Egypt announced a cease-fire agreement between Israel and Hamas effective Wednesday evening local time, the Associated Press reported.
In details of the agreement obtained by news agency, Israel will cease all military activity against the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip at 9 p.m. local time (11 a.m. PST) and Palestinian militants will cease rocket attacks into Israel. After 24 hours of quiet, Gaza's border crossings with Israel will be opened further to allow freer movement of goods and people.
The announcement by Egyptian Foreign Minister Mohamed Amr and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton followed talks in Cairo between Clinton and Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi.
It seems to me that Israel Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu's only skill is to make war instead of peace. And unfortunately the people in Gaza are sitting ducks, and when they fight back he blames them and punishes them even more. Now the violence is spreading into Syria and Egypt, which is dangerous. Interestingly, Reuters is reporting a massive hacking attack directed at the Israeli Government.
Updated at 5:14 p.m. ET: TEL AVIV, Israel - Israel was prepared to substantially broaden its operation in the Gaza strip, the country's prime minister said on Sunday as its military planes continued to bomb targets in Gaza City.
"The Israel Defense Forces have attacked more than 1,000 terror targets in the Gaza Strip," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at a cabinet meeting. "We are exacting a heavy price from Hamas and the terrorist organizations and the Israel Defense Forces are prepared for a significant expansion of the operation."
. . . Meanwhile, President Barack Obama said he fully supported Israel's right to defend itself but cautioned against a ground offensive.
"If this can be accomplished without a ramping up of military activity in Gaza, that is preferable," Obama said. "That's not just preferable for the people of Gaza, it's also preferable for Israelis because if Israeli troops are in Gaza they're much more at risk of incurring fatalities or being wounded."
More than 44 million hacking attempts have been made on Israeli government web sites since Wednesday when Israel began its Gaza air strikes, the government said on Sunday. Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz said just one hacking attempt was successful on a site he did not want to name, but it was up and running after 10 minutes of downtime.
Typically, there are a few hundred hacking attempts a day on Israeli sites, the ministry said. Attempts on defence-related sites have been the highest, while 10 million attempts have been made on the site of Israel's president, 7 million on the Foreign Ministry and 3 million on the site of the prime minister.
A ministry spokesman said while the attacks have come from around the world, most have been from Israel and the Palestinian territories.
"The ministry's computer division will continue to block the millions of cyber attacks," Steinitz said. "We are enjoying the fruits of our investment in recent years in developing computerized defence systems." Steinitz has instructed his ministry to operate in emergency mode to counter attempts to undermine government sites.
