Israel and Hamas-led Palestinian guerrillas entered a 72-hour truce on Tuesday mediated by Egypt with a view to encouraging negotiations on a more enduring end to the month-old Gaza war.
Minutes before the ceasefire took hold at 8 a.m. (0100 EDT), Hamas launched a salvo of long-range rockets, calling them revenge for Israel's "massacres". Sirens went off as far north as Jerusalem's outlying areas. There was no word of casualties.
Israeli ground forces withdrew from the Gaza Strip ahead of the truce, with a military spokesman saying their main goal of destroying cross-border infiltration tunnels had been completed.
Troops and tanks would be "redeployed in defensive positions outside the Gaza Strip and we will maintain those defensive positions," spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Peter Lerner said, reflecting Israeli readiness to resume fighting if attacked.
Several previous attempts by Egypt and other regional powers, overseen by the United States and United Nations, failed to calm the worst Israeli-Palestinian fighting in two years.
Gaza officials say the war has killed 1,834 Palestinians, most of them civilians. Israel says 64 of its soldiers and three civilians have been killed since fighting began on July 8, after a surge in Palestinian rocket launches.
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