Gaza ceasefire holds to second day

A ceasefire in the Gaza Strip appeared to be holding this morning, stopping Palestinian rocket fire and Israeli operations for the first time in five months.

It took several hours for word of the truce, which took effect at 6am (4am Irish time) yesterday, to filter down to Palestinian rocket squads.

They fired 11 rockets at Israel between the start and 10am (8am Irish time), when the last rocket exploded near the Israeli town of Sderot.

Both sides appeared to be serious about making the truce work. One of the last holdouts, the violent Islamic Jihad, publicly joined the stand-down.

“We will respect this (national) agreement so long as Israel is committed,” Islamic Jihad official Khaled al-Batch said after nightfall yesterday.

But Israeli troops in the West Bank shot dead at least one member of a militant group with ties to Gaza’s Popular Resistance Committees early today, raising concerns that there could be a violent response from the strip.

The army said troops operating in the northern West Bank town of Qabatiya shot two armed Palestinians.

An official from the local Salah A-Din Committees group, however said one of the dead was a local militant leader, while the other was a woman passer-by.

“We shall give an answer to this, both in the West Bank and in the Gaza Strip,” the official, Yasser Mazal, said.

Militant groups based in Gaza have warned that the latest ceasefire could collapse unless Israel also halts military operations in the West Bank.

The military said it arrested a total of 15 alleged militants in overnight operations throughout the West Bank.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, speaking before the rocket fire ceased, called for patience. Later yesterday, his foreign minister, Tzipi Livni, was hopeful.

“It was clear from the beginning that when you say ’6 in the morning,’ it will be difficult to get things started. But we have to give it a chance,” she said.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas called Olmert late Saturday with news that the factions had agreed to a truce, and Olmert accepted it.

Abbas ordered his security forces to patrol the Gaza border yesterday afternoon to stop the rocket attacks.

“The instructions are clear. Anyone violating the national agreement will be considered to be breaking the law,” said Lieutenant General Abdel Razek Mejaidie, Abbas’ security adviser.

Security officers fanned out across northern Gaza, taking up positions at major intersections with orders to stop anyone suspicious.

Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas said he had contacted the leaders of all the Palestinian factions yesterday, and they reassured him they were committed to the truce.

Palestinian officials said that Hamas supreme leader Khaled Mashaal, in Cairo for talks with Egyptian mediators about defusing Israeli-Palestinian tension, played a role in speeding up the agreement.

Also yesterday, Mashaal backed away from a six-month deadline he set the day before for achieving a Palestinian state or else the militant group would launch a new uprising against Israel.

But he warned during an Egyptian television interview aired yesterday if negotiations were ignored, Palestinians would “carry on their struggle”.

In another optimistic sign, the Israeli army was to renew security coordination with Palestinian forces for the first time since the Hamas-led government took office in March, security officials said.

The truce agreement, if it holds, would be a coup for Abbas, who has been trying for months to end the violence in Gaza that has killed 300 Palestinians, scores of them civilians. Five Israelis were also killed in the violence.

Livni indicated that only peace talks would solidify the truce. “History teaches us that if this kind of ceasefire with the Palestinians isn’t accompanied by something else, it will deteriorate,” she said.

A ceasefire in Gaza is part of a broad package Abbas is trying to put together in the hope of restoring hundreds of millions of euro in funding Western donors cut off to pressure Hamas to recognise Israel and renounce violence.