Agreeing to More Talks in Egypt, Israelis and Palestinians Begin Latest Cease-Fire
JERUSALEM
— Israeli and Palestinian negotiators on Sunday accepted Egypt’s
proposal for a new 72-hour cease-fire in the Gaza fighting, which began
one minute after midnight on Monday, and agreed to resume
Egyptian-mediated negotiations toward a more durable solution.
But
several previous cease-fires have collapsed or expired, followed by
renewed fighting, and it was not immediately clear whether the sides had
moved nearer to an agreement on the contested issues.
The
Palestinian negotiators have remained in Cairo since the last
cease-fire expired on Friday. As that truce ended, Hamas, the Islamic
group that dominates Gaza, fired barrages of rockets into Israel,
prompting Israel to resume its airstrikes.
Sunday’s
hostilities, which left at least seven Palestinians dead, continued
almost to the last minute. Just before midnight, like a grand finale,
more rockets soared out of Gaza into southern Israel and one fell into
the sea near Tel Aviv. Hamas’s military wing claimed responsibility; the
Israeli police said the rockets caused no injuries.
An
Israeli official said the Israeli delegation, which left Cairo on
Friday morning, would return on Monday if the cease-fire held overnight
but warned that Israel would not negotiate under fire.
The
Egyptian Foreign Ministry said in a statement that the new lull was
intended to facilitate the flow of humanitarian aid into Gaza and the
repair of essential infrastructure, and to allow a window for the
resumption of “indirect, immediate and continuous negotiations” for a
lasting cease-fire.
But
members of the Palestinian delegation expressed frustration earlier
Sunday over what they said was an emphasis by the Egyptian mediators and
the Israelis on winning a cease-fire at the expense of longer-term
solutions that would end the isolation of Gaza. One of Hamas’s central
demands is a complete lifting of the blockade of Gaza and the free
movement of people and goods through its border crossings with Israel
and Egypt. Hamas has also demanded the construction of a seaport and the
reconstruction of Gaza’s airport.
Israel, for its part, wants to see Hamas come out of the negotiation process weakened and without any obvious rewards.
“The
day after should be based, on the one hand, on providing for the
economic and social needs of the people of Gaza, without strengthening
Hamas,” said Tzipi Livni, a moderate Israeli minister who has pushed for
a permanent peace deal with the West Bank Palestinian leadership. But,
speaking to reporters in Jerusalem on Sunday, Ms. Livni said any Gaza
solution should also be based on Israel’s security concerns, and she
called for a mechanism to prevent Hamas from rearming, which is now also
an Egyptian interest, and the eventual demilitarization of Gaza.
Ms.
Livni ruled out any immediate movement on a Gaza seaport or the
airport, saying those were issues to be negotiated as part of a final
peace agreement between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization
to establish an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel.
Azzam
al-Ahmad, the leader of the Palestinian delegation to the talks,
implored the Israelis not to “waste the time” during the negotiations
and the lull in the fighting — especially, he said, because the
Palestinians had made “absolutely no new demands,” but rather, he
asserted, were asking the Israelis to honor various past agreements.
“The
72-hour cease-fire should be used to achieve a complete agreement, to
stabilize the cease-fire and to stop stalling and procrastinating,” he
said.
Qais
Abdel-Karim of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine,
one of the factions attending the talks, said it would be a “farce” for
the Palestinian delegation to return with a truce and little else, given
the high civilian death toll and the devastation in Gaza.
“People
have been suffering and tolerating all that with the hope that this
will lead to the relaxation of lifting of the blockade,” Mr. Abdel-Karim
said.
But Ehud Yaari, an Israel-based fellow of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy who specializes in Arab affairs, said Hamas was “reaching a point where they realize they are not going to have any gains.”
Instead,
Mr. Yaari said, the deal would probably be based on “a major package”
for the reconstruction of Gaza that would be “for the benefit of the
Gaza population,” with projects channeled as much as possible through
the West Bank leadership.
“I think Hamas has been impressed — to its detriment — by the solidity of the Egyptian-Israeli position,” Mr. Yaari added.
Palestinian
militants and the Israeli military exchanged blows through Sunday, but
on a much smaller scale than the fierce fighting of the past month,
which claimed more than 1,900 Palestinian lives — a majority of them
probably civilians — and killed 67, mostly soldiers, on the Israeli
side.
The
Israeli military said it struck about 40 targets in Gaza throughout the
day, including what it described as 11 “terror squads,” some of whom
were preparing to fire rockets. At least seven Palestinians were killed
in the strikes, including four who were hit on Sunday evening. Three of
those were killed in an airstrike aimed at a motorcycle in Khan Younis
and one was killed in a strike that hit agricultural land near Jabaliya,
according to the Health Ministry in Gaza.
More
than 40 rockets were fired at Israel on Sunday, the military added.
Several were intercepted by Israel’s Iron Dome antimissile defense
system, and most fell on open ground, causing no injuries. Israel
temporarily closed its main goods crossing into Gaza after at least two
rockets landed in the compound.
In
the West Bank, an 11-year-old Palestinian boy was killed Sunday by
Israeli soldiers during a protest near Hebron. The Israeli military said
that the soldiers had been responding to protesters who were throwing
rocks and that the shooting was being investigated. A relative said the
boy had not been involved in the protest.
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