Israel, Cairo | featured news

Israel and Hamas have agreed to a cease-fire, the Egyptian foreign minister said Wednesday, ending eight days of fighting that killed more than 140 Palestinians and five Israelis. The cease-fire is set to start at 9 p.m. Cairo time (2 p.m. ET), Egyptian Foreign Minister Mohamed Kamel Amr announced in a news conference alongside visiting U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

The olive orchards and wheat fields lining the Gaza Strip border with Israel were always sparsely populated, but on Monday the area was a virtual no-man’s land. Fearing an Israeli ground invasion of the coastal strip, hundreds of families have fled.

When they left their village north of Cairo on August 27, Ahmed Waguih and Bahaa Zaqzouq told their families they were going on holiday. A few weeks later and hundreds of miles away, the cousins were killed mounting a cross-border raid into Israel.

Hundreds of Egyptians stormed the building housing Israel's mission in Cairo and threw embassy documents and its national flag from windows, while airport sources said on Saturday that Israel's envoy was set to fly out of the country.

New US special envoy George Mitchell begins his Middle East tour in Cairo Tuesday with a brief from President Barack Obama to "engage vigorously" to achieve real progress in Arab-Israeli peace efforts.