Gaza crisis: Truce crumbles after rocket fire into southern Israel, three killed in Gaza air strikes

20 Aug 2014

(Translation of this article appears in Arabic section)

Thousands of Palestinians are fleeing their homes in the east of Gaza City after Israel launched a new wave of air strikes in response to renewed Hamas rocket attacks.

Palestinian health officials say three people, including a woman and a two-year-old girl, were killed in Gaza as the ceasefire crumbled and Israel ordered its negotiators home from peace talks in Egypt.

Israel said Palestinian rockets had hit southern Israel about eight hours before a 24-hour ceasefire - an extension of several other temporary truces - had been due to expire.

Hamas said it had fired a rocket at Tel Aviv's Ben Gurion airport and sirens were heard across central Israel.

The Israeli military urged Israelis living as far as 80 kilometres from the Gaza border to open bomb shelters.

Palestinian officials said 15 people had been wounded in the Israeli air strike which killed the woman and girl. The third victim was not identified.

Hamas said the woman and girl were the wife and daughter of its armed wing leader Mohammed Deif but did not say if Deif had been killed.

Israeli media said more than 30 air strikes had been carried out across Gaza.

The United States has blamed Hamas for the breakdown in the talks and the ceasefire.

"Hamas has security responsibility for Gaza ... rocket fire came from Gaza," state department spokeswoman Marie Harf said.

"This rocket attack was a grave and direct violation of the ceasefire," said Mark Regev, a spokesman for Israel's prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Palestinian delegate had warned violence could flare again

Earlier in Cairo, the chief Palestinian delegate to the indirect negotiations with Israel cautioned that violence could erupt anew if the talks failed.

Azzam al-Ahmad, senior leader of president Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah movement, said there had been "no progress on any point" in the negotiations.

The Palestinians were demanding an end to the Egyptian and Israeli blockades of the economically crippled Gaza Strip, where Israel launched an offensive on July 8 after a surge in Hamas rocket fire across the border.

Israel and Egypt view Hamas—the Islamist group that dominates the impoverished enclave—as a security threat, and want guarantees any removal of border restrictions will not result in militant groups obtaining weapons.

"We hope that every minute of the coming 24 hours will be used to reach an agreement, and if not [successful], the circle of violence will continue," Mr Ahmad had said.

Palestinian officials held more meetings on Tuesday with Egyptian mediators.

An Israeli government official had said Israeli delegates were poring over details of a possible deal, although the parties had not yet agreed on a draft.

An agreement would open the way for reconstruction aid to begin to flow to the Gaza Strip, where thousands of homes have been destroyed in the conflict and the United Nations says 425,000 people have been displaced.

The Palestinian health ministry put the Gaza death toll at 2,016 and said most of the dead were civilians in the small, densely populated coastal territory.

Israel said it had killed hundreds of Hamas fighters. Sixty-four Israeli soldiers and three civilians in Israel have been killed.

Reuters/ABC