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Uniformed Hamas police sought to bring security to the Gaza Strip on Monday after a three-week Israeli offensive that heavily damaged the territory's infrastructure. Despite the destruction, Hamas said it was still capable of firing more rockets into Israeli border towns.

During the conflict, Israeli military officials said Hamas militants were rarely seen, launching attacks from alleyways and buildings, apparently to minimize casualties. At least 1,259 Palestinians died in the fighting, and more than half were civilians, according to the United Nations.

On Monday, a spokesperson for the Hamas military wing said the group was ready and willing to continue its fight.

"We are still ready and capable of firing more rockets," Abu Obeida told The Associated Press. "We are developing the range of our rockets and the enemy will face more, and our rockets will hit new targets, God willing."

The violence ended this past weekend when Israel declared a unilateral ceasefire, and Hamas followed with its own truce.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon was expected to arrive in Gaza on Tuesday, to inspect the aftermath of the conflict and see the various UN buildings that had been damaged.

He did not schedule meetings with Hamas, according to AP. The group was elected to power in the Gaza Strip, but is not internationally recognized.

The UN said half a million people had been without water since the conflict began, and power was still out in most of Gaza. In addition, 4,000 homes were destroyed in the offensive and tens of thousands left homeless.

CTV's Middle East Bureau Chief Janis Mackey Frayer said medics and rescue crews were still searching for missing people in the rubble of bombed out buildings, on Monday.

"We're talking about buildings that have been levelled, streets that have been churned by tanks and other heavy armour," she told Â鶹ӰÊÓnet.

"People who are plodding along trying to carry things back to their homes that they had left over the past few weeks, and they're just not sure what they're going to find when they get there."

Troop withdrawal

On Monday, Israel began pulling its troops out of the area in hopes of executing a complete withdrawal by the time U.S. president-elect Barack Obama is inaugurated on Tuesday.

Israeli officials told AP that pulling troops out of Gaza ahead of the inauguration would set the stage for a smooth start to Obama's presidency.

Israeli government spokesperson Mark Regev told CTV's Canada AM on Monday that border crossings were once again open and aid was beginning to flow to Palestinians.

"The border crossings are open, from our point of view there are no limitations on the number of trucks going in with food stuff, medicine, emergency supplies for the people of Gaza," Regev said on Monday.

"We want to see that support arrive in a timely fashion, we want to see it in the correct volume, we want to see the people that need that humanitarian aid receive it immediately."

He also said Israel is doing all it can to bring relief to the citizens of Gaza who have been hardest hit by the conflict.

Militant path a 'dead end'

Regev said the militants have lost credibility, and as a result there is a new sense of hope that lasting peace can be achieved.

"Hopefully in the longer term, maybe later this year, we could see a peace process with greater momentum precisely because the radicals, the extremists have been discredited and the moderates are ready to stand at centre stage," Regev said, adding that the path of radicalism followed by Hamas has been exposed as a "dead end."

"I think Palestinians are asking themselves today 'What did Hamas give us? What did this path of extremists bring to us?" And I think today the whole extremist theology has been discredited."

Regev also said the ceasefire will remain permanent so long as Hamas doesn't resume its barrage of rockets into southern Israel.