Cairo: While the fighting in Gaza rages on, the offensive has killed at least 1,028 Palestinians, about half of them civilians, including 300 children and teenagers, Gaza Health Ministry officials said.
The toll included 68 Palestinians who were killed or died of wounds Wednesday. More than 4,500 Palestinians have been wounded, medical officials said. Thirteen Israelis have also been killed, four by rocket fire from Gaza.
Egypt and Hamas are close to a deal for a 10-day cease-fire between Israel and the Palestinian militant group in Gaza, where the death toll from the Israeli offensive exceeded 1,000, officials said Wednesday.
Egyptian and Hamas officials expressed optimism that an agreement for a temporary halt in fighting could be sealed soon and presented to Israel.
But even if all sides sign on, further talks will be needed to resolve contentious disputes over policing Gaza's borders and ensure a longer-term truce.
"We're working with Hamas and we're working with the Israeli side. We hope to reach an outcome soon," Egyptian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hossam Zaki told the British Broadcasting Corp.
Battles picked up early Thursday north and south of Gaza City, where explosions and gunfire could be heard.
Also, seven were killed in two separate airstrikes. Hospital officials said four militants died in an airstrike shortly after midnight in southern Gaza, and three people were killed an hour later in Gaza City.
Before sunrise three Palestinians were killed in battles in northern Gaza, including two civilians, hospital officials said.
Two firefighters were killed in an airstrike as they tried to extinguish a blaze in a residential building in northern Gaza City late Wednesday, Palestinian medics said. A shell had been fired at the apartment, causing the blaze.
Nine Israeli human rights groups accused the army of endangering Gazan civilians and called for a war crimes investigation.
The groups wrote to Israeli leaders that the Gaza campaign has left civilians with nowhere to flee. Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor said Israel supports freedom of expression, even if an opinion "is not based on any solid evidence and even if it is tainted with political bias."
Guerrillas in Lebanon sent rockets crashing into northern Israel on Wednesday for the second time in a week, drawing an Israeli artillery barrage and threatening to drag the Jewish state into a second front.
Egyptian and Hamas officials held intensive talks in Cairo. Late Wednesday, Salah al-Bardawil, a Gaza-based Hamas official, stopped short of saying Hamas had accepted the Egyptian proposal. He told reporters that "we submitted our points of view" on the proposed deal, adding, "We hope that this Egyptian effort will succeed."
Ghazi Hamad, another Gaza-based Hamas official, told the BBC, "I am optimistic now because I think there is no other choice for us. This kind of agreement can be done now, and I think now there is good progress in Egypt. We hope that now Egypt will contact Israel and talk about all issues."
But there were signs Hamas' leadership-in-exile had reservations. Osama Hamdan, a leading Hamas official in Beirut, said there were still points Hamas had not agreed to. "We do not agree with the initiative as it stands now," he told Al-Jazeera TV.
The contradictory comments were the latest sign of cracks between Hamas leaders under fire in Gaza and the leadership-in-exile, which is largely based in Syria and is seen as more hard-line.
Egypt's UN Ambassador Maged Abdelaziz told a UN Security Council meeting Wednesday evening that neither side has accepted the Egyptian plan. "Each believes that it will emerge victorious" from the conflict, he said.
Israel launched its offensive December 27 to halt years of Palestinian rocket attacks. It has said it will press forward until Hamas halts the rocket fire and receives guarantees that Hamas will stop smuggling weapons into Gaza through the porous Egyptian border.
Jakob Kellenberger, head of the international Red Cross, welcomed the three-hour daily lulls in the fighting set by Israelis to let groups send in aid and assist the wounded in Gaza, but he said more time was needed.
"You must have access at any time to people who are wounded," he said.
Under the Egyptian proposal, Hamas would back off its demand that Israeli troops withdraw from Gaza and borders be opened immediately as part of any halt in fighting.
Instead, Israeli forces would remain in place during a 10-day cease-fire until details on border security are worked out, Egyptian and Palestinian officials close to the talks told The Associated Press. They spoke on condition of anonymity to provide details of the closed-door negotiations.
Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert met late Wednesday with Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni to discuss the cease-fire efforts. In a sign of progress, Israel's chief negotiator, Amos Gilad, planned to fly to Egypt on Thursday to present Israel's stance, a senior defense official said. Gilad had put off the trip in recent days, saying the time was not yet ripe.
A senior Israeli official said it was far from certain that Israel would accept the deal. He said Israel welcomed many parts of the plan, but is concerned that Hamas will not respect a cease-fire as long as troops are in Gaza. The Israeli officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the press.
Israel has made clear that the Cairo talks are key to determining whether it widens its offensive and sends thousands of reservists into crowded, urban areas where casualties on both sides would likely mount.
Israeli leaders signaled that they have crippled Hamas to their satisfaction after 19 days of heavy bombardment and ground fighting, but were holding out for international guarantees that weapons would no longer be smuggled into Gaza.
In a Web audiotape Wednesday, al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden urged Muslims to launch a holy war against Israel. Iran's top leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, issued a religious opinion, or fatwa, forbidding the purchase of any Israeli goods or trade with Israeli companies.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon opened a visit to the Mideast on Wednesday, urging an immediate halt to the violence.
"It is intolerable that civilians bear the brunt of this conflict," he said after talks in Cairo with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. "Negotiations need to be intensified to provide arrangements and guarantees in order to sustain an endurable cease-fire and calm."
Ban is scheduled to arrive Thursday in Israel. He will also visit Jordan, the West Bank, Turkey, Lebanon, Syria and Kuwait. His itinerary does not include a stop in Gaza.
If a cease-fire is reached, it would aim to give 10 days of quiet to work out the contentious issues of a longer truce, according to the framework outlined by the Egyptian and Palestinian officials close to the talks.
During that time, Egyptian, Turkish and other international mediators would try to negotiate an arrangement for policing Gaza's borders — particularly those with Egypt — to prevent weapons smuggling into the territory, the officials said.
This would likely entail some kind of international monitors on the Palestinian side of the border — but the two sides remain far apart on who would make up the force, where they would be deployed and their mission.
Hamas has so far publicly resisted deploying international monitors and has demanded a role in policing the crossings and borders. Israel — like the United States, the EU and other nations — considers Hamas a terrorist group and has always rejected a role for it policing the crossings.
Only after a deal on border security has been reached would the crossings be opened and Israel withdraw its forces from Gaza, as Hamas has demanded, the officials said.
Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit underlined that all elements must fall into place — the cease-fire, the security arrangements, and the eventual opening of border crossings and Israeli withdrawal. Otherwise, "we will end up with a truce but without reconciliation or with a truce that will be broken," he said.
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