Lengthy assault expected to be deadly

By Associated Press

GAZA CITY - Israeli tanks and troops launched a ground offensive in the Gaza Strip last night. Officials expected a lengthy fight with Hamas militants in the densely populated territory after eight days of punishing airstrikes failed to halt rocket attacks on Israel.

Hamas vowed Gaza would be a “graveyard” for Israelis forces.

“This will not be easy and it will not be short,” Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said.

The incursion was preceded by several hours of heavy artillery fire after dark, igniting flames in the night sky. Machine gun fire rattled as bright tracer rounds flashed through the darkness and the crash of hundreds of shells sent up streaks of fire.

Artillery fired illuminating rounds, sending streaks of bright light drifting over Gaza’s packed neighborhoods. Gun battles could be heard as troops crossed the border in single file, backed by helicopter gunships and tanks.

Israeli officials said the objective is not to reoccupy Gaza. The depth and intensity of the ground operation will depend on parallel diplomatic efforts, the officials said on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

“I don’t want to disillusion anybody, and residents of the south will go through difficult days,” Barak said. “We do not seek war, but we will not abandon our citizens to ongoing Hamas attacks.”

The U.N. Security Council scheduled emergency consultations last night on the escalation of violence in Gaza.

Eight days of airstrikes have left a reported 460 Palestinians dead and four Israelis were killed by rocket fire. Gaza is densely populated, so intense urban warfare in those conditions could exact a much higher civilian toll. The U.N. estimates that a quarter of the Palestinians killed were civilian.

“We have many targets, said Israeli spokeswoman Maj. Avital Leibovich. “To my estimation, it will be a lengthy operation.”

Before the ground incursion began, heavy Israeli artillery fire hit east of Gaza City where Hamas fighters were deployed. The artillery shells were apparently intended to detonate Hamas explosive devices and mines planted on the border before troops marched in.

“Gaza will not be paved with flowers for you, it will be paved with fire and hell,” Hamas warned Israeli forces. Spokesman Ismail Radwan said in a televised speech that Gaza will “become a graveyard” for Israeli soldiers.

A text message sent by Hamas’ military wing, Izzedine al-Qassam, said “the Zionists started approaching the trap which our fighters prepared for them.” Hamas said it also broadcast a Hebrew message on Israeli military radio frequencies promising to kill and kidnap the Israeli soldiers.

“Be prepared for a unique surprise, you will be either killed or kidnapped and will suffer mental illness from the horrors we will show you,” the message said.

Hamas has also threatened to resume suicide attacks inside Israel.

Civilians die in Gaza fighting
Al Jazeera

Heavy fighting is raging in the Gaza Strip between Israeli forces and Palestinian fighters after Israel launched its ground offensive on the territory.

At least 30 Palestinians, mostly civilians, have been killed since fighting began late on Saturday, according to Palestinian medical sources.

An Israeli soldier was killed on Sunday in the fighting, the Israeli army said.

Thousands of Israeli troops entered the Gaza Strip overnight with tanks and helicopters, accompanied by naval support and air strikes.

The ground offensive followed eight days of intense Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip, purportedly aimed at ending cross-border rockets being fired by Hamas fighters from the territory into southern Israel.

The Israeli assault, codenamed "Operation Cast Lead", has killed more than 507 Palestinians and wounded more than 2,400 others. Four Israelis have been killed by the Hamas rocket strikes in the same time.

Among the latest victims were a mother and her four young children, killed in an Israeli air strike on their home in Gaza.

Also killed in Israeli shelling was a Palestinian paramedic, the Oxfam aid agency said. Another paramedic lost his leg when a shell struck an ambulance.

Hamas defiant

An undaunted Hamas, however, has vowed to fight back and defeat the Israeli forces. A spokesman for Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of the Hamas, told Al Jazeera on Sunday that Israeli troops faced death or capture.
"The battle has just started and the enemy should endure the consequences and results. They should be ready for the bad news coming from the Gaza Strip," Abu Obeida, a spokesman, said.

Hamas said it had captured two Israeli soldiers but the Israeli army denied that.

While the UN secretary-general called for an immediate end to the operations, the Security Council failed to agree on a resolution calling for a ceasefire after an emergency meeting.

Shimon Peres, the Israeli president, has meanwhile rejected the possibility of a ceasefire but said Israel does not intend to occupy Gaza.

"We don't intend neither to occupy Gaza nor to crush Hamas, but to crush terror. And Hamas needs a real and serious lesson. They are now getting it," Peres said in an interview.

Al Jazeera's Sherine Tadros, reporting from the Shifa hospital in Gaza City, said doctors were struggling to cope amid low supplies and the rising number of wounded.

She said the scene was chaotic, with doctors treating the injured on the floor.

Humanitarian crisis

Fears of a humanitarian crisis have also grown in recent days, as the strip, home to 1.5 million people, is already suffering shortages of fuel, food and medical supplies due to a two-year economic blockade imposed by Israel.

The International Committee for the Red Cross said on Sunday its medical emergency team had been prevented for a third day from entering the territory.
Egypt has also completely closed the Rafah crossing, cutting off aid supplies to the territory.

The UN has warned that there were "critical gaps" in aid reaching Gaza, despite claims from Tzipi Livni, the Israeli foreign minister, that there was no crisis and that aid was getting through.

However, Christopher Gunness, the UN Relief and Works Agency (Unrwa) spokesman said the idea that there is no humanitarian crisis is absurd.

"The organization for which I work - Unrwa - has approximately 9-10,000 workers on the ground. They are speaking with the ordinary civilians in Gaza... People are suffering. A quarter of all those being killed now are civilians. So when I hear people say we're doing our best to avoid civilian casualties that rings very hollow indeed."

Elsewhere in the strip, heavy artillery, tracer fire and rockets could be heard while reports said Israeli troops had reached the northern towns of Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun.

Soldiers and fighters were also locked in gun battles east of the Hamas stronghold of Zeitoun.

'Fear and terror'

Ayman Mohyeldin, Al Jazeera's correspondent reporting from Gaza City, said: "Perhaps the most significant military development on the ground is that Gaza has now actually been split into two.

"A column of Israeli tanks and artillery, and armoured personnel vehicles has made its way through from the eastern part of Gaza, reaching as far as the Mediterrannean sea on the Western part, essentially splitting Gaza.

"That area, mostly in the former settlement of Nitzerim, it was an open area after Israel withdrew the settlement, so they were able to make strong advances all the way across Gaza, essentially cutting off the northern part from the southern part."

Mohyeldin said that the scene in Gaza was one of "fear and terror".

He said power lines have been cut throughout Gaza and more than 250,000 people in the northern part of the territory were without electricity.

"The biggest concern is a ground invasion could result in urban warfare," he said.

Witnesses in eastern Gaza told Al Jazeera that soldiers have begun house to house operations, moving from building to building. They have also taken positions on top of many of the rooftops in that area.
Al Jazeera's Jacky Rowland, reporting from the Israeli side of the border, said the authorities there have been extremely tight-lipped about the operation.

However, the military has confirmed that at least 30 soldiers have been wounded, two of them seriously, in the fighting so far.

Israel extended its naval blockade of Gaza early on Sunday, from six nautical miles to 20 nautical miles, preventing humanitarian aid and protest vessels from trying to break the siege.

It also captured the Hamas-affiliated Al Aqsa TV and has been broadcasting messages telling Hamas leaders to give themselves up.

Around 9,000 military reservists have been called up to assist in the ground assault.

Ehud Barak, Israel's defence minister, said that the operation was aimed at forcing Hamas "to stop its hostile activities against Israel and bring about significant change".

"The operation will be expanded and intensified as much as necessary," Barak said on Sunday. "War is not a picnic."

Mark Regev, an Israeli government spokesman, told Al Jazeera that the "single aim" of the offensive was to halt Hamas rocket attacks into Israeli territory.

"Ultimately Hamas is solely responsible for this crisis and today they are paying a price for that," he said.

Death toll now more than 515


GAZA CITY: Israeli troops and Hamas fighters battled in Gaza on Monday amid tank, artillery and air strikes, as Israel pressed on with its assault on Hamas and world leaders stepped up efforts to end the conflict.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy was scheduled to arrive in Israel for talks on how to end one of its deadliest offensives in Gaza in decades, which has killed more than 515 Palestinians, dozens of them children.

Israeli infantry units backed by tanks and helicopters took up positions around Gaza City after effectively cutting the coastal strip into two by taking control of the main roads leading into the capital, witnesses said.

The troops exchanged fire with Hamas militants, fighting against the deepest Israeli thrust into Gaza since it unilaterally withdrew from the coastal territory more than three years ago.

The most intensive exchanges of fire were reported to be taking place in the north around Jabaliya and Beit Lahiya.

Palestinian medics said five children were killed in two separate Israeli strikes around Gaza City early on Monday.

At least 75 Palestinians have been killed since Saturday, when Israel upped a weeklong bombardment of Hamas targets in Gaza by pouring in ground troops into the densely populated territory.

Israel said one soldier was killed by a mortar shell on Sunday and another 55 were woun ded since the start of the ground offensive.

Three civilians and one soldier have been killed by rockets fired from Gaza since Israel unleashed its “Operation Cast Lead” against Hamas on December 27.

In the same period, at least 517 Palestinians, including 87 children, have been killed and more than 2,500 wounded, according to Gaza medics.

Humanitarian crisis

Aid groups said the offensive had aggravated a humanitarian crisis for the 1.5 million residents of Gaza, most of whom depend on foreign aid in a territory that Israel has virtually sealed off since Hamas took control in June 2007.

Gaza residents currently have little electricity, no water and now face dire food shortages, aid groups say. Hospitals were only running on backup generators.

International pressure

The Israeli government has fought off international pressure over its biggest military operation since its 2006 war in Lebanon.

Along with Sarkozy, European Union and Russian delegations were expected in the region on Monday.

International efforts to halt the conflict sought new impetus after the UN Security Council failed to agree a statement on the conflict, with the United States giving strong backing to Israel.

France’s Sarkozy was scheduled to meet Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in Jerusalem and Palestinian President Mah mud Abbas in Ramallah on Mon day, after first meeting his Egyptian counterpart, Hosni Muba rak, in Cairo.

France hopes Egypt can rekindle its role as a mediator between Israel and Hamas.

Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency, is heading a delegation to the Middle East, while Medvedev’s Middle East envoy, Alexander Saltanov, was also on the way.

The European Union and Russia are both part of the Middle East diplomatic Quartet, along with the United Nations and the United States.

Israeli offensive

Israel unleashed “Operation Cast Lead” on December 27 in response to consistent rocket fire from Gaza into Israel.

Israel believes Hamas may be seeking “a respectable” way out of the conflict having underestimated the scope of the military offensive, Social Affairs Minister Isaac Herzog said.

He told CNN television Hamas was under “huge pressure” from the military operation.

“The intelligence reports that we’ve received today in the Israeli cabinet are that the Hamas is looking for a respectable way of finding a way to get out of this situation,” he said.

The Israeli offensive has sparked spiraling anger in the Muslim world and protests across the globe.

Security Council

The UN Security Council failed to agree on a statement calling for a ceasefire in closed-door consultations late on Saturday.

That drew expressions of regret from UN chief Ban Ki-moon on Sunday, who said he would be working with key players to facilitate a consensus to bring about an end to the violence.

Hamas spokesman Fawzi Bar hum condemned the Security Council action as “a farce” dominated by the United States, which has strongly supported Israel.
-- AFP

'Israel's image being destroyed'


Jerusalem - Israel has taken a battering in the global propaganda battle over its war with Hamas, despite deploying all the latest weaponry from YouTube videos to Twitter blogs and an overworked spokesperson, experts said.

Governments worldwide have slammed the Israeli military onslaught on the Gaza Strip, with UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon condemning attacks near UN schools that killed dozens and foreign media angry at being kept out of the Palestinian territory.

With images of parents carrying lifeless children to overwhelmed hospitals dominating international media, angry protests have been staged in major capitals and Israeli websites have reportedly come under cyber attack.

European Union External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner told President Shimon Peres in a meeting on Tuesday that "Israel's image is being destroyed" by its refusal to heed appeals for a ceasefire.

Hamas has concentrated on the Arabic media and largely shunned the West. But Israel has sought to keep the focus firmly on Hamas cross-border rocket attacks that led to the war, and launched a sophisticated public relations campaign.

Military spokesperson Major Avital Liebovich has become an international media celebrity as she parries tough questions about the Israeli attacks and the hundreds of Palestinians killed.

Israeli ambassadors have also been forced to join the television battle.

Social networking debate

The defence ministry in Tel Aviv has posted videos of Israeli air strikes on Hamas targets on YouTube, and the government has also tried to spur debates on Facebook.

The Israeli consulate in New York this week organised a Twitter social networking debate on the merits of the war which drew more than 2 500 bloggers.

It was not conducted in the language of diplomacy, as this extract shows:

"Explore4corners: How many attacks have there been against IS in the last 6 months? How many casualties? The MSM doesn't report that here.

"Israelconsulate: ovr 500 rockts Hit IL in the 6 mts of CF. per the last 72 hrs mre thn 300 hit IL. killing 4 ppl & injuring hndreds."

Israel says it will not let world public opinion sway the decision whether to call a ceasefire in the conflict that has left more than 680 Palestinians dead since December 27 - a third of them children.

According to the president's office, Peres replied to Ferrero-Waldner: "We are not in the business of public relations or improving our image. We are fighting against terror, and we have every right to defend our citizens."

But Israel, which last year hired a British public relations firm that had worked with Lebanon and the Northern Ireland governments on their image, does care, experts say.

Powerful images

The Israelis "are the ones who have a grip on communications", said Dominique Wolton, a specialist on media at France's National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) in Paris.

"But Israel will not win the communications battle because whatever Israel's legitimate rights are, the unbalanced use of force and the unleashing of violence by Israel is acting against it.

"The Palestinians are not saying a lot. Israel has a grip on the communications and Israel manages it very well," Wolton commented. "The word 'terrorist' is systematically linked to Palestinians."

Charles Tripp, professor of Middle East politics at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London, told AFP: "As far as the Arab world is concerned, clearly, there is no question about who's winning the propaganda war."

In Europe, Tripp added, "the very powerful images of what's happening to civilians in Gaza must be having a greater impact than seeing Israeli spokesmen talking about the war on terror.

"In many ways, one of the main targets of the Israeli propaganda is Europe and the US, and I would have thought they're not doing too well there."

In a BBC television interview broadcast on Wednesday, Ron Prosor, Israel's ambassador to Britain, acknowledged the difficulty of the battle when the suffering of Palestinians is dominating the debate.

"In a sense, it is very hard for me but I know that our nation has to defend itself and its citizens," he said.

- AFP