the Palestinian side on arrangements to prevent any repetition of military action and to deal with the causes. In Paris, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said Israel and the moderate Palestinian Authority, Hamas’ rival, accepted the plan. However, the Palestinian Authority is not a direct party to the conflict.
Turkey has already been asked to put together an international force in Gaza, according to a Middle Eastern diplomat familiar with the country’s efforts to end the conflict.
He said the responsibilities of the force were yet to be determined. The diplomat spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the information, and Turkish officials would not immediately comment.
Hamas and Israel voiced reservations, and the Bush administration also withheld firm backing. “What we are seeking is a cease-fire that would actually last,” said White House press secretary Dana Perino.
Russia’s top Middle East envoy met exiled Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal in Damascus yesterday. A Russian Foreign Ministry statement said Meshaal declared himself ready to take part in a “political-diplomatic solution” but that “the imposition of capitulatory conditions by Israel was unacceptable.”
Osama Hamdan, a Hamas representative in Lebanon close to the group’s leadership in Syria, told Al-Jazeera television that Hamas would not accept any initiative that does not include the withdrawal of the Israeli Army from Gaza and the opening of all of the territory’s border crossings.
“Any proposal that does not include these bases is unacceptable and no one should bother by presenting such proposals,” he said.
“The idea of an international force is rejected and such forces which will come to Gaza to protect Israel will be dealt with as enemy forces.”
The United Nations expressed outrage and demanded an independent investigation after military strikes on three UN-run schools in Gaza on Tuesday killed 48 people. “If the rules of war had been broken those found guilty must be brought to justice,” Christopher Gunness, spokesman for the UN refugee agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, told AFP.
“It is the responsibility of the Security Council to help to end any conflict as soon as it arises. And the current conflict in Gaza should be no exception,” Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal told reporters on the sidelines of a Security Council debate on the Israeli offensive in New York.
“If the Security Council takes no action ... that certainly raises questions about its credibility.”
Israel carried out 40 airstrikes in Gaza yesterday, the army said. An Israeli combat officer, identified as Lt. Col. Amir, said troops neutralized hundreds of explosives devices, including booby-trapped houses, and discovered many tunnels dug by fighters.
Despite the army’s push, Gaza fighters fired 14 rockets yesterday, including hits on the towns of Beersheba and Ashkelon.
Israel briefly suspended its offensive yesterday to allow humanitarian supplies to reach Gaza, and Israeli officials said such lulls would be declared on a regular basis.
The announcement came among growing warnings by the World Bank and aid groups of a humanitarian crisis.
The Word Bank said there is a severe shortage of drinking water and that the sewage system is under growing strain.
During yesterday’s lull, Israel allowed in 80 trucks of supplies as well as industrial fuel for Gaza’s power plant.
Medics tried to retrieve bodies in areas that had previously been too dangerous to approach.
Medic Mohammed Azayzeh in central Gaza pulled out three people, killed by shrapnel fire on Sunday, from the border town of Mughraqa, where Israeli tanks had settled nearby.
— With input from agencies
