Israel allowed fuel to reach the Gaza Strip’s sole power station yesterday, but kept border crossings used to bring in humanitarian and commercial supplies closed for a third consecutive day, Israeli officials said.
An EU official said an estimated 600,000 liters of industrial fuel would be pumped through the Nahal Oz border terminal to Gaza’s power station, enough to keep the plant running for several days.
The EU funds fuel deliveries to the power station.
Israeli military liaison official Peter Lerner confirmed the delivery of fuel but said other border crossings used to bring in supplies remained closed.
Israel closed those crossings on Wednesday, one day after Palestinian militants fired rockets into the Jewish state.
Gaza militants again fired two rockets into southern Israel on Thursday, causing no injuries but further straining a shaky, week-old truce. Despite the rocket attack, Israel dispatched an envoy to Egypt in hopes of negotiating a prisoner swap with Gaza’s ruling Islamic Hamas.
The Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a violent offshoot of moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah, claimed responsibility for firing the rockets. One exploded harmlessly in a field, the military said, refusing to disclose where the other landed.
A statement from the militant group demanded that Israel halt its military operations in the West Bank.
Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said Israel should retaliate.
“I am not interested in who fired and who didn’t fire at Israel,” she told reporters. “It is a violation, and Israel needs to respond immediately, militarily, for every violation.”
The truce, hammered out by Egypt over months of separate talks with Israel and Hamas, does not include the West Bank. On Tuesday, Islamic Jihad fired three rockets at Israel, wounding two people, linking the attack to an Israeli raid in the West Bank.
Previous truces have come apart quickly because Gaza militants claimed the right to retaliate for Israeli West Bank raids.
Instead of retaliating for the rocket attacks with airstrikes at Palestinian rocket squads, as it did routinely during the year since Hamas overran Gaza a year ago, Israel closed the crossings, where vital supplies are shipped into Gaza — restoring a blockade that has caused severe shortages.
That hits at the main interest of Hamas — ending the blockade and easing the hardships facing the people under its control. Hamas officials charged that by restoring the blockade, Israel is violating the truce. Underlining the high level of distrust, Palestinians formed a committee to track Israeli violations.
At a meeting on Wednesday, Israeli defense officials discussed how to proceed once the crossings are reopened. According to the same officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the meetings were closed, Israel might reset the truce clock each time it closes the crossings in response to a Palestinian violation.
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