Israel, responding to the expected platform of a new Palestinian unity coalition, insists that the agreement does not satisfy the international community's conditions for ending its financial embargo of the PA, and that there is no basis for talks with the new Hamas-Fatah government.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh concluded the parameters for forming a national unity government late Sunday night, Abbas confirmed on Monday. Abbas is expected to announce the dissolution of the current government during the next 48 hours and invite Haniyeh to form a new government.
Israel, however, is preparing a diplomatic offensive to ensure that the new government is not recognized by the international community.
On the ground, Palestinian fighters fought gunbattles with Israeli troops inside the Gaza Strip on Tuesday and Al Jazeera television reported one soldier had been killed. Qatar-based Al Jazeera said the soldier died near Kissufim, a crossing point into the central Gaza area.
According to Reuters, eyewitnesses said gunmen had exchanged fire with Israeli soldiers in an area of central Gaza Strip after troops backed by tanks had moved across the border just after dawn.
Earlier, an Israeli air strike early Tuesday demolished the Gaza Strip home of a senior Palestinian security official, witnesses said. They said that an Israeli aircraft circled over the city before firing a heavy missile at the house in the Sabra neighborhood. There were no reports of casualties at the house.
Elsewhere, Palestinian security sources and eyewitnesses said that an Israeli missile had missed a group of Islamic Jihad activists in the southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah. No injuries were reported.
