Do Or Do Not; Which Way Israeli Leaders Squirm

So, which is it? Has the Olmert government engaged in a cease fire in Gaza, or are operations continuing as Ehud Barak has stated? Well, this should come as no surprise, but the Olmert government is pushing the military to scale back its operations in Gaza:

The IDF has confirmed that the political echelon has instructed the army to scale-down its operation against terrorists in the Gaza Strip, Army Radio reported Monday. According to the report, there is currently almost no military activity going on in the Strip, and the army was ordered to seek the approval of the political echelon for action against any potential target.
[IDF troops operate in...]

Officials in the Prime Minister's Office said earlier Monday that the prime minister had instructed the army to halt air strikes and raids into the Gaza Strip in response to a serious drop in rocket fire from the territory.

Olmert gets it backwards. The reason there's a drop in rocket fire from the territory is because of the increased pace of Israeli operations against the terrorists. If you deny the terrorists time and space to operate, they can't plot their attacks.

Olmert has created the seeds for a resurgence of terrorist activities because he thinks that the Israeli military should restrain itself.

The Palestinian Authority is also claiming that Israel is secretly engaging in talks with Hamas through Egypt to scale back the violence in Gaza with a series of "understandings". It wouldn't surprise me if they were engaged in backchannel negotiations, but again, all it does is provide the terrorists with time and space to operate going forward. Hamas is also pushing the propaganda claims that Israel has no choice but to negotiate with them, calling Israel's ongoing operations in Gaza a failed effort. When you have a bunch of dead terrorists and lots of destroyed bomb and rocket factories and caches, I'd say that Israel was a lot more successful than Hamas would care to admit. They wouldn't want to engage in a hudna unless they knew that they were hurting bad and need time and space to resupply and regroup.

Israel, meanwhile, has captured 29 more terror suspects in the West Bank.