Gaza-Israel frontier calms as enemies warily cease fire

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Palestinian militants and Israel held their fire late on Tuesday following an Egyptian-brokered ceasefire, bringing relative calm to the Gaza frontier after the fiercest rocket missiles and air strikes since the 2014 war.

The enemies made clear the pause was an armed stand-off rather than a long-term accommodation.

Fighting died down at 5 p.m. (1500 GMT) and a Palestinian official briefed on the negotiations said Gaza factions ceased firing as part of a deal proposed by Egypt. Israeli officials confirmed Cairo had been involved in Tuesday's arrangement.

Since Monday, Israeli air strikes had killed seven Palestinians, at least five of them gunmen, and destroyed several buildings used by Gaza's ruling Hamas Islamists.

Relatives of Mohammed Ouda, killed in an Israeli air strike, mourn during his funeral in Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip, November 12, 2018. /VCG Photo

Rocket attacks from Gaza sent residents of southern Israel to shelters, wounding dozens and killing a Palestinian laborer from the occupied West Bank.

The flare-up was triggered by a botched Israeli commando incursion on Sunday but the surge of violence has been stoked by the economic plight of the Gaza Strip, which Israel blockades in hope of isolating Hamas.

The exchanges were the fiercest since the Gaza war in 2014, the third between Israel and Hamas in a decade as part of the wider Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The joint command of the Palestinian armed factions in Gaza said in a statement on Tuesday they would abide by a ceasefire "as long as the Zionist enemy does the same."

Residents of southern Israel protest against their government's decision to hold fire in Gaza in response to a similar decision by Palestinian militants, in Sderot, November 13, 2018. /VCG Photo

Israeli security minister Yuval Steinitz said after a cabinet debate lasting several hours that he knew of no formal truce.

Rather, he said that Israel had landed a harsh and unprecedented blow on Hamas and the terrorist groups in Gaza, and we will see if that will suffice or whether further blows will be required.

While many Palestinians celebrated in the streets, in Israel the response was mixed. Dozens of residents of bombarded southern villages blocked an Israeli traffic junction and burned tyres in protest at what they deemed a government capitulation.

Simmering violence

A ball of fire is seen above the building housing the Hamas-run television station al-Aqsa TV in Gaza City during an Israeli air strike, November 12, 2018. /VCG photo

Violence has simmered since Palestinians launched weekly border protests on March 30 to demand the easing of the blockade and the right to return to land lost in the 1948 war of Israel's founding.

Israeli troops have killed more than 220 Palestinians during those confrontations, which have included border breaches.

Alarmed at the bloodshed, Egypt, the United Nations and Qatar have sought ways to improve conditions in the enclave.

Israel withdrew settlers and soldiers from Gaza in 2005 but maintains tight control of its land, air and sea borders. The wider Israeli-Palestinian peace process has been stalled for several years.

Source(s): Reuters