Israel mulls truce but says assault may last weeks
Israel on December 30 mulled a proposed 48-hour truce as world leaders stepped up calls for an end to the violence and warplanes pummeled Hamas targets in the battered Gaza Strip for a fourth day. But Israeli officials warned that the onslaught, which has killed at least 368 Palestinians, could continue for weeks, while Hamas militants remained defiant, firing more deadly rockets into Israel and threatening to step up the attacks.
"We tell the leaders of the enemy - if you continue with your assault, we will hit with our rockets further than the cities we have hit so far," a masked spokesman for the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, the Hamas armed wing, said in televised comments.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was meeting his foreign and defense ministers to consider a French proposal for a 48-hour truce in Gaza, a senior official said. And US President George W. Bush spoke with Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas to discuss a "sustainable ceasefire."
"What we want is not a ceasefire but a stop to terrorism," said President Shimon Peres.
Accompanying Peres on a tour of the Israeli High Command headquarters, armed forces Chief of Staff Lieutenant General Gabi Ashkenazi said: "It is our intention to continue this operation in an urgent manner to improve the security situation for the residents of the south."
Infrastructure Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer warned a ceasefire would allow Hamas "to regain strength, recover from the shock and prepare an even stronger attack against Israel."
"There is no reason that we would accept a ceasefire at this stage," he told AFP.
With tanks and troops massed on the Gaza border, the Israeli military said ground forces are ready to join what politicians have warned would be a prolonged offensive.
Olmert said the bombardment so far was "the first of several stages approved by the security cabinet," while deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai warned the offensive - one of Israel's deadliest against Gaza - could turn into "weeks of combat."
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice renewed calls for a halt to the fighting in a telephone conversation, Moscow said.
World leaders have expressed serious concern about the humanitarian situation in Gaza, a tiny, aid-dependent territory of 1.5 million which Israel has virtually sealed off since Hamas seized power in June last year.
Israel opened one of its crossings into Gaza for a third consecutive day on Tuesday, the defense ministry said, adding that a total of 179 truckloads of humanitarian supplies and 10 ambulances were allowed into the Palestinian enclave since the military operation started.
In Gaza City, residents picked through rubble and broken glass after a night which saw Israel hammer the overcrowded territory with some 40 strikes on Hamas buildings, training camps and rocket launching sites.
"It was a night of horror, the way the earth shook," said Iyad al-Sayagh , a mother who lives in the area. Children again fell victim to Israel's bombardment, with two sisters dying when a missile slammed onto a donkey cart in northern Gaza.
Four days of intensive bombardment have killed several senior Hamas officials and reduced much of the Islamist movement's infrastructure in Gaza to rubble, but have failed to stop rocket fire.
Three Israelis - two civilians and one soldier - were killed on Monday by rockets fired from Gaza, with one slamming into the southern port city of Ashdod more than 30 kilometers (18 miles) from the border. Hamas has threatened to carry out suicide attacks inside Israel for the first time since January 2005.
Since the massive aerial attack was unleashed on Saturday in a bid to halt persistent rocket fire from Gaza, at least 368 Palestinians, including 39 children, have been killed and 1,720 wounded, Gaza medics say.
Palestinian militants have also fired more than 250 rockets and mortar shells, killing four people inside Israel and wounding around two-dozen more.
Israel's offensive followed days of rising violence after a tenuous six-month truce in and around Gaza ended on December 19. It also comes ahead of early parliamentary elections in Israel called for February 10.
Source: www.defensenews.com
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