At 05:00 (08:00 local) on Tuesday (5/8/14) both Israel and Hamas began a
72 hour cease-fire. At around 18:00 (21:00 local) on Thursday (7/8/14) a
Hamas spokesman gave a televised address in which he announced that
Hamas would resume military action when the cease-fire ended at 05:00
(08:00 local) on Friday (8/8/14) unless all of Hamas' demands were met.
As the only three demands that Israel have not agreed to are the opening
of an airport in Gaza, the opening of a seaport in Gaza and the free
movement of Gazans into Israel this was essentially Hamas announcing
that it was going to resume attacks on Israel. After all as Hamas has
spent the last two months doing everything in its power to attack Israel
and kill Israelis there is no way on earth Israel is going to agree to
make it easier for Hamas to re-arm and intensify its attacks.
As it turns out Islamic Jihad actually fired first launching mortars
into Israel at around 01:00 (04:00 local) on Friday morning breaking the
cease-fire by around 4 hours. However as soon as the cease-fire expired
Hamas also resumed rocket fire with 76 rockets being fired into Israel
since the cease-fire expired. Of those 20% have fallen short and landed
in Gaza. Each one of those rockets represents what is termed an
indiscriminate, area weapon. As such their use against civilian areas in
Israel each constitutes an individual war crime. Under the self-defence
principle of meeting force with equal force each rocket entitles Israel
to use indiscriminate, area weapons such as artillery against civilian
areas in Gaza without being accused of committing war crimes.
So far Israel has held back from exercising that right and has limited
its response to guided air-power striking 70 targets in Gaza since the
end of the cease-fire. The overwhelming majority of these targets have
been rocket launch sites. Unlike Qassam rockets that can be launched
from pretty much anywhere in a matter of moments the more advanced rockets
that Hamas have been using in this conflict need specialised launch
sites which are essentially mini-missile silos which can take several
days to set up. So once these launch sites have been identified by
having rockets fired from them the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) move in
quickly to destroy them in order to prevent them being used in future
attacks.
Israel has also been carrying out limited strikes against senior Hamas
personnel and weapons stores The most high profile of these has probably
been the overnight attack on the al-Qassam Mosque in which senior Hamas
official Moaaz Zaid was killed. Although I cannot account for every
single air-strike as far as I can tell when attacking homes and other
civilians buildings the IDF have resumed the practise of issuing a
telephone warning followed by a dummy 'roof knock' strike on the
building in order to allow civilians to evacuate. Of course by providing
these warnings the IDF are also making it a lot easier for their
intended targets to escape. As a result there is a debate as to whether
Israel is prepared to simply destroy Hamas militants homes rather then
killing civilians in an attempt to kill them. Destroying military
officials homes like this is most certainly allowed under the rules of
war and to me at least it seems highly preferable to killing civilians
even if it does mean that it is likely to extend the conflict.
In terms of peace talks Hamas' decision to resume attacks left the
Israeli delegation with little choice other then to leave Egypt in
protest. However the Palestinian delegation remain in Egypt and the
Israeli delegation have indicated to the mediators that they could be
prepared to return if the circumstances permit. I am actually quite
comfortable with this situation provided the Palestinian delegation is
prepared to make progress. After all it is impossible to argue that it
is anything other then Hamas' inflexibility that is providing the main
sticking point at this time.
(Originally Posted) 16:05 on 9/8/14 (UK date).
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