As the quarter opened, Israeli and Palestinian Authority (PA) negotiating teams created at the 11/07 Annapolis summit were holding regular meetings to discuss final status. Israel, meanwhile, maintained an extremely tight seal on Gaza following Hamas’s 1/23– 2/3 breach of the Gaza-Egypt border (see Quarterly Update in JPS 147); no exports were permitted and only very limited humanitarian imports were allowed. During the day, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) makes a ground incursion into Rafah, clashing with local gunmen, killing 1 Hamas mbr., wounding 7 Palestinians (including 1 bystander). In the West Bank, the IDF conducts arrest raids, house searches in ‘Ayn al-Sultan refugee camp (r.c.) nr. Jericho, nr. Nablus. A Palestinian resistance mbr. wounded during a 2/11 IDF raid on Wadi al-Silqa dies. An Islamic Jihad mbr. dies of injuries sustained on 2/15 when a mortar he was preparing exploded prematurely. (WP 2/17; OCHA 2/20; PCHR 2/21; OCHA 3/4)
Saturday, February 16, 2008