Israel’s air strikes in the Gaza Strip over the weekend, which were triggered by a rocket barrage on Israel overnight Friday, have prompted the European Union to issue a statement urging both sides to exercise calm.
The organization’s chief foreign policy and defense coordinator, Federica Mogherini, issued a general call for both sides to engage in talks.

The Israeli military said its soldiers thwarted a cyber attack by the Hamas terror group over the weekend, without elaborating on the nature or target of the offensive.
The Israel Defense Forces said once the digital threat was neutralized, fighter jets destroyed the building housing the headquarters of the terror group’s cyber unit.
“Hamas no longer has cyber capabilities after our strike,” IDF spokesperson Ronen Manelis told reporters.
Read more at Times of Israel.
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The building that was attacked by the IDF on Sunday evening was the office of Twafiq Abu Naim, the interior minister and head of the security services of Hamas, according to the IDF spokesperson.
Abu Naim was jailed by Israel in 1991 and was released in 2011 as part of the Gilad Shalit prisoner exchange deal.
Upon his return to the Gaza Strip, Abu Naim became a political leader. He is responsible for the security mechanisms of Hamas, which are often used to commit terror acts.
Read more at JPOST.
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Hamas leadership has reportedly approved a UN and Egyptian proposal for a ceasefire with Israel, according to reports in Palestinian media.
Foreign diplomats are quoted in media reports as saying the proposal, that is set to go into effect at midnight, is now being presented to Israel.
 
Earlier, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said that restoring calm in and around the Gaza Strip is possible if Israel agrees to stop all retaliatory strikes in the Palestinian enclave.
 
Read more at Times of Israel.
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An Israeli man was critically injured Sunday afternoon, when a rocket fired from the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip hit his car in southern Israel.
The incident occurred in the Shaar HaNegev district in the vicinity of Kitbbutz Yad Mordechai in southern Israel, when a rocket made a direct hit on a private vehicle, destroying the car and leaving the driver critically injured. Hospital officials at Barziliai hospital in Ashkelon later said that the victim had succumbed to his injuries.
Hamas later released a video showing the attack. The video has since been taken down.
Read more at Arutz Sheva.
{Matzav.com}

Senior Israeli officials on Sunday said the Hamas terror group has asked for a ceasefire to end a weekend of sharply spiraling violence during which Palestinians fired over 600 rockets and mortars at southern Israel, prompting retaliatory airstrikes from Israel against hundreds of targets in Gaza, according to Israeli television reports.
According to media reports, senior Israeli officials said Hamas sent a message via Egyptian mediators that it was seeking to end the heavy fighting. The Israeli sources were not identified in the reports and Hamas did not confirm it was seeking a cessation of hostilities.

The death toll in Israel rose to four Sunday afternoon, after terrorists operating out of the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip fired more than 600 rockets and missiles at Israel.
An Israeli man roughly 60 years of age succumbed to his injuries Sunday afternoon after his car was hit by a missile fired from the Strip, bringing the total number of dead in Israel to four.
Earlier on Sunday, two men were killed when a rocket struck a factory in the coastal city of Ashkelon. The men, 50 and 22 years old, were evacuated to Barzilai hospital, where they were declared dead. The 50-year-old victim has been identified as Ziad Alhamada, a resident of a Bedouin town in southern Israel. On Motzei Shabbos, 58-year-old Moshe Agadi was killed by a rocket attack on Ashkelon.

Tickets to the latest stop on Bill and Hillary Clinton’s speaking tour were going for as little as $20 on the secondary market as their 13-city adventure continued to struggle to find an audience.
The best seats in the house at Seattle’s WaMu Theater on Friday could be had for $829, a steep 54% drop from the $1,785 that the former first couple fetched when the tour was announced in early November.
“I really believe that we are in a crisis, a constitutional crisis,” Hillary Clinton opined during the 90-minute performance, presented as an interview of her and her husband by actor Bradley Whitford. “This is a test for our country.”
Read more at NY POST.

Nikki Haley, the former US ambassador to the UN, on Saturday criticized the international community which remains silent as Israel continues to be attacked by rockets from Gaza.
“If this was any other country, the international community would raise havoc. No other country would sit back and take this. Why should Israel? #DoubleStandard,” tweeted Haley.
Jason Greenblatt, the US Special Representative for International Negotiations, on Saturday night also condemned Hamas and the Islamic Jihad.