Abbas Fights to Restore Ceasefire As Airstrikes Pound Northern Gaza

By Donald Macintyre

The Israel Air Force launched a fresh round of air strikes on militant targets in Gaza yesterday as the Palestinian President, Mahmoud Abbas, struggled to raise dwindling hopes of restoring the shattered ceasefire between Hamas and Israel.

Israeli aircraft launched two attacks in northern Gaza and two in central Gaza the day after Shirel Friedman, a woman in the border town of Sderot, became the ninth Israeli to be killed in a Qassam rocket attack since 2000. The Army said early today it had launched two fresh attacks in northern and southern Gaza.

Mr Abbas was hoping to open talks with Hamas leaders on the mounting conflict with Israel and the fragile ceasefire between Hamas and Fatah after more than a week of internal fighting that cost at least 47 Palestinian lives. Palestinian medics say at least 34 Palestinians have been killed in the air strikes since Wednesday last week, the majority of which, but by no means all, were militants. Palestinian sources said at least seven people were wounded in yesterday’s four airstrikes, in Israel’s response to about 150 rocket attacks in the past week.

Ahmed Youssef, a Hamas aide to the Palestinian Prime Minister, Ismail Haniyeh, suggested that a "comprehensive ceasefire" was possible if Israel was willing to operate it in the West Bank as well as Gaza. Amir Peretz, the Defence Minister and a native of Sderot, said: "Hamas … is leading the violence. We don’t intend on stopping. We will stop at the point that the rockets stop."

Ephraim Sneh, the Deputy Defence Minister, said "no one" in Hamas, including Mr Haniyeh, was immune from strikes.

The death on Monday night of Ms Friedman, 32, has added to a sense of fear and frustration among Sderot’s 25,000 residents. Police said yesterday that about half had left the town to escape the rockets, either on their own initiative or under a government- sponsored temporary evacuation plan. Most schools have been closed for the past 10 days.

Some of those who remained staged an angry demonstration outside the town hall after Ms Friedman died on the way to hospital from shrapnel wounds in her legs. She had been walking near a parked BMW which was hit by a Qassam at about 8pm.

Ms Friedman was in some ways typical of Sderot, an immigrant "development town" which was started in the 1950s with Jews mainly from Morocco and Romania. Continued exposure to Qassams, as the nearest large Israeli community to Gaza, has compounded the economic hardship and high unemployment rates – about 30 per cent.

According to a friend, Edna Sela, Ms Friedman, whose family came from Romania, had worked on the controversial Wisconsin plan designed to force people off benefits and into low-paid jobs. Ms Sela, 55, who is still on the project, said: "She was sent from job to job but she left because she couldn’t take the physical work. She had no money." She said that Ms Friedman’s mother, who is also on the plan, gave her money when she could.

Ms Sela added: "She was a very nice person, a beautiful person. She loved being outside. She was a bit naive. I met her just by the market with her mother yesterday and I told her, ‘You should go home because they will start shooting Qassams at night’. But she said, ‘God will not kill me’."

Among several residents seeking an even tougher response was Yaffa Malcha, 44, a hairdresser, who said: "They should destroy every house where a Qassam has been fired from. They are shooting at civilians and I don’t care if there are women and children there."

A shopkeeper, Amnon Zakai, 46, said: "If this was Ashkelon, never mind Tel Aviv, they would be doing something." Arto Argonov, 37, who works in a factory, said: "Everybody is afraid." Echoing one reported plan by the Israel Defence Forces, he added: "The army should create a buffer zone in the [Gaza] area that they are shooting from."

(c) 2007 Independent, The; London (UK). Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.