GAZA CITY: Top Israeli ministers on Wednesday approved an even tougher war on Hamas despite warming to a new ceasefire initiative and briefly silencing its guns to let Gaza City residents hunt for food and fuel.
Defence Minister Ehud Barak was given the green light by Israel's security cabinet to order a deeper offensive into Gaza towns as part of the campaign to halt Hamas cross-border rocket attacks, a senior defence official told AFP.
But Barak has also decided to send an envoy to Cairo on Thursday to get details on an Egyptian ceasefire plan, which secured widespread international backing amid growing anxiety over the civilian toll now close to 700 dead.
The cabinet meeting in Jerusalem "approved continuing the ground offensive, including a third stage that would broaden it by pushing deeper into populated areas," the official said.
The final decision will be left with Barak, the official added.
Israeli shelling and air attacks around Gaza City were halted for three hours as a humanitarian gesture. Hamas also halted rocket attacks.
People and cars quickly filled the streets of Gaza City and long queues formed outside bakeries which soon ran out of bread. Aid groups sent dozens of truckloads of food and fuel across the border during the truce.
But the fighting equally quickly resumed, inflicting new deaths. A man and his three sons and a nephew were killed in one attack at the Jabaliya refugee camp, according to Gaza medics.
Israel also warned thousands of people in the Rafah zone on the Egyptian border to leave or face air strikes.
And after Israeli attacks on three UN schools in Gaza on Tuesday, pressure mounted for a permanent truce in the 12-day old war. New hopes are being placed in a ceasefire plan proposed by Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.
Amos Gilad, a top advisor to the defence minister, will go to Cairo on Thursday to discuss details of the plan, the defence official said.
Mubarak outlined the plan after talks with French President Nicolas Sarkozy late on Tuesday.
The proposal calls for an "immediate ceasefire," Israeli-Palestinian talks in Egypt on securing Gaza's borders, reopening border crossings and possible Palestinian reconciliation talks under Egyptian mediation.
Egypt has asked the International Committee of the Red Cross to open a humanitarian corridor from its border with Gaza for aid and evacuating the wounded, the foreign ministry in Cairo said.
The Hamas leadership announced it was studying the plan and Palestinian Authority president Mahmud Abbas was set to go to Cairo for talks.
The United States signalled it was open to the idea of a ceasefire but the White House said Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was clarifying details of the Egyptian plan.
Russia's top Middle East envoy met exiled Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal in Damascus on Wednesday. A Russian foreign ministry statement said Meshaal declared himself ready to take part in a "political-diplomatic solution" but that "the imposition of capitulatory conditions by Israel was unacceptable."
Israel has insisted there can be no ceasefire until Hamas rocket attacks on Israel halt and there is an end to weapons smuggling into Gaza through tunnels under the border with Egypt.
Despite the truce moves, Israel stage dozens more air raids targeting rocket-launching sites and gunmen.
At least 694 people have now been killed, including at least 220 children, since the war erupted on December 27, Gaza medics say. More than 3,100 Palestinians have been wounded.
Six Israeli soldiers have been killed in combat, while Israel says more than 100 Hamas fighters have died.
Hundreds of rockets fired into Israel over the past 12 days have killed four people and wounded dozens.
The United Nations expressed outrage and demanded an independent investigation after military strikes on three UN-run schools in Gaza on Tuesday killed 48 people.
Forty-three people were killed in the worst strike at Jabaliya. The army said its investigation found militants had fired at Israeli forces from inside the school and Hamas militants were among those killed.
The United Nations denied this.
"Following an initial investigation, we are 99.9 percent sure that there were no militants or militant activities in the school and the school compound," Christopher Gunness, spokesman for the UN refugee agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, told AFP.
"We are calling for an independent investigation to establish the facts," he said. "If the rules of war had been broken those found guilty must be brought to justice." - AFP/de
Defence Minister Ehud Barak was given the green light by Israel's security cabinet to order a deeper offensive into Gaza towns as part of the campaign to halt Hamas cross-border rocket attacks, a senior defence official told AFP.
But Barak has also decided to send an envoy to Cairo on Thursday to get details on an Egyptian ceasefire plan, which secured widespread international backing amid growing anxiety over the civilian toll now close to 700 dead.
The cabinet meeting in Jerusalem "approved continuing the ground offensive, including a third stage that would broaden it by pushing deeper into populated areas," the official said.
The final decision will be left with Barak, the official added.
Israeli shelling and air attacks around Gaza City were halted for three hours as a humanitarian gesture. Hamas also halted rocket attacks.
People and cars quickly filled the streets of Gaza City and long queues formed outside bakeries which soon ran out of bread. Aid groups sent dozens of truckloads of food and fuel across the border during the truce.
But the fighting equally quickly resumed, inflicting new deaths. A man and his three sons and a nephew were killed in one attack at the Jabaliya refugee camp, according to Gaza medics.
Israel also warned thousands of people in the Rafah zone on the Egyptian border to leave or face air strikes.
And after Israeli attacks on three UN schools in Gaza on Tuesday, pressure mounted for a permanent truce in the 12-day old war. New hopes are being placed in a ceasefire plan proposed by Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.
Amos Gilad, a top advisor to the defence minister, will go to Cairo on Thursday to discuss details of the plan, the defence official said.
Mubarak outlined the plan after talks with French President Nicolas Sarkozy late on Tuesday.
The proposal calls for an "immediate ceasefire," Israeli-Palestinian talks in Egypt on securing Gaza's borders, reopening border crossings and possible Palestinian reconciliation talks under Egyptian mediation.
Egypt has asked the International Committee of the Red Cross to open a humanitarian corridor from its border with Gaza for aid and evacuating the wounded, the foreign ministry in Cairo said.
The Hamas leadership announced it was studying the plan and Palestinian Authority president Mahmud Abbas was set to go to Cairo for talks.
The United States signalled it was open to the idea of a ceasefire but the White House said Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was clarifying details of the Egyptian plan.
Russia's top Middle East envoy met exiled Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal in Damascus on Wednesday. A Russian foreign ministry statement said Meshaal declared himself ready to take part in a "political-diplomatic solution" but that "the imposition of capitulatory conditions by Israel was unacceptable."
Israel has insisted there can be no ceasefire until Hamas rocket attacks on Israel halt and there is an end to weapons smuggling into Gaza through tunnels under the border with Egypt.
Despite the truce moves, Israel stage dozens more air raids targeting rocket-launching sites and gunmen.
At least 694 people have now been killed, including at least 220 children, since the war erupted on December 27, Gaza medics say. More than 3,100 Palestinians have been wounded.
Six Israeli soldiers have been killed in combat, while Israel says more than 100 Hamas fighters have died.
Hundreds of rockets fired into Israel over the past 12 days have killed four people and wounded dozens.
The United Nations expressed outrage and demanded an independent investigation after military strikes on three UN-run schools in Gaza on Tuesday killed 48 people.
Forty-three people were killed in the worst strike at Jabaliya. The army said its investigation found militants had fired at Israeli forces from inside the school and Hamas militants were among those killed.
The United Nations denied this.
"Following an initial investigation, we are 99.9 percent sure that there were no militants or militant activities in the school and the school compound," Christopher Gunness, spokesman for the UN refugee agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, told AFP.
"We are calling for an independent investigation to establish the facts," he said. "If the rules of war had been broken those found guilty must be brought to justice." - AFP/de
