Hamas and Israel agree on truce to end Gaza flare-up

Israel and Hamas, the resistance movement that governs Gaza, agreed on a truce on Thursday to end a flare-up in cross-border fighting, two Palestinian officials said.

Hamas' Al Aqsa TV channel reported late on Thursday that a ceasefire has taken hold "on the basis of mutual calm."

It said the deal was mediated by Egypt and other regional players.

A senior Hamas official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to speak to the media, said the deal formally went into effect at midnight.

The source said the agreement merely ends the latest two-day burst of violence between Israel and Hamas.

He said Egypt would continue efforts to broker a long-term ceasefire. Hamas wants an end to a decade-long Israeli-Egyptian border blockade as a condition for any long-term deal.

There was no immediate Israeli comment.

TRT World's Mohammad Mansour has the latest from Gaza.

A mother and baby killed by Israel

In recent days, tension has steadily mounted between Israel and Gaza-based resistance groups. 

At least seven Palestinians were injured on Thursday by an Israeli air strike that targeted a cultural centre west of Gaza City, 

Overnight on Wednesday, three Palestinians — including a woman and her 18-month-old baby — were killed by an Israeli air strike inside Gaza.

TRT World's Arabella Munro has more on the story.

In a statement, the Israeli army claimed to have struck at least 140 targets across the Gaza Strip in recent days, also claiming that Gaza-based resistance groups had fired 80 rockets into southern Israel — 25 of which were intercepted — over the same period. 

According to Israeli press reports, a total of nine Israelis have recently been injured by rockets fired from Gaza.

Over the past four months, 158 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire, including at least 120 in the protests near the fence and others in Israeli air strikes and other incidents elsewhere in Gaza, according to the Gaza Health Ministry and a local rights group.

Twenty-four of the slain protesters were minors, the ministry has said. One Israeli soldier was killed by a Gaza sniper during this period.

Protesters demand the “right of return” to their homes and villages in historical Palestine, from which they were driven in 1948 to make way for the new state of Israel. 

They also demand an end to Israel’s 11-year blockade of the Gaza, which has gutted the coastal enclave’s economy and deprived its roughly two million inhabitants of many basic commodities.

 The Gaza Strip, home to nearly two million Palestinians, has been reeling under a crippling Israeli blockade since 2007.