Deadly Israel-Gaza conflict resumes, talks in tatters

Deadly hostilities engulfed Gaza on Aug. 8 once again where a 10-year-old boy was killed and Israeli warplanes struck targets in retaliation for dozens of Palestinian cross-border rockets attacks.

Exactly one month after Israel launched a punishing air campaign to destroy Hamas rockets, the Jewish state said talks in Cairo on extending a 72-hour truce were over as rockets wounded two people in Israel.

"Israel will not negotiate under fire," an official said on condition of anonymity. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered the military to retaliate "forcefully to the Hamas breach of the ceasefire," as the violence ended long-term ceasefire negotiations in Cairo.

Before Hamas breached the truce, Israel had told Egypt it was willing to extend the ceasefire by another 72 hours, the Israeli official said.

The violence ended a three-day lull in four weeks of fighting between Israel and Hamas that has killed at least 1,894 Palestinians and 67 people on the Israeli side, almost all soldiers.

A 10-year-old boy was the latest fatality, killed on Aug. 8 with six people wounded in an Israeli air strike in northern Gaza City, Palestinian emergency services said. The United Nations says at least 1,354 of the Palestinians killed in the fighting since July 8 were civilians, including 447 children.

In Gaza, some families who had returned home trickled back to shelter at UN-run schools after Palestinian militants fired two rockets into Israel, breaching the temporary ceasefire before it formally expired at 0500 GMT.

'All scared'

In al-Tuffah in Gaza City, hundreds of refugees were seen living in classrooms, laundry hanging off balconies and a scrum of people queing for UN food handouts.

"Of course we're...