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Updated 11.31 am
THE PROPOSED 72-hour ceasefire in Gaza has lasted only hours with at least 27 people killed by Israeli shelling this morning.
Israeli forces claim that Hamas broke the ceasefire and fired eight rockets and mortars across the border. They also say that one of their soldiers was taken hostage soon after the firing took place.
AFP correspondents report that intensive Israeli shelling killed at least 27 people and wounded more than 150 in southern Gaza.
The artillery barrage of the southern city of Rafah was ongoing, preventing medics from recovering the dead and wounded, after the army said Gaza militants had resumed rocket fire against Israel.
Emergency services spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra gave a death toll of 27, correcting an initial figure of 30 given by the hospital in Rafah.
The humanitarian truce began at 5am GMT but several reporters in the Middle Eastern strip have said that violence resumed within the last two hours.
The failed truce had been brokered as a diplomatic push for a more durable end to almost four weeks of bloodshed gained pace.
As the truce began the skies over the Gaza Strip fell silent, although in the preceding two hours there was heavy Israeli fire and the sound of outgoing rockets.
Earlier, US Secretary of State John Kerry said that once the ceasefire was under way, Israeli and Palestinian representatives, including from Hamas, would begin more durable truce talks in Cairo, in a move confirmed by Egypt.
But Israeli forces would remain inside Gaza, he added, after the Jewish state vowed it would not accept any ceasefire that did not allow troops to continue destroying tunnels used by militants to attack its territory.
As the truce took hold, Gaza doctor Belal al-Dabour tweeted:
This ceasefire should give us a glimpse on our life for the coming months after Israel destroyed everything. It’s not going to be pretty.Calm. Let’s sleep y’all!
Hours earlier, Israeli tank and air fire killed 14 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, and the Israeli army said five of its soldiers died in mortar fire near the border with the Palestinian enclave.
While the ceasefire was accepted by Hamas, the main power in Gaza, in the name of all militant groups, a spokesman for the Islamist movement stressed it was dependent on Israel reciprocating.
“Hamas and all the resistance movements have accepted a 72-hour humanitarian ceasefire from 8am Friday which will be respected by all these movements if the other party also observes the ceasefire,” said Fawzi Barhum.
A source in the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said: “Israel has accepted the US/UN proposal for a 72-hour humanitarian ceasefire beginning 8:00 am Friday”.
‘US-UN initiative’
The ceasefire was a joint US-UN initiative and would give civilians “a much needed reprieve”, Kerry said in New Delhi.
“This is a respite, a moment of opportunity — not an end. It’s not a solution,” he warned, saying Israel would still be allowed to carry out “defensive” operations to destroy tunnels.
British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond welcomed the halt to firing, the latest and longest of several:
We should now redouble our efforts and leave no stone unturned, to ensure this is a lasting and durable ceasefire to make way for substantial discussions to resolve the underlying issues on both sides.
Just minutes before the truce deadline, Palestinians continued to fire rockets into southern Israel, with five brought down by missile defences, army radio said.
The 14 Palestinians who died included a woman and at least two children killed by Israeli tank fire in the southern Gaza Strip early Friday, the emergency services said.
Six of them were killed in an Israeli air strike in the same area.
Their deaths bring the toll on the Palestinian side to 1,450 since the Israeli offensive in the Gaza Strip began on July 8.
UN figures show about two-thirds of the victims were civilians, drawing sharp criticism from around the world.
Meanwhile the Israeli army said that “five soldiers were killed during operational activity along the border with the Gaza Strip when a mortar was fired at the forces.”
Their deaths bring the Israeli military toll to 61, since the beginning of “Operation Protective Edge,” it added.
Tunnel vision
The ceasefire came after the UN Security Council expressed “grave disappointment” that repeated calls for a truce had not been heeded, and demanded there be a series of humanitarian breaks to ease conditions for civilians trapped in the war-torn territory.
Egypt has invited Israel and the Palestinian Authority to send delegates to Cairo for longer-term truce talks.
“Egypt emphasises the importance of both sides committing to the ceasefire so the negotiations can take place in a favourable atmosphere,” the foreign ministry in Cairo said.
The delegations were expected to start arriving in Cairo later in the day.
Frank Lowenstein, the US Middle East envoy, was also expected to depart on Friday for the Egyptian capital, the State Department said.
Despite rising international concern over the civilian death toll in Gaza, Washington said it had agreed to restock Israel’s dwindling munitions supplies.
The announcement came as the White House said there was little doubt that Israeli artillery was the source of a “totally indefensible” strike on a UN school in northern Gaza that killed 16 people on Wednesday.
The school was sheltering more than 3,000 Palestinians made homeless by the relentless fighting.
“It does not appear there’s a lot of doubt about whose artillery was involved in this incident,” spokesman Josh Earnest said.
The Israeli army has suggested the deaths may have been the result of a misfired Palestinian rocket.
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How the hell did it cost $1400 to build. You’d make that for 80 quid.
for 1400 he could have bought a mobile home or a serious tent/camper combo with gas cooker and electrics.
I’d say they journal forgot the decimal point.
.
It should read $11.40
I hope so, otherwise that lad is a dope.
He used the same builder that put up the temporary housing units for €190,000 a pop……….
He could have used anything up to 8 sheets of marine plywood for this, add couple of tins of polish to give a good finish, it has timber internal framing too, given that hes an illustrator probably needed to buy a circular saw for couple of hundred, possibly had to buy his own bed and quilting. strip light could be 40-50 quid. Cost would add up easily enough.
A top of the range 12v leisure battery with trickle or automatic charger or even solar panels to keep his ‘lights’ on, a high end makita circular saw, the timber and ply if he replaced with oak, and if he polished it in gold dust (and that doesn;t look polished to me) wouldn’t cost him 1400
Sorry man, but that could be made for free. I think it’s an error in the article. If not, his rent is the least of his worries.
Just glanced at his blog and he did indeed pay 1300 to have it made. Talk about stupidity.
but how would you know how much things cost is SF ? Just asking.
I checked. It’s far cheaper than here. Googled the costs of materials. I also import tools and camping gear from the US regularly as it’s half the price of the UK.
Didn’t even get a lick of ronseal
Fair play – just asking. Maybe it includes land rent !!!
€1500 to live in a plywood crate? I have a barna shed he can have for a grand a month
He’s probably wondering why he hasn’t had any takers on his great idea. If he popped down to any industrial estate or any importers in SF, he would have got that for free. They would be more than happy for him to take it away.
He pays $400 to live there not 1500
And put it where Smeghead?
Put it on a campsite in san francisco for 10 dollars a night. Buy a camper for 1400.
It’ll be some craic in the pod when he has kids.
What’s the point, other than to fulfill some need for attention on social media?
Shared a room a few times in university/J1 etc. One room, two beds… No big deal. Plenty of people I know who grew up in the 80′s/90′s shared a room with a sibling. No one ever saw the need to build a ridiculous crate to live in.
I really don’t know how to take the current generation of 20 somethings and the way they carry on.
That’s true Drew, some of the places I shared in my college years would make the 20+ generation toes curl, one room with two beds, kitchenette in a corner of the room, and one had a shared bathroom and loo down the hall. It’d been much cheaper for him to go and buy a damn bed, oh and in no way did that thing cost 1400.
Your comment shows what are ridiculous nation we’ve become that apparently it hasn’t been acceptable for siblings to share a room since the 90′s. Don’t think we need to look to the US for ridiculousness.
is it unacceptable I wonder. Families are smaller I suppose as the cost of raising kids is now so high. Well for most of us anyway,
He may avoid the stout whilst living in that thing. One fart and he’s brown bread.
That’s why he put in the sky light.
Wanna come back to my pod?
Nevermind him, can you imagine having that in your sitting room! No one take any notice of the man in the box. It would just be so awkward
Hope the landlords don’t see this article b giving them ideas
If my missus sees this, that’s me done for !
Wife jokes are so 90′s
This was supposed to be posted yesterday I take it…?
I was written shortly after it appeared on Reddit ;)
It blows all the irish building regulations out the windows and health and safety will probably get toffee nosed about pod living too.
Jaysus my dogs kennel is nearly that size
rental opportunity !!!
W**k box
That’s existing. Just. Don’t show Alan Kelly. He will have us all back to tenements in no time.
Looks cosy.
Looks like what dob and edna would dream up to solve the housing crisis at a substancial cost to the taxpayer of course
Sure does anyone remember some of the adverts online over here ? Someone was actually advertising a bed for rent under the stairs in a house .
It would be funny if his mate put the couch in front of the entrance…nice chest of drawers behind the couch as well to give him a bit of a challange
Sure makes moving out of the parents home look ‘great’!
He won’t get his hole in there
Um fire hazard?
I hope he doesn’t get an Irish roommate. There’d be a firelog and a shovel of coal in on top of him
And the top of his box used as a bar counter.
80? With the bedding, the storage space, shelves/desk, the lights etc?
Yes. A saw, a measuring tape, and those are fairy lights operated by a simple battery most likely, the bedding you’d pick up in a second hand shop or second hand for peanuts. People dump stuff like that, nor a mind say sell it.
Tbh, it’s comical anyone would spend 1400 on a dog kennel. And a dog kennel would be better built than that yoke. I’d knock that together in 2-3 hours.
And I’d do it for free by picking up pallets.
Uhhhh yeah…
$20 for cheap used bedding… $800 to rid your apartment of bed bugs, or loose your security deposit.
Yeah Drew, cos landlords the world over are known to buy all their furniture brand new for lettings.
Does he have a rest room in there ?
Where’s Dave? Ah, he moved in to the sideboard…
America, the greatest country on earth? You wouldn’t have people living like this in the third world.
The Japanese would just love that accommodation.
“Workaholics who live in rabbit warrens”.
.
What a tool
This was written and published just to shake the housing market a bit more in ireland….. that would be the next option for landlords trying to get more money for an apt
Man in a box right there
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