UPDATE 1915 GMT: Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has pointed to continuing war in an evening press conference, “We will continue until the goal is reached….Who says we gave up on the option of toppling Hamas?”
Netanyahu said, in response to a question about the attempted assassination of Hamas military leader Mohammed Deif, “The commanders of terror organizations are a legitimate target, no one is immune.”
Netanyahu made no specific comment about the operation, indicating with the omission that Israel may have failed to kill Deif.
However, the Prime Minister’s most significant statement may have been his admission of opposition within his Security Cabinet.
He said he expected Ministers to “behave responsibly”:
In the cabinet, everything can be discussed, and I certainly permit raising any issue. But outside — you have to provide support and talk less.
Several of Netanyahu’s Ministers, including Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman and Economy Minister Naftali Bennett, have implicit criticized the Prime Minister for not being tough enoungh on Hamas. Lieberman and his allies have said that the Israeli military should re-occupy Gaza.
UPDATE 1715 GMT: The Israeli Security Cabinet has made no decisions in its meeting this afternoon, following the withdrawal from talks in Cairo on Tuesday and the resumption of hostilities with Gazan factions.
Instead, the Cabinet was “more of an update session”, according to officials.
UPDATE 1625 GMT: The military wing of Hamas has denied Israeli claims that leading commander Mohammad Deif may have killed by an airstrike on Tuesday.
A spokesman for the Al Qassam Brigades said West Jerusalem had breached the ceasefire and declared, “You Israel are one big lie.”
He added that Deif, who survived five previous assassination attempts, “has foiled your celebrations for 25 years”.
“We promise you that Muhammad Deif will be the military commander of the army who will liberate al-Aqsa (Jerusalem),” he asserted.
The spokesman also warned foreign airline carriers to stop flying to Ben Gurion International Airport from 6 a.m. (0300 GMT) on Thursday.
Relatives gather round the body of Mohammad Deif’s 7-month-old son, killed in Tuesday’s attempt by Israel to assassinate his father:
After a pause of almost a week, Gaza’s 43-day war resumed on Monday, with rockets fired across the border at Israel and Israeli forces carrying out airstrikes.
A 24-hour extension of the truce had been declared from midnight, as indirect talks between Israel and Palestine continued in Cairo; however, it was broken in the afternoon by the firing of three rockets at the southern Israel city of Be’er Sheva. Hamas initially denied any knowledge of the attack, but the attack and subsequent launches — more than 60, according to the Israeli military, including firing on Tel Aviv and Jerusalem — were claimed by its military wing, the Al-Qassam Brigades.
The renewed attacks came as Israel tried to assassinate Hamas military leader Mohammed Deif, the target of several previous Israeli attempts. The strike on a house killed his wife and 7-month-old son.
It is unclear if the assassination attempt preceded or followed the first rocket launches, but members of the Palestinian delegation in Cairo claimed that the strike restarted the conflict and any Gazan attacks were in retaliation.
Interior Minister Gideon Sa’ar later said that Deif is “like (Osama) Bin Laden. He’s an arch-murderer. If an opportunity to liquidate him presents itself, it should be taken.”
The Israel Defense Forces, on the orders of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon, hitting at least 30 targets in Gaza.
Another woman was killed and 45 injured in the attack on the Deif house in the Sheikh Radwan district of Gaza City. Palestinians report seven people were killed, including a girl and pregnant woman, in an Israeli air strike on a house in Deir al-Balah in central Gaza.
Three missiles targeted my aunt's house, leveled to the ground, home for five families, all homeless now #GazaUnderAttack
— Yousef M. Aljamal (@YousefAljamal) August 20, 2014
There were no reported Israeli casualties.
The talks in Cairo, including discussion of an 11-point Egyptian proposal for a long-term ceasefire, broke down soon after the news of the first rockets. The Israeli delegation was withdrawn by Netanyahu, and Palestinian negotiators said they will leave Wednesday after submitting a “final” proposal to end the fighting.
Azzam al-Ahmad, the leader of the Palestinian delegation, declared, “It’s clear the Israelis are not interested in the ceasefire. We did not hear from them. We were willing to, but we did not hear from them.”
The US State Department blamed Hamas for the resumption of hostilities. “We are very concerned about today’s development and condemn the renewed rocket fire,” spokesperson Marie Harf said. “Hamas has security responsibility for Gaza.”
She offered no comment on the Israeli airstrikes or the attempted assassination.
In contrast to Washington’s position, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon did not assign blame in his statement:
The Secretary-General condemns in the strongest terms the breach of the Egyptian brokered humanitarian ceasefire which was to expire at midnight local time. He is gravely disappointed by the return to hostilities.
The Secretary-General reminds both sides of their responsibility not to let the situation escalate. The hopes of the people in Gaza for a better future and the hopes of the people in Israel for sustainable security rest on the talks in Cairo.
At least 2,019 Gazans have died in the conflict and more than 10,200 have been wounded. Israel has lost 64 troops, while two Israeli civilians and a Thai worker have been killed by rockets.
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