Analysts Warn of Quagmire:
Zionists Suffer Worst Losses in Gaza
GAZA CITY (Dispatches) – The occupying regime of Israel continued with its aggression against the besieged Gaza Strip for the 20th day on Sunday as the Palestinian death toll passed 1,100.
A ceasefire that began at 8 A.M. on Saturday collapsed 26 hours later when the Zionist regime announced it is resuming aerial, naval and ground strikes on Gaza.
A Hamas spokesman said that any ceasefire that doesn't ensure the pullout of occupying forces from Gaza and the evacuation of the wounded is not acceptable.
Early on Sunday, a Zionist soldier was killed by a mortar shell near the Gaza border. Two other Israeli soldiers who were previously wounded in the fighting died of their wounds on Saturday evening, bringing the occupying regime’s death toll to 43, the highest in recent history.
In Gaza, the total death toll neared 1,150 as the humanitarian ceasefire allowed rescue workers to recover bodies from buildings destroyed in Israeli strikes.
On Sunday afternoon, Hamas said "resistance groups” would agree to a new 24-hour truce starting at 2 p.m. local time. A Hamas official in Gaza released a statement saying that Hamas’s decision came "in response to the intervention of the United Nations” and out of understanding for the people of Gaza who are preparing for Eid al-Fitr, the holiday that ends Ramadan.
There was no immediate response from the occupying regime of Israel but it apparently rejected the proposal. Asked on a CNN program, whether Israel would accept the offer, the Zionist regime’s PM Benjamin Netanyahu replied, "Hamas doesn’t even accept its own ceasefire, it’s continuing to fire at us as we speak.”
On Sunday afternoon, sirens wailed in Israeli communities close to the border, warning of incoming rocket or mortar shells from Gaza.
The Zionist regime is now confronting the same kinds of divisive questions it faced in Lebanon: What are its goals in Gaza? And how long does it intend to remain there to achieve them?
"The more you drag on, the more you stay there, the more the exit strategy becomes a blur,” said Yossi Melman, an Israeli intelligence analyst. "We will be trapped there, and we will have more casualties. If we don’t have a clear vision of what we want to achieve, we unwittingly will find ourselves reoccupying Gaza again.”
The Zionist regime and its allies don’t want that. In Paris, envoys from Qatar, Turkey, France, Britain, Germany, Italy and the United States worked late into the night Saturday in an attempt to win an extension of the ceasefire, despite the reignited tensions.
They viewed a truce lasting several days — the goal of diplomatic efforts that fell short last week in Cairo — as a bridge to a sustainable ceasefire. The occupying regime of Israel wants to see Hamas demilitarized, while Hamas’s core demand is the lifting of Israel’s economic blockade of Gaza.
As a diplomatic breakthrough was sought, Gazans seized advantage of the pause in fighting. In the three hardest-hit towns, residents rushed back to gather belongings and search for missing relatives after 24 hours of intense fighting and heavy bombing by Israel that left deep impact craters where apartment blocks once stood. Whole neighborhoods were transformed into acres of twisted metal and concrete dust. More than 180 bodies were pulled from the rubble.
In the Shejaiyah neighborhood, east of central Gaza City, three brothers stood at the edge of a deep crater left by a large Israeli bomb. The day before it was their four-story apartment house, home to 30 family members. "We have nothing left,” said one of the brothers, Said Helou, 32, a baker.
Even as it faces diplomatic pressure to agree to a durable truce, the Zionist regime has given mixed signals about its exit strategy from Gaza.
Melman, the analyst, said he hoped there was "no hidden agenda to topple the Hamas regime,” because that could lead to radical militants taking control. "After Hamas, you could have ISIS,” he said, referring to the group that has seized large swaths of Iraq.
It would be virtually impossible, he added, to get Hamas to give up its weapons. In killing 43 Israeli soldiers, Hamas already believes it is the victor and has the upper hand, he said.
The UN-brokered deal that ended the Lebanon war called for Hezbollah to be disarmed. Today, it is believed to be stronger than ever, its rockets still pointed at Zionist targets.
A Hamas spokesman said that any ceasefire that doesn't ensure the pullout of occupying forces from Gaza and the evacuation of the wounded is not acceptable.
Early on Sunday, a Zionist soldier was killed by a mortar shell near the Gaza border. Two other Israeli soldiers who were previously wounded in the fighting died of their wounds on Saturday evening, bringing the occupying regime’s death toll to 43, the highest in recent history.
In Gaza, the total death toll neared 1,150 as the humanitarian ceasefire allowed rescue workers to recover bodies from buildings destroyed in Israeli strikes.
On Sunday afternoon, Hamas said "resistance groups” would agree to a new 24-hour truce starting at 2 p.m. local time. A Hamas official in Gaza released a statement saying that Hamas’s decision came "in response to the intervention of the United Nations” and out of understanding for the people of Gaza who are preparing for Eid al-Fitr, the holiday that ends Ramadan.
There was no immediate response from the occupying regime of Israel but it apparently rejected the proposal. Asked on a CNN program, whether Israel would accept the offer, the Zionist regime’s PM Benjamin Netanyahu replied, "Hamas doesn’t even accept its own ceasefire, it’s continuing to fire at us as we speak.”
On Sunday afternoon, sirens wailed in Israeli communities close to the border, warning of incoming rocket or mortar shells from Gaza.
The Zionist regime is now confronting the same kinds of divisive questions it faced in Lebanon: What are its goals in Gaza? And how long does it intend to remain there to achieve them?
"The more you drag on, the more you stay there, the more the exit strategy becomes a blur,” said Yossi Melman, an Israeli intelligence analyst. "We will be trapped there, and we will have more casualties. If we don’t have a clear vision of what we want to achieve, we unwittingly will find ourselves reoccupying Gaza again.”
The Zionist regime and its allies don’t want that. In Paris, envoys from Qatar, Turkey, France, Britain, Germany, Italy and the United States worked late into the night Saturday in an attempt to win an extension of the ceasefire, despite the reignited tensions.
They viewed a truce lasting several days — the goal of diplomatic efforts that fell short last week in Cairo — as a bridge to a sustainable ceasefire. The occupying regime of Israel wants to see Hamas demilitarized, while Hamas’s core demand is the lifting of Israel’s economic blockade of Gaza.
As a diplomatic breakthrough was sought, Gazans seized advantage of the pause in fighting. In the three hardest-hit towns, residents rushed back to gather belongings and search for missing relatives after 24 hours of intense fighting and heavy bombing by Israel that left deep impact craters where apartment blocks once stood. Whole neighborhoods were transformed into acres of twisted metal and concrete dust. More than 180 bodies were pulled from the rubble.
In the Shejaiyah neighborhood, east of central Gaza City, three brothers stood at the edge of a deep crater left by a large Israeli bomb. The day before it was their four-story apartment house, home to 30 family members. "We have nothing left,” said one of the brothers, Said Helou, 32, a baker.
Even as it faces diplomatic pressure to agree to a durable truce, the Zionist regime has given mixed signals about its exit strategy from Gaza.
Melman, the analyst, said he hoped there was "no hidden agenda to topple the Hamas regime,” because that could lead to radical militants taking control. "After Hamas, you could have ISIS,” he said, referring to the group that has seized large swaths of Iraq.
It would be virtually impossible, he added, to get Hamas to give up its weapons. In killing 43 Israeli soldiers, Hamas already believes it is the victor and has the upper hand, he said.
The UN-brokered deal that ended the Lebanon war called for Hezbollah to be disarmed. Today, it is believed to be stronger than ever, its rockets still pointed at Zionist targets.