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Tuesday, July 22, 2014
Pressure for Cease-Fire Builds on Hamas
Pressure for Cease-Fire Builds on Hamas
By Saud Abu Ramadan, Sangwon Yoon and Jonathan FerzigerJul 22, 2014 9:37 PM ET
Diplomats stepped up pressure on Hamas to accept a cease-fire in Gaza
and end a conflict that has killed more than 600 people, as global
airlines suspended flights to Tel Aviv because of rocket fire.
U.S.
Secretary of State John Kerry, who’s in Cairo to promote the Egyptian
plan for a truce, said Hamas has “a fundamental choice to make.”
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said late yesterday that Hamas
agreed to a proposed cease-fire to be followed by five days of talks,
even though it rejected the Egyptian initiative last week while Israel accepted it. There was no immediate response from Hamas to the Palestinian Authority leader’s remarks.
Israel
sent troops into Gaza last week and it has been bombarding it for more
than two weeks, saying it aims to stop a barrage of rockets fired by
militants from the territory. U.S. aviation authorities yesterday
ordered the cancellation of flights to Tel Aviv because of the threat
from missiles, one of which landed near the city’s airport, and European
carriers including Lufthansa also called off flights.
Kerry and other diplomats are trying to end the third major
round of violence between Israel’s military and Gaza militants in five
years. Previous accords haven’t resolved fundamental issues including
the arsenals that the militants have amassed and Israel’s blockade on
Gaza. The embargo, along with Egypt’s closing of its border with the
territory, has battered Gaza’s economy and confined 1.8 million
Palestinians to a 140-square-mile (363-square-kilometer) patch of land.
Photographer: Hassan Mohammed/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, second left, meets with Egyptian Foreign Minister... Read More
Hamas Demands
Shortly before Kerry arrived in
Cairo, Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh said his group wouldn’t
back down without pledges the Israeli blockade will be lifted. He also
demanded that hundreds of Palestinians arrested in Israel’s recent sweep
of the West Bank be released.
The conflict in Gaza escalated
after the breakdown of U.S.- brokered peace talks between Israel and the
Palestinian Authority in April. Abbas responded to that by reaching an
accord with Hamas for a unity government to end their seven-year rift,
enraging Israel. The kidnap and murder of three Israeli teenagers, and
the suspected revenge killing of a Palestinian youth, added to the
tensions.
Abbas said late yesterday in a televised speech that Hamas and its patron Qatar agreed with Egypt
on the cease-fire plan. He pledged to continue to work together with
Hamas in running the joint government for Gaza and the West Bank and to
hold Israel responsible for the hundreds of dead.
Palestinians
are “sticking to unity and ending division,” Abbas said, adding that
they “will chase the war criminals who committed crimes against our
people.”
Israel occupied Gaza for almost 40 years before
withdrawing in 2005. It says trade restrictions remain in place to
prevent materials that can be used to attack Israel from reaching the
militants, pointing to the concrete-lined tunnels that have been built
to enable raids into Israel.
Kerry said yesterday that talks
will continue in the coming days “to see if we can find a way forward, a
way that ends the violence and then addresses the underlying causes.”
About
two-thirds of the Palestinians killed over the past two weeks are
civilians, including 154 children, Gaza health official Ashraf al-Qedra
said. Israel says Hamas uses civilians, including children, as human
shields. The number of Gazans seeking shelter from the fighting with the
UN Relief and Works Agency has exceeded 100,000, the agency said in an
e-mailed statement.
Soldiers Killed
At least 27
Israeli soldiers have been killed since ground troops entered Gaza last
week, the military said, more than double the toll during Israel’s last
incursion in 2009. Two Israeli civilians have been killed by rockets
since early July.
Israel said yesterday that an infantryman is
missing in Gaza, bearing the same name as a soldier Hamas militants say
they’re holding. Hamas hasn’t said whether the soldier is dead or alive.
Israel has in the past released Palestinian prisoners in return for the
freeing of soldiers seized by militant groups.
Israeli markets have been largely unaffected by the violence. The benchmark stock index extended gains yesterday, adding 0.4 percent, and the shekel is little changed since the conflict escalated on July 8.
Economic Risk
The
halting of flights to Tel Aviv, Israel’s commercial hub, shows the risk
of economic damage from the conflict, as militants in Gaza extend the
range of their rocket fire.
Israel’s Aviation Authority said the
last such cancellations in the city were during Iraq’s Scud missile
bombardment in the 1991 Gulf War. Transport Minister Israel Katz said
Ben Gurion airport remains safe.
“Hamas hasn’t had a lot of
success killing people with its rockets so it’s not a surprise that
they’re going after economic targets such as the airport,” said Rafi
Gozlan, chief economist at Israel Brokerage & Investments - IBI Ltd.
“Since our domestic carriers are flying, this is still manageable, but
it’s certainly going to have an impact on the third quarter.”
Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked Kerry to help restore flights,
according to a text message from his office, after the U.S. Federal
Aviation Administration’s decision to stop them. Ben Rhodes, the U.S.
deputy national security adviser, told CNN television that “the Israelis
have raised concerns,” adding that the White House is “not going to
overrule the FAA” on a flight security matter.
Kerry discussed the FAA’s action with Netanyahu yesterday, said Jen Psaki,
a U.S. State Department spokeswoman, in a statement. The “only
consideration” in stopping flights was “the safety and security of our
citizens,” she said.
Mike Bloomberg, the former mayor of New
York and majority shareholder of Bloomberg LP, which owns Bloomberg
News, said on Twitter that he plans to fly to Tel Aviv on Israel’s El Al
Airlines to demonstrate that it is safe to fly to the nation.
To contact the reporters on this story: Saud Abu Ramadan in Jerusalem at sramadan@bloomberg.net; Sangwon Yoon in Cairo at syoon32@bloomberg.net; Jonathan Ferziger in Tel Aviv at jferziger@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alaa Shahine at asalha@bloomberg.net Amy Teibel, Justin Blum
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