Israel’s hawkish defence minister, Avigdor Lieberman, has announced he is resigning from the rightwing coalition government led by Benjamin Netanyahu in protest at a Gaza truce. Announcing his decision, Lieberman called Tuesday’s Egyptian-mediated deal with the Palestinian militant group Hamas “a capitulation to terror” and called for elections.

“What happened yesterday – the truce combined with the process with Hamas – is a capitulation to terror. It has no other meaning,” Lieberman told journalists. “What we’re doing now as a state is buying short-term quiet, with the price being severe long-term damage to national security.” Lieberman has long demanded a more aggressive Israeli policy in Gaza, and his announcement follows the most intense round of fighting since the war in 2014.

The two-day bout of violence erupted after Israeli special forces engaged in a deadly firefight with gunmen on Sunday in what appeared to have been an intelligence mission deep inside the coastal enclave that was exposed when they passed a Hamas checkpoint. Hamas and Israel have traded frequent rocket fire and airstrikes for months, often as tensions spike over the bloodshed at regular Palestinian protests along the frontier. Israeli soldiers have killed about 170 demonstrators and injured thousands more.(theguardian)…[+]