The Truce Holds
Room hit by Grad rocket
The 5 month truce between Israel and Hamas has reduced the violence but not ended it. With each flare-up, it is clear that the term “truce” has taken on a diplomatic meaning distinct from actual events on the ground. The media has adopted this definition of the truce. News sources use terms like “shaky,” under “pressure,” or “deteriorating” to describe outright violations of the truce.
On Nov. 14, an AP story, “Gaza truce shaky amid rockets, airstrike,” noted that 11 militants have been killed and 140 rockets and mortars have been fired in the recent outbreak of violence.
Deutsche Agenteur headlined its piece, “Gaza truce deteriorating amid rocket barrage, airstrike.”
The International Herald Tribune’s piece on Nov. 13, “Gaza clash puts new pressure on truce,” described the killing of four Hamas gunmen in a gun battle as “further testing a shaky truce that took effect in June.”
The LA Times on Nov. 13 saw it this way as well, reporting in “Israel-Gaza border clash further threatens truce” that the killing of the gunmen was “the second such incident in about a week.” The LA Times noted:
The fighting raised the possibility that the truce will break down or will not be renewed when it expires next month, bringing a new round of heavy fighting in the region as the United States and Israel change administrations.
… Israel tightened a blockade of Gaza but eased it in June after the Egyptian-brokered truce took hold.
The truce largely held, until this month. On Nov. 4, Israeli forces making their first incursion into Gaza since June destroyed a border tunnel they believed militants had planned to use to capture Israeli soldiers. Six Palestinian militants were killed in the fighting that day.
Hamas continues to build its arsenal, sporadically fire salvos of rockets and mortars and dig tunnels to kidnap Israeli soldiers. Israel for its part continues to conduct air strikes and raids into Gazan territory in response to identified threats. And the truce continues.
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