The radical Islamic Jihad movement said on Thursday that an Egyptian-brokered truce had gone into effect to halt a spiralling confrontation with Israel.
"An Egyptian-brokered truce went into effect at 2pm (1200 GMT)," Islamic Jihad spokesman Daud Shihab told AFP. There was no immediate confirmation from Israel.
Earlier on Thursday, Reuters quoted Israeli police as saying that Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip fired rockets at Israeli cities in a second day of a cross-border flare-up.
Sirens sounded in the southern Israeli towns of Ashkelon and Ashdod. Police said the rockets had landed in open areas, causing no casualties.
The Israeli military carried out 29 air strikes and fired tank shells at militant targets in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday after the Islamic Jihad group launched 60 rockets toward Israel in the heaviest barrage in nearly two years.
No casualties were reported on either side of the frontier in Wednesday's incidents. Islamic Jihad said its rocket fire had been a response to Israel's killing of three of its men a day earlier.
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
