GAZA CITY: A humanitarian truce in Gaza collapsed only hours after it began on Friday amid a deadly new wave of violence and the apparent capture by Hamas of an Israeli soldier.
Intensive shelling killed more than 60 people in southern Gaza hours into the truce, which began at 8am and was due to last 72 hours.
But the ceasefire was short-lived, with Hamas accusing Israel of breaking it and the Jewish state saying it was responding to rocket fire.
With Israel’s security cabinet reported to be meeting on Friday night, the chances of a durable truce seemed as remote as ever after the probable capture of Israeli Second Lieutenant Hadar Goldin, 23.
The military also announced that two soldiers had been killed in the same incident near the southern city of Rafah.
“Our initial indications suggest a soldier has been abducted by terrorists in an incident where terrorists breached the ceasefire,” according to army spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Peter Lerner.
60 Palestinians killed in renewed shelling
He said a suicide bomber blew himself up, adding that first reports “indicate that a soldier was seized”.
Friday’s short truce gave brief respite to people in the battered Strip from fighting that has killed more than 1,500 on the Palestinian side, mostly civilians, and 63 Israeli soldiers and three civilians on the other.
Within hours, air raid sirens were heard on the Israeli side, and heavy shelling resumed in Rafah, killing at least 62 people and wounding more than 350, medics said.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office accused Hamas and other Gaza militants of “flagrantly violating” the ceasefire.
Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhum riposted that “it is the (Israeli) occupation which violated the ceasefire. The Palestinian resistance acted based on... the right to self defence.”
Netanyahu’s office said the premier spoke to US Secretary of State John Kerry by phone.
Washington blamed Hamas for the breakdown of the ceasefire and accused it of launching a “barbaric” attack to capture the Israeli soldier.
Kerry demanded that Hamas “immediately and unconditionally release the missing Israeli soldier”, as did UN chief Ban Ki-moon.
He had said that once the ceasefire was under way, Israeli and Palestinian representatives, including from Hamas, would begin talks in Cairo on a more durable truce.
Published in Dawn, Aug 2nd , 2014
