GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Palestinians celebrated the sudden resignation Nov. 14 of hawkish Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman, launching spontaneous marches in the Gaza Strip. A senior Hamas official said Liberman's departure could speed up efforts to reach a long-term truce between Hamas and Israel through Egyptian, Qatari and UN mediation.
Liberman resigned a day after Israel and Palestinian armed factions reached a cease-fire agreement, even as an especially fierce and deadly cross-border exchange was taking place, with Palestinian rockets and mortar shells bombarding southern Israel, and Israeli airstrikes punishing Gaza. That exchange followed one on Nov. 11, when Hamas detected a special Israeli force trying to carry out a secret mission in eastern Khan Yunis, in the southern Gaza Strip.