Israel Mulls 48-Hour Halt To Gaza Strikes

Cease-Fire Being Weighed To Give Hamas Opening To Stop Rocket Attacks

(CBS/AP)  Israel, under international pressure, is considering a 48-hour halt to its punishing four-day air campaign on Hamas targets in Gaza to see if Palestinian militants will stop their rocket attacks on southern Israel, Israeli officials said Tuesday.

But Israel insists Hamas has not been damaged enough and that it is still prepared to use its ground troops, if that's what it deems is necessary, reports CBS News correspondent Mark Phillips from the Israel-Gaza border.

"We will do whatever it takes," said Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak. "We are ready to deepen and widen the operation in order to make sure that the calm and tranquility will come back to the region."

Any truce offer would be coupled with a threat to send in ground troops if the rocket fire continues.

The dilemma that's been facing the Israelis is not just if, but how to use their troops, reports Phillips. A full scale military reoccupation of Gaza is not on the table.

The Israelis have been caught in that quagmire before, Phillips adds. The last time Israel invaded Gaza, their fruitless occupation lasted 38 years.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert discussed the proposal - floated by France's foreign minister - and other possible next steps with his foreign and defense ministers, Israeli officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not supposed to make the information public.

Earlier Tuesday, Olmert told Israeli President Shimon Peres that the current, aerial phase of the operation was just "the first of several" that have been approved, an Olmert spokesman said.

In its Tuesday night meeting, Israel's leadership trio stepped up preparations for a ground offensive, conducting a telephone survey among Cabinet ministers on a plan to call up an additional 2,500 reserve soldiers, if required. Earlier this week, the Cabinet authorized a callup of 6,700 soldiers.

After the four-hour meeting, Olmert's office issued a statement early Wednesday saying no details of the discussion would be made public because of the sensitivity of the subject matter.

European Union foreign ministers met Tuesday evening in Paris for urgent talks on the crisis, with France and Germany both seeking a cease-fire.

President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called leaders in the Middle East to press for a durable solution beyond any immediate truce. Mr. Bush, at left, spoke with Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad from his office at the ranch in Crawford, Texas, to discuss ways to stop the violence.

And members of the Quartet of world powers trying to promote Mideast peace concluded a conference call with an appeal for an immediate cease-fire. The Quartet powers are the United States, the United Nations, the European Union and Russia.

And even amid talk of a truce, Israeli warplanes continued to unload bombs on targets in Gaza. Powerful airstrikes caused Gaza City's high-rise apartment buildings to sway and showered streets with broken glass and pulverized concrete. Israel's ground forces on Gaza's border also used artillery for the first time.

Hamas kept up its rocket barrages, which have killed four Israelis since the weekend, and sent many more in running for bomb shelters.

The killing zone has been spreading in this conflict, Phillips reports. The Israelis are burying victims in areas that have never been hit by Hamas rockets before.

A medium-range rocket hit the city of Beersheba for the first time ever, zooming 28 miles deep into Israel and slamming into an empty kindergarten. A second rocket landed in an open area near the desert city, Israel's fifth-largest. The military said later it successfully struck the group that launched those rockets.

A pattern of daytime lulls and nighttime spikes in rocket fire appeared to be emerging as militants found safer launch cover in darkness.

Four days into a campaign that has killed 374 Palestinians and prompted Arab and international condemnation, a diplomatic push to end the fighting gathered pace.

In two phone calls to Barak on Monday and Tuesday, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner appealed to him to consider a truce to allow time for humanitarian relief supplies to enter the beleaguered Gaza Strip, two senior officials in Barak's office said.
A Hamas spokesman said any halt to militant rocket and mortar fire would require an end to Israel's crippling blockade of the Gaza Strip. "If they halt the aggression and the blockade, then Hamas will study these suggestions," said Mushir Masri.

Any cease-fire between Israel and Hamas would face questions about its long-term viability. In the past, Hamas has been unable or unwilling to rein in all the militants, some of which belong to different factions. Israel has angered the Palestinians by continuing to target its leaders and by maintaining a blockade of the Gaza Strip.

"It's certainly difficult for Hamas because, having witnessed the losses that they have just suffered on large scale, their credibility is on the line and they're not going to easily agree to a cease-fire that goes back to the conditions that prevailed before, after all these losses," said Shibley Telhami, professor of political science at the University of Maryland and senior fellow at the Brookings Institute. "So, we're likely to see more bloodshed, and I think that is where we are in a way, events on the ground are going to dictate."

Israel's military, meanwhile, pressed on, sending warplanes to strike a Gaza government complex that includes the ministries of interior, foreign affairs and justice. Bombs ripped the tops and sides from buildings that had already been evacuated and left fires blazing in upper floors.

It was the largest government target hit so far and involved the largest number of bombs dropped in a single strike - at least 16 in all.

Most of the 364 people killed in Gaza since Saturday, according to Palestinian officials, were members of Hamas security forces, but the number included at least 64 civilians, according to U.N. figures.

The airstrikes have sent the people of densely populated Gaza on a zigzagging desperate search for safer ground - hard to find with no way out of the blockaded territory.

"I don't know what's safe anymore," said university student Rasha Khaldeh of Gaza City. She fled her home, fearing Israel would target her Hamas neighbors, then had to leave her uncle's house because of nearby shelling. She listens intently for the approach of pilotless Israeli drones.

During brief lulls between airstrikes, Gazans tentatively ventured into the streets to buy goods and collect belongings from homes they had abandoned after Israel's aerial onslaught began Saturday.

The campaign has brought a new reality to southern Israel, too, where one-tenth of the country's population of 7 million has suddenly found itself within rocket range.

"It's very scary," said Yaacov Pardida, a 55-year-old resident of Ashdod, southern Israel's largest city, which was hit Monday. "I never imagined that this could happen, that they could reach us here."

Israel's military said it hit 31 targets on Tuesday, including a Cabinet building, rocket-launching sites, and places were missiles were being built. Some of the hits on sites with weapons stockpiles triggered secondary explosions.

The question still hanging over the Israeli operation is how it can halt rocket fire. Israel has never found a military solution to the barrage of missiles. The "Iron Dome," a system to guard against short-range missiles, will take years to build.

Beyond delivering Hamas a deep blow and protecting border communities, the assault's broader objectives remained cloudy. Israeli President Shimon Peres acknowledged the challenge, saying the operation was unavoidable but more difficult than many people anticipated.

"War against terrorists is harder in some aspects than fighting armies," Peres said.