A 12-hour humanitarian ceasefire came into effect in the Gaza strip on Saturday, with the death toll of the offensive which entered its 20th day neared 900.
The Zionist entity and the Palestinian resistance said they would observe the temporary ceasefire, at 0500 GMT, after US Secretary of State John Kerry was unable to reach a lasting truce during talks Friday in Cairo.
In the hours leading up to the pause, however, the violence continued, with Israeli air strikes killing 23 people, among them four children and a paramedic, Gaza medical services said.
An Israeli air strike in southern Gaza killed 16 members of a single family, hours ahead of a 12-hour humanitarian ceasefire, medics said.
The strike slammed into a home in the southern city of Khan Yunis, emergency services spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra said, killing 16 members of the Najjar family, including women and children.
The first strike of Saturday killed an on-duty paramedic in Khan Yunis, Qudra added.
Saturday toll brought the total Palestinian martyred in the brutal offensive against the besieged enclave to 891, Qudra said.
The diplomatic push for a lasting truce is to resume from 0900 GMT on Saturday, when the foreign ministers of key players in the conflict are to gather for talks in Paris, including Kerry.
On Friday, the top US diplomat said in Cairo that both Tel Aviv and the resistance "still have some terminology" to agree to on a ceasefire, but added they had "fundamental framework" on a truce.
Under the proposal, once a humanitarian lull takes hold, delegations from the Israeli regime and the resistance would arrive in Cairo -- which has mediated past conflicts between the two sides -- for indirect talks that could lead to a lasting deal.
Source: AFP
| 26-07-2014 - 10:02 Last updated 26-07-2014 10:03 |
An Israeli air strike in southern Gaza hours before a humanitarian truce was declared killed 20 people, including 11 children, most of them from a single family, medics said.
The strike in southern Khan Younis hit the home of the Najjar family, killing at least 14 relatives, emergency services spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra said.
Another two members of the Abu Shahla family were killed, along with four other people, two of whom have yet to be identified.
The dead included 11 children, among them a one-year-old girl and a three-year-old boy, Qudra said.
Separately, the bodies of at least another 35 Palestinians were recovered from rubble across Gaza on Saturday, raising to over 900 the overall death toll of Israel's onslaught on the territory since July 8, medics said.
Emergency services spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra said the bodies were retrieved in the three hours since a humanitarian truce came into effect.
Thirteen bodies were recovered in Shejaiya in eastern Gaza City, 13 more in Deir al-Balah and Nusseirat in central Gaza, and nine in north Gaza.
The toll is expected to rise as bodies are pulled from the rubble of homes in some of the worst-hit parts of Gaza, in northern Beit Hanoun, eastern Shejaiya and Zeitoun, and southern Khan Younis.
(AFP, Al-Akhbar)
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