The attacks abated July 18, when Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas said that a tattered 5-month-old truce could still be salvaged though negotiations with the militant groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad.

Abbas said he hoped that Egyptian mediators in Gaza would be able to cool down the situation as maintaining the truce is especially important given Israel's plans to withdraw from the Gaza Strip on Aug. 17. "We want this withdrawal to be clean and to be final," he said.

That evening, in their biggest test yet, security forces stopped thousands of Gaza withdrawal opponents marching in defiance of a police ban. Determined to reach nearby Jewish settlements and to stop the Israeli pullout, after a two-hour standoff they reached an agreement with security forces 20 km from their goal, the main crossing point into the Gaza settlements.

The Japan Times Weekly: July 23, 2005
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