A 69-year-old Palestinian man was killed and three others injured in an attack by the Israeli Air Force on tunnels and a weapons depot in the Gaza Strip on Feb. 12. The Israeli military released a statement saying its aircraft had struck four targets, including "a terror tunnel and a weapon manufacturing facility" near Gaza City. The strikes came in response to a short-range rocket that was launched from Gaza the previous day, wounding an Israeli woman, the statement said. No faction took credit for the rocket attack. Hamas, Gaza's ruling Islamist movement, has tried to rein in attacks on Israel as it seeks political accommodation with the secular Fatah movement that controls the Palestinian Authority. (Ha'aretz [2], Feb. 12)
Gaza power authority official Ahmad Abu al-Amaren meanwhile warned that the Strip will soon have only six hours of electricity per day if more fuel is not delivered. He said a small delivery on Feb. 13 staved off a wide-scale blackout, but the Gaza administration will soon be forced to introduce a highly restricted schedule, with cuts for 16 to 18 hours each day. A solution to the electricity crisis depends on Egypt allowing the necessary fuel to pass into the coastal strip, he said. The Palestinian Authority took over responsibility from the European Union for delivering diesel to the Gaza Energy Authority in late 2009. The directors of Gaza's only power plant said that the Palestinian Authority's delay in payments for fuel contributed to the crisis. With Egypt beset by continuing unrest, agreement has yet to be reached on stable fuel deliveries to Gaza. Abu Al-Amaren pledged that despite the escalating crisis, the Strip's sole plant "will operate until the last available drop of fuel." (Ma'an News Agency [3], Jan. 13)
See our last posts on Palestine [4] and the Gaza Strip [5].
