Hamas Supporters Celebrate 'Victory' in Gaza City - The New York Times
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A mother embracing her children after an Israeli warplane bombed the tower they live in on Thursday.Samar Abu Elouf for The New York Times
JERUSALEM — A cease-fire between Israel and Hamas took effect early Friday morning, hours after both sides agreed to end more than 10 days of fighting that had claimed hundreds of lives.
The truce, mediated by Egypt, began at 2 a.m. in Israel — 7 p.m. Thursday in the Eastern United States — as people on either side of the divide watched nervously to see whether it would hold.
In Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office announced on Thursday evening that his security cabinet had voted unanimously to accept the Egyptian proposal, and officials of Hamas, the militant group that controls Gaza, confirmed that it, too, had accepted. But each side cautioned that its compliance could depend on the other’s actions.
In a broadcast address from the White House, President Biden lamented “the tragic deaths of so many civilians, including children,” and lauded Israeli and Egyptian officials. Noting that he had spoken with Mr. Netanyahu six times during the crisis, he said, “I commend him for the decision to bring the current hostilities to a close in less than 11 days.”
He vowed to marshal international resources to rebuild Gaza, adding, “We will do this in full partnership with the Palestinian Authority — not Hamas, the Authority — in a manner that does not permit Hamas to restock its arsenal.”
The Palestinian Authority is a semiautonomous body that exercises partial jurisdiction in parts of the occupied territories. Hamas controls Gaza, and is considered a terrorist organization by the United States and others.
As morning dawned with no reported violations of the truce, both sides were beginning to take stock of the deadliest Israeli-Palestinian fighting in seven years. Since May 10, Hamas has fired rockets into Israel, and Israel has bombed targets in Gaza. Sirens sounded in Israeli towns bordering the Gaza Strip in the minutes after the Israeli announcement, indicating that militants were continuing to fire rockets as the cease-fire approached.
Diplomats from Egypt, Qatar and the United Nations have mediated intensively between Hamas and Israel, which do not talk to each other directly, amid growing international pressure to stop the fighting, and both sides said this week that they were open to a cease-fire.
The Israeli aerial and artillery campaign has killed more than 230 people in Gaza, many of them civilians, and badly damaged the impoverished territory’s infrastructure, including the fresh water and sewer systems, the electrical grid, hospitals, schools and roads. The primary target has been Hamas’s extensive network of tunnels for moving fighters and munitions, and Israel has also sought to kill Hamas leaders and fighters.
More than 4,000 rockets have been fired at Israel from Gaza since May 10, killing 12 people, mostly civilians.
Mr. Netanyahu met on Thursday with his security cabinet to review how far the military had gone in damaging Hamas, including destroying its network of tunnels and its arsenal of rockets and launchers. He and other Israeli officials had insisted that the bombardment of Gaza would continue as long as it took to safeguard Israeli security.
A home in Ashkelon in southern Israel on Thursday that was damaged in a rocket attack from the the Gaza strip.Dan Balilty for The New York Times
Hamas and Israel have been engaged in some form of conflict since the Palestinian group was founded in the 1980s. This particular round of military action began as Hamas fired a barrage of rockets at Jerusalem in response to several police raids on the Aqsa Mosque, one of the holiest sites in Islam, and the planned evictions of several Palestinian families from their homes in the city.
Even if the fighting pauses, its underlying causes remain: the battle over land rights in Jerusalem and the West Bank, religious tensions in the Old City of Jerusalem and the absence of a peace process to resolve the conflict. Gaza remains under a punishing blockade by Israel and Egypt.
Although the conflict forged a rare moment of unity among Palestinians across the West Bank, Israel and Gaza, it remains unclear whether it will significantly alter their standing and sense of oppression.
It also led to days of violent attacks within Israel by Arab and Jewish mobs, and highlighted decades of frustration among Arab citizens of Israel who account for about 20 percent of the population and face frequent discrimination.
Residents of Gaza survey the damage to their homes.Hosam Salem for The New York Times
The United States is planning to be at the forefront of an international response to help rebuild Gaza, an effort that was likely to cost billions of dollars and include restoring health and education services and other reconstruction, a senior Biden administration official said on Thursday.
The administration is also considering how to foster relations and coordination among Palestinian political factions in Gaza and the West Bank. The rivalry between the Palestinian Authority, which exerts partial control in parts of the occupied territories, and Hamas, which governs Gaza and is considered by the United States and others as a terrorist group, has been a major obstacle in international efforts to aid the Palestinian people.
Rebuilding Gaza is a necessary part of the diplomacy — not only to help residents, but also because officials and experts said it could help create leverage with Hamas, which has lost popularity among residents who criticize its authoritarian approach and poor administration.
But Dennis B. Ross, a veteran American negotiator of peace efforts between Israel and the Palestinians, said that international donors would be wary of financing a costly reconstruction effort without assurances that any investments would not go to waste — as they all but certainly would if Hamas reignited hostilities that would draw a harsh response from Israel.
Similar warnings were posed in 2014, after an eight-week war between Israel and Hamas damaged more than 170,000 homes in Gaza, displacing over a quarter of its population. The international community created a monitoring system to oversee the rebuilding efforts and ensure that Hamas was unable to import supplies that could be used as weapons.
A Brookings Institution analysis concluded in 2017 that the reconstruction effort largely failed because of opposition to Hamas from Israel, but also from Egypt, which opposes the militants’ ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.
Restricted access to Gaza — as enforced by Egypt and an Israeli blockade — limited building supplies, humanitarian assistance and other equipment to the area, the analysis concluded. At the same time, the analysis found, many Arab states that also opposed Hamas’s ties to the Muslim Brotherhood failed to fulfill their pledges of funds.
Mr. Ross said that any future monitoring system would need to be an effective, round-the-clock endeavor that would halt reconstruction if Hamas was found to be storing, building or preparing to launch rockets.
“The issue is massive reconstruction for no rockets,” Mr. Ross said. “There has to be enough oversight of this process to know that it’s working the way it’s intended. And the minute you see irregularities, everything stops.”
Palestinians took to the streets and celebrated in Gaza after the cease-fire was announced.Hosam Salem for The New York Times
GAZA CITY — As the cease-fire between Israel and Hamas took effect at 2 a.m. local time on Friday, thousands of Palestinians gathered in the streets of Gaza City to celebrate what Hamas supporters were calling a defeat of the Israeli forces.
With the skies free from the threat of Israeli bombardment for the first time since May 10, loudspeakers at mosques blared “God is great,” a chant more often heard during holidays such as Eid al-Fitr, which marks the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Voices on the speakers called on residents to come out “to celebrate the victory,” while some Hamas supporters passed out sweets and others toted weapons on their shoulders, occasionally firing into the air.
“I feel we won,” said Ibrahim Hamdan, 26, adding that barrages of rocket attacks by Hamas had forced Israel to accept the cease-fire.
“It’s the first time that the resistance has hurt the enemy,” he said.
Ibrahim al Najjar, a 26-year-old who joined the rally with two friends, said Hamas had achieved a milestone when its rockets reached Tel Aviv, the bustling Israeli coastal city that for the first time last week found itself in the militants’ firing line, with Israeli beachgoers forced to scurry to safety.
“It’s the most luxurious victory because at least we struck Tel Aviv,” al Najjar said. “I wasn’t as happy on my wedding day as I was when they hit Tel Aviv.”
Some Hamas supporters chanted, “We are Mohammed Deif’s men,” referring to the Hamas military commander whom Israeli officials said they had been trying to kill, so far without apparent success.
But the celebratory mood belied the devastation in Gaza, where Israeli airstrikes killed more than 200 Palestinians, destroyed buildings, left huge swaths of the territory without electricity or water, and forced tens of thousands to flee their homes. Some in the crowd questioned what the conflict had accomplished.
Ramadan Smama came out not to celebrate, he said, but to take in the destruction. The 53-year-old said that he admired the growing capabilities of Hamas’s arsenal of rockets, but said it was too soon to tell whether the fighting would improve life for the two million people of Gaza.
“I don’t see achievements,” he said, “but I hope there will be achievements.”
Northern Gaza StripHosam Salem for The New York Times
Khan Yunis, Gaza StripSamar Abu Elouf for The New York Times
Ashkelon, IsraelDan Balilty for The New York Times
Northern Gaza StripHosam Salem for The New York Times
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