Israel hits Gaza targets, Egypt says talks positive
MIDDLE EAST: Israel bombarded Gaza with air strikes on Friday
in a widening military effort to secure the release of an abducted
Israeli soldier amid an Egyptian report that the ruling Palestinian
party has approved his freedom.
Israeli warplanes roared over Gaza striking at various targets,
including the office of Palestinian Interior Minister Saeed Seyam, which
caught fire after it was hit in the intensifying military operation to
free 19-year-old Israeli Corporal Gilad Shalit, who was abducted by
gunmen on Sunday.
Reports of a gunbattle in northern Gaza trickled in even as an
Egyptian newspaper reported that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said
Hamas, the ruling Palestinian party, has told him they have given
conditional approval for Shalit’s release.
Three militant groups, including an armed wing of Hamas, have claimed
responsibility for the attack during which Shalit was abducted.
Israel has said it holds Hamas responsible for his safe return and
has seized several members of the Islamic militant group, including
government ministers, in the West Bank.
Egypt’s al-Ahram newspaper also said Mubarak told it in an interview
that although Hamas has given conditional approval, a handover agreement
with Israel has not yet been reached.
“There were Egyptian communications which included a number of Hamas
leaders and resulted in initial positive results in the form of a
conditional approval by Hamas to turn over the Israeli soldier as
quickly as possible to avoid escalation,” the newspaper paraphrased
Mubarak as saying.
Israeli troops and tanks rolled into southern Gaza on Wednesday in
their first raid on the Palestinian enclave since it pulled troops and
settlers out of the territory last summer.
Forces have also massed near central and northern Gaza, from which
militants have fired dozens of rockets into Israel since its pullout.
Israeli Defence Minister Amir Peretz has said Israel will aim to stop
rocket launchers during its offensive.
Senior diplomatic sources and Israeli media said Israel has delayed a
large-scale assault in Gaza to allow for last-ditch talks mediated by
Egypt to try to secure the soldier’s release.
The army had no comment.
The United States and other world powers have cut off direct aid to
the Palestinian Authority since Hamas won a January parliamentary
election, and have demanded Hamas disarm and recognise the Jewish state
and interim peace deals with it.
Israeli air strikes and artillery in recent days have wounded several
Palestinians and have destroyed bridges, water systems and a major power
transformer, causing blackouts in most of Gaza, home to 1.4 million
Palestinians.
Air strikes on Friday also targeted an office used by President
Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah group, injuring one Palestinian outside the
building. Missiles slammed into two Hamas training camps and structures
used by the Islamic group.
An Israeli army spokesman confirmed the strikes, saying all targets
were abandoned at the time and that the Fatah office was used by the
faction’s militant group, al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades.
Gaza, Friday, Reuters |