Finally, after a 22-day assault in which more than 1,200 Palestinians and 13 Israelis were killed, there is some hope for Gaza. Facing demands for war crimes investigations, Israel declared last night an unilateral ceasefire. And today Hamas and other Palestinian militant groups announced an immediate week-long ceasefire in Cairo where President Mubarak of Egypt had invited the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to meet with the French President Nicolas Sarkozy to discuss Gaza. Other leaders from Britain, Germany, Italy and Turkey, as well as the U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon were also present in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh to coordinate policy on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The United States was absent one hopes due to the timing, just two days before the inauguration of its new president.
While the shape of any lasting peace is far from clear, the immediate topics were to be the interdiction of the smuggling of arms into Gaza and its reconstruction after the Israeli air and land attack, which has left large areas of in ruins and without basic services like potable water and electricity.Even though the whole world is hoping the ceasefire remains and the reconstruction of Gaza goes ahead, one cannot but wonder what all the destruction and all the deaths have accomplished. As a Palestinian said: “In the end the innocents were killed and nobody won.”
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