Humanitarian Truce Begins In Gaza After Seven Weeks War (image-instagram/mahmoudhamda)
After prolonged negotiations and delay of at least 24 hours, a four day humanitarian truce between Hamas and Israel has begun. The truce comes after seven weeks of war that destroyed the besieged enclave of Gaza. Ahead of the beginning of the Qatar-mediated truce, the Gaza strip endured a night of intensified bombardment from air, land and sea, as per UN report.
The halt in fighting was promised in exchange of dozens of hostages held by militants in Gaza in return for Palestinians imprisoned by Israel. Al Jazeera correspondent has confirmed that the truce has begun and the attacks are ceased for the moment. Qatar will monitor the truce from the operation rooms installed in Doha where they will receive real-time information from Gaza. Qatar hopes to extend the truce beyond four days. Gaza is expected to witness huge number of aid trucks entering from today. 200 trucks might enter the besieged enclave today carrying 140,000 liters of fuel and at least four trucks of gas.
While Israel Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu has said that he will press ahead with the war after the cease-fire expires, reports AP. The truce deal was reached in weeks of indirect negotiation with Qatar serving as the mediator. The releases are to take place in stages over the next four days.
In the beginning hours of the truce, first three aid trucks have entered Gaza by crossing the Rafah border. Two of them carries fuel and the other one carries gas, reports Al Jazeera.
The first group of Israel captives will be released at about 4 pm local time and this includes 13 women and children. The Red cross will handover the prisoners to the Israel military through the Rafah border. Then the captives will be taken to hospitals in Tel Aviv for physical and psychological tests. Thirty nine Palestinian prisoners held captive in Israel jails and 13 captives in Gaza will be released as part of the swap for the first day. The Palestinian captives will be taken from two Israeli prisons – Damon and Megiddo.
Dozens of Palestinian families has begun returning home in the southern areas of the Gaza strip after the start of the truce.
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Meanwhile, the Israel military has warned the Palestinians to not to attempt to return to their homes in the northern part of Gaza. Arabic leaflets were dropped on Friday over southern Gaza stating that the war has not ended yet and the people should remain in place.
“Returning to the north is prohibited and very dangerous,” the leaflets said. “Your fate and the fate of your families is in your hands. We have warned you,” reports AP.
