Posts Tagged ‘paris’
Israeli airstrikes on Gaza continued for a fifth day Wednesday, as the Jewish state’s defense minister mulled a truce proposal to allow humanitarian aid into Gaza.The air assault overnight into Wednesday struck the office of Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniya and the Hamas Interior Ministry, among other targets, the Israeli Defense Forces told. The airstrikes followed a mission Tuesday that leveled at least three buildings in a Hamas government compound.
The Israeli air force also blasted away at a series of tunnels linking Gaza to Egypt through the Rafah crossing.Meanwhile, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak was considering the truce proposal — originally raised by French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner — and would bring it to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert for consideration, a Defense Ministry official said.
France, which holds the rotating European Union presidency until Thursday, had brought together foreign ministers in Paris to address the situation in Gaza and in southern Israel.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy’s office said Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni will meet Sarkozy in Paris on Thursday.The Israeli military says it was targeting only Hamas militants, blaming them for rocket fire into southern Israel.Hamas has vowed to defend Gaza in the face of what it calls continued Israeli aggression. Each side blames the other for violating an Egyptian-brokered cease-fire, which formally expired December 19 but had been weakening for months.
Meanwhile, U.S. President George W. Bush called Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Salam Fayyad to discuss a “sustainable cease-fire,” White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe told. And the Middle East quartet — comprised of the United States, the United Nations, Russia and the European Union.
However, Gaza is controlled by Hamas — considered a terrorist group by Israel and the United States. Neither will negotiate with Hamas leadership, which seeks an Islamic fundamentalist Palestinian state.
“There is nowhere to talk about just the 48-hours cease-fire,” Hamas spokesman Osama Hamdan told “Situation Room” on Tuesday. “We have to talk about an end for this attack, Israeli attacks against the Palestinians and opening all of the borders for the Palestinians to have aid — either medical aid or another other kind of support — and then we can talk about the politics.”
The United Nations has called for both sides to end the violence, and U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has roundly condemned both sides: Hamas for the rocket fire and Israel for its “excessive use of force” in retaliating.Despite the rumblings on a potential truce, Olmert warned earlier Tuesday the airstrikes were only the beginning of a wider military operation, telling Peres, “We are currently at the first stage of the operation,” Israeli government said.
Of the 375 Palestinians killed, most were Hamas militants, Palestinian medical sources said Tuesday. U.N. officials said at least 60 civilians were among the dead.Among the dead were two girls, ages 4 and 11, who were killed early Tuesday, as they rode in a donkey-driven cart in Beit Hanoun said.On the Israeli side, three civilians and a soldier have been killed in rocket attacks from Gaza on southern Israel since the campaign began Saturday, military officials and police said.
“They are committed to our destruction,” Former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said of Hamas. “They’re firing missiles at our civilians. They’re hiding behind their civilians. That’s a double war crime right there.” Palestinian parliament member Mustafa Barghouti, however, has called the raids a “war on the Palestinian people” and said the incursion is politically motivated.
The armed wing of Hamas, the Izzedine al-Qassam Brigades, said it would continue launching rockets into Israel if “the aggression continues,” a masked spokesman said in televised comments. The spokesman said the group had “so far” launched 250 rockets into Israel.
Israel also has moved tanks to the outskirts of Gaza and called up at least 2,000 army reservists — sparking fears of a ground incursion into the Palestinian territory. On Tuesday, the Israeli Cabinet approved a Defense request for an additional 2,500 soldiers to be called up if needed.The escalating violence in Gaza triggered worldwide demonstrations for both sides. A group of students stormed inside the British embassy in Tehran.Protests also took place in the U.S. cities of Miami and New York.
In the Mediterranean Sea, an Israeli patrol vessel struck a boat carrying medical volunteers and supplies to Gaza early Tuesday as it attempted to intercept the vessel, witnesses and Israeli said.Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor called allegations that the boat was deliberately rammed “absurd” and countered that the volunteer vessel was trying to outmaneuver the Israeli boat.
Israel has allowed dozens of trucks carrying relief supplies into Gaza. Also, the Rafah border crossing to Egypt was opened temporarily Tuesday to allow aid workers and medical supplies into Gaza and to transport injured Palestinians to hospitals in Al Arish, about 19 miles from the border, Egyptian journalist Shahira Amin said.Doctors in Al Arish said they were treating 36 wounded Palestinians, at least six of whom were critically injured and being transferred to a hospital in Cairo, Egypt, for treatment.
Violence on Greece
Posted on: December 11, 2008
Riots erupted for a fifth day and strikes paralysed Greece on Wednesday, as unrest ignited by the police shooting of a teenager was fuelled further by resentment of economic hardship and government scandals.
Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis announced financial support for businesses damaged in the riots and main socialist opposition leader George Papandreou appealed for an end to the violence that has gripped more than 10 Greek cities. “Government murderers!” demonstrators shouted, furious at the shooting of a boy by police on Saturday.
Karamanlis, clinging to a thin majority, pledged to safeguard people from violence, but did not say how. Government sources denied rumours emergency measures were being considered. No more protests are planned this week and the premier flies to Brussels on Thursday for an EU summit but tension remains high.
Protesters lobbed firebombs at police, who returned volleys of tear gas outside Athens polytechnic university. Hooded youths pulled a driver from her car and set it alight in front of her. Earlier, marchers clashed with police outside parliament following a rally against economic and social policy.
“Participation in the strike is total, the country has come to a standstill,” said Stathis Anestis, spokesman for the GSEE union federation, which called the 24-hour strike along with its public sector counterpart ADEDY, numbering millions of members.
Foreign and domestic flights were grounded, banks and schools were shut, and hospitals ran on emergency services as hundreds of thousands of Greeks walked off the job. Unions say privatisations, tax rises and pension reform have worsened conditions, especially for the one-fifth of Greeks who live below the poverty line, just as the global downturn is hurting the 240 billion-euro economy.
“We are fed up with scandals and corruption,” said demonstrator Efi Giannisi, 38, an English teacher.
Counting the cost:-
The Greek Commerce Confederation said damage to businesses in Athens alone was worth about 200 million euros ($259 million), with 565 shops seriously damaged.
In a televised message, Karamanlis, who swept to power amid the euphoria of the 2004 Athens Olympics, announced subsidies, loans and tax relief measures for those affected. “The government is determined not only to make citizens feel safe but to support businesses which suffered damage,” he said.
In four years of conservative rule, a series of scandals, devastating forest fires, and unsuccessful economic measures have erased the optimistic mood of 2004. The opposition socialist party, which has overtaken the ruling conservatives in opinion polls, has called for elections.
“I appeal to all to show responsibility, restraint and to end the violence that our country is experiencing these days,” Papandreou told a conference.
One policeman has been charged with murder and his partner with abetting him over the shooting of Alexandros Grigoropoulos, 15. A prosecutor on Wednesday ordered them both jailed pending trial after the officer testified he had fired in the air.
His lawyer told Reuters the investigation had shown the bullet had ricocheted but witnesses told TV stations after the shooting that the policeman had aimed at the boy and fired. The ballistics report has not yet been officially published.
Rioting over the boy’s death began in Athens on Saturday and quickly spread across the European Union nation of 11 million people. Greeks also protested in Paris, Berlin, London, Rome, The Hague, Moscow, New York, Italy and Cyprus. The unrest is the worst in Greece since the aftermath of military rule in 1974.
In Rome, demonstrators burned a garbage bin and threw fire crackers and rocks at police cars trying to stop them reaching the Greek embassy. Some shopowners in Athens started to replace broken windows and others boarded them up to prevent further damage. Bus stops and litter bins were blackened by fire, public telephone booths smashed and some buildings gutted by blazes.
Greece has a tradition of violence at student rallies and firebomb attacks by anarchist groups are common.
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