Israel pulled its ground forces out of the Gaza Strip yesterday and started a 72-hour ceasefire with Hamas mediated by Egypt as a first step toward negotiations on a more enduring end to the month-old war.
Minutes before the truce began at 8am, Hamas launched a salvo of rockets, calling them revenge for Israel’s “massacres.”
Israel’s anti-missile system shot down one rocket over Jerusalem, police said. Another hit a house in a town near Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank. There were no casualties.
Israeli armor and infantry withdrew from the Gaza Strip ahead of the truce, with a military spokesman saying their main goal of destroying cross-border infiltration tunnels had been completed.
“Mission accomplished,” the military tweeted.
Troops and tanks are to be “redeployed in defensive positions outside the Gaza Strip and we will maintain those defensive positions,” Israeli spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Peter Lerner said, reflecting Israeli readiness to resume fighting if attacked.
Sami Abu Zuhri, a spokesman for the Islamist Hamas faction that rules Gaza, said Israel’s offensive in the densely populated, coastal enclave was a “100 percent failure.”
Israel sent officials to join talks in Cairo to cement a longer-term deal during the course of the truce.
“The delegates left under an hour ago. I assume they’ve already arrived in Egypt,” an Israeli official said.
In Gaza, where about half a million people have been displaced by a month of bloodshed, some residents, carrying mattresses and with children in tow, left UN shelters to trek back to neighborhoods where entire blocks have been destroyed by Israeli shelling and the smell of decomposing bodies fills the air.
Sitting on a pile of debris on the edge of the northern town of Beit Lahiya, Zuhair Hjaila, a 33-year-old father of four, said he had lost his house and his supermarket.
“This is complete destruction,” he said. “I never thought I would come back to find an earthquake zone.”
Several previous truce attempts by Egypt and other regional powers, overseen by the US and the UN, failed to calm the worst Israeli-Palestinian fighting in two years.
An Israeli official said that in the hour before the ceasefire came into effect, the civilian airspace over Tel Aviv was closed as a precaution against Gaza rockets, and takeoffs and landings were delayed at Ben-Gurion airport.
Gaza officials say the war has killed 1,867 Palestinians, most of them civilians. Israel says 64 of its soldiers and three civilians have been killed since fighting began on July 8, after a surge in Palestinian rocket launches.
Hamas said it had informed Egypt “of its acceptance of a 72-hour period of calm,” beginning yesterday.
The Palestinian Cabinet issued a statement welcoming the ceasefire after its weekly meeting in Ramallah.
Palestinian Foreign Minister Riad al-Malki said there was “clear evidence” of war crimes by Israel during its offensive in Gaza as he met International Criminal Court prosecutors in The Hague to push for an investigation.
Both sides have traded allegations of war crimes during the Gaza assault, while defending their own actions as consistent with international law.
POLITICAL AGENDA: Beijing’s cross-strait Mid-Autumn Festival events are part of a ‘cultural united front’ aimed at promoting unification with Taiwan, academics said Local authorities in China have been inviting Taiwanese to participate in cross-strait Mid-Autumn Festival celebrations centered around ideals of “family and nation,” a move Taiwanese academics said politicizes the holiday to promote the idea of “one family” across the Taiwan Strait. Sources said that China’s Fujian Provincial Government is organizing about 20 cross-strait-themed events in cities including Quanzhou, Nanping, Sanming and Zhangzhou. In Zhangzhou, a festival scheduled for Wednesday is to showcase Minnan-language songs and budaixi (布袋戲) glove puppetry to highlight cultural similarities between Taiwan and the region. Elsewhere, Jiangsu Province is hosting more than 10 similar celebrations in Taizhou, Changzhou, Suzhou,
The Republic of China (ROC) is celebrating its 114th Double Ten National Day today, featuring military parades and a variety of performances and speeches in front of the Presidential Office in Taipei. The Taiwan Taiko Association opened the celebrations with a 100-drummer performance, including young percussionists. As per tradition, an air force Mirage 2000 fighter jet flew over the Presidential Office as a part of the performance. The Honor Guards of the ROC and its marching band also heralded in a military parade. Students from Taichung's Shin Min High School then followed with a colorful performance using floral imagery to represent Taiwan's alternate name
COGNITIVE WARFARE: Chinese fishing boats transmitting fake identification signals are meant to test Taiwan’s responses to different kinds of perceived incursions, a report said Chinese vessels are transmitting fake signals in Taiwan’s waters as a form of cognitive warfare, testing Taipei’s responses to various types of incursions, a report by the Institute for the Study of War said on Friday. Several Chinese fishing vessels transmitted fake automatic identification system (AIS) signals in Taiwan’s waters last month, with one mimicking a Russian warship and another impersonating a Chinese law enforcement vessel, the report said. Citing data from Starboard Maritime Intelligence, the report said that throughout August and last month, the Chinese fishing boat Minshiyu 06718 (閩獅漁06718) sailed through the Taiwan Strait while intermittently transmitting its own AIS
CHINESE INFILTRATION: Medical logistics is a lifeline during wartime and the reported CCP links of a major logistics company present a national security threat, an expert said The government would bolster its security check system to prevent China from infiltrating the nation’s medical cold chain, a national security official said yesterday. The official, who wished to stay anonymous, made the remarks after the Chinese-language magazine Mirror Media (鏡周刊) reported that Pharma Logistics (嘉里醫藥物流) is in charge of the medical logistics of about half of the nation’s major hospitals, including National Taiwan University Hospital and Taipei Veterans General Hospital. The company’s parent, Kerry TJ Logistics Co (嘉里大榮物流), is associated with the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA), the
RSS