Israeli envoys sent to US, Egypt for truce talks

[Mrs. Sharon B. Hodge]

Israeli envoys sent to US, Egypt for truce talks
By IBRAHIM BARZAK and MARK LAVIE


GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip – Top Israeli diplomats headed for Egypt and the United States on Friday in what appeared to be a final push toward a cease-fire to end Israel's punishing Gaza offensive against Hamas militants.

In the West Bank, United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon urged Israel to immediately stop its three-week-old war, meant to halt militant rocket fire on southern Israel from Gaza.
"I strongly urge Israeli leadership and government to declare a cease-fire unilaterally," he said from Ramallah, the seat of the West Bank government of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, Hamas' fierce rival. "It's time to think about a unilateral cease-fire from the Israeli government."

Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev dismissed the notion.

"I don't believe that there's a logical expectation in the international community that Israel unilaterally cease fire while Hamas would continue to target cities, trying to kill our people," he said.

Ban is on a weeklong trip to the region meant to promote a truce after both sides ignored a U.N. resolution demanding an immediate cease-fire. He will not meet with Gaza's Hamas rulers, who have been shunned by much of the international community since they violently overran Gaza in June 2007.

His comments came a day after Israeli forces shelled a U.N. compound in Gaza that had been sheltering hundreds of refugees from the fighting, sending thousands of tons of food aid up in flames.

Some 1,100 Palestinians have been killed since the war began on Dec. 27, including 346 children, according to the U.N. and Gaza health officials. Thirteen Israelis have been killed, four by rocket fire, according to the military.

A day after Israeli forces killed a senior Hamas official and shelled a U.N. compound, the Israeli military kept up its pressure on Hamas.

Before dawn Friday, Israeli aircraft struck about 40 targets all over Gaza, the military said. An official statement said targets included smuggling tunnels along the Egyptian border, a rocket launcher ready for firing and a mosque that housed a tunnel entrance and was also used to store arms.

Later, Palestinian medical officials reported an 11-year-old girl was killed in a shelling in northern Gaza and witnesses reported an air strike on a Gaza City mosque as people were headed there for Friday prayers. The Israeli military had no comment.

Militant rockets, meanwhile, struck five times in southern Israel, causing no injuries, the military said.

Chief Israeli negotiator Amos Gilad arrived in Cairo on Friday for his second visit in two days to seek clarifications and express Israeli views about the latest Egyptian proposal for a cease-fire.

And after midnight, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni left for Washington, where she was expected to sign a memorandum of understanding with the U.S. over ways to stop arms smuggling to Hamas. Before leaving, she made it clear that halting arms smuggling was a crucial part of any truce deal.

"Israel is going to retain its right to defend itself anyway, also when it comes to the smuggling of weapons, not only to rockets being fired at Israel," she said.

The Bush administration was racing in its final days to negotiate a deal on American support for mediation efforts under which the U.S. would give technical support and expertise to prevent Hamas from rearming, said U.S. and Israeli diplomats. The diplomats spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the talks.

Israel wants a total end to Hamas' rocket launches into Israel and an arms embargo on Gaza's militant rulers.

Hamas has demanded an immediate Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and the opening of blockaded border crossings.

"These are our demands and we don't accept any political movement that does not accept them," the movement's top political leader, Khaled Mashaal, said in a televised address from his headquarters in Damascus, Syria.

Intense Israeli military activity in Gaza on Thursday exacted a steep price from Hamas when Interior Minister Said Siam was killed in an airstrike. Siam was the commander of Hamas security forces and was widely feared in Gaza.

A small crowd of mourners buried Siam in Gaza City on Friday. His white-shrouded body was draped in a green Hamas flag and some of the people who carried it chanted, "Greetings from Hamas!" One man fired an assault rifle in the area in a traditional salute.

Siam was seen as a main architect of the violent Hamas takeover of the Gaza Strip in June 2007, when Hamas fighters expelled forces loyal to Western-backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. He was the highest Hamas official killed in the offensive.

"We are talking about a key person in terms of logistics in the field, and also in the political sense," said Bassem Zbeidy, a Hamas expert in the West Bank.

He called Siam's death a "huge loss for Hamas," but said the movement is easily capable of generating new leaders, often more radical than their predecessors.

Israel infuriated the U.N. Thursday when it shelled the word body's headquarters in Gaza City, where hundreds of Gazans were seeking cover from the fighting among food and supplies meant for refugees. The destruction added to what aid groups say is a humanitarian crisis in Gaza and ratcheted up tensions between Israel and the international community even as diplomats indicated progress in cease-fire talks.

The U.N. compound, made up of workshops and warehouses as well as offices, was struck about a half-dozen times over a roughly two-hour period while more than 700 civilians were sheltering there, said John Ging, head of Gaza operations for the U.N. Relief and Works Agency.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Hamas militants opened fire from the U.N. compound. "It is absolutely true that we were attacked from that place, but the consequences are very sad and we apologize for it," he said. The military said it was still investigating.

Ging called that explanation "total nonsense."
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Barzak reported from Gaza City; Lavie from Tel Aviv, Israel. Associated Press correspondent Edith M. Lederer contributed to this report from the United Nations.