Israel on Sunday reopened several border crossings into the Gaza Strip, following a four-day closure in response to truce-violating rocket attacks from the Palestinian enclave.
The Sufa commercial crossing, the Nahal Oz fuel terminal, the Erez crossing and the Karni crossing resumed operations on Sunday morning, with some restrictions, said an Israeli military spokesman.
The Jewish state opened its Gaza border crossings after an Egypt-brokered ceasefire with militant groups in the Hamas-ruled strip came into effect on June 19, but closed them again on Wednesday after the Islamic Jihad (Holy War) fired three Qassam rockets at Sderot town on Tuesday in revenge for the killing of one of its militants in the West Bank.
The ceasefire calls for the Gaza militants to stop rocket fire and other attacks against Israel and for Israel to gradually lift its siege on the enclave. But the deal does not apply to the West Bank.
Israel on Sunday reopened several border crossings into the Gaza Strip, following a four-day closure in response to truce-violating rocket attacks from the Palestinian enclave. Israel had been expected to reopen the crossings on Friday, but a high-level security meeting late Thursday decided to drop the plan, while greenlighting the transfer of 600,000 liters of industrial fuel into the Strip for its sole power plant.
Senior Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahar said in an interview published Saturday that his group will arrest anyone who tries to break the ceasefire and confiscate their weapons whether they are from Hamas or the Islamic Jihad.
Israel besieged the Gaza Strip a year ago after Hamas violently seized control of the territory, and then tightened the blockade in response to continued rocket attacks, causing widespread shortages of basic goods in the enclave.
The Rafah border crossing between the Gaza Strip and Egypt, the main gateway to the outside world for some 1.4 million Gaza residents, remains closed. Israeli officials have said that it will be opened after Hamas returns Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit who was captured two years ago.
Source:Xinhua
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