Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said Sunday that even a large-scale military operation in Gaza Strip will not cease rocket attacks from the Hamas-ruled region.

The Egypt-mediated Gaza ceasefire, which went into effect in June, is effectively halting the barrages, Barak said in an interview with local TV Channel 10, adding that he hoped the truce would last for a year.

If Israeli forces launch a military operation in the Palestinian enclave, the Jewish state "would have to achieve a truce" and "would have to deal with the same parties as before," said the former prime minister, who has repeatedly talked of a possible Israeli invasion.

"Even if Israeli forces stay there two years and destroy the Hamas regime down to the last office and the last activist, in the aftermath Israel is controlling another people against their will, and the Palestinian people, when they compare the two, will choose Hamas ... and not those who talk peace," he said, in an apparent reference to the moderate Fatah.

Since Israel's 2005 unilateral disengagement from the coastal strip, Palestinian militants had frequently pelted southern Israel with rockets and mortar shells, till the implementation of the current truce, which Barak said has reduced Gaza rocket fire from hundreds to just a few.

Historical records show that Israeli forces were able to stop the rocket fire only as long as they were in Gaza Strip, according to local daily Ha'aretz.

(Xinhau News Agency August 11, 2008)