An Offering, An Acceptance and A Rejection to the Peace of Gaza

Egypt has offered a truce proposal to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that has been accepted by Israel but rejected by Hamas. Hamas claims it was not consulted on the agreement which it claims offers nothing to the people of Gaza. After the proposal was announced, rockets were sent into Israel. The Jewish state, in accepting the Egyptian written agreement,  has warned that should Hamas not accept the terms of the peace, it will respond to future Hamas attacks with greater fury.

The cease-fire agreement put forward by Egypt's foreign ministry, calls for a truce in the violence and for high-level delegations from Israel and the Palestinian factions to meet in Cairo within 48-hours to consolidate the cease-fire with "confidence-building measures", Reuters reported. But Hamas has maintained throughout the eight-day conflict that any peace must include an end to Israel's blockade of Gaza and a re-commitment to a peace reached back in 2012. According to Reuters reports, Hamas also wants Egypt to ease restrictions at its Rafah crossing with Gaza imposed by Egypt's military after the Islamist Morsi was ousted.

Will Hamas yield? Will a peace emerge? That Hamas has also made demands of the truce proposers suggest future complexities to winning the peace of Gaza. For these reasons, I opined on this Blog yesterday that perhaps Turkey would  best mediate the Gaza peace. But there is hope. Hamas appears to be open for further negotiations. To the innocents of Gaza and Israel, we pray for a quick and lasting peace. But reality and the present state of affairs in the Middle East suggest a longer and wider conflict.