A Palestinian minister lashed out at the international community on Sunday for staying silent over Israel’s deadly incursion into the Gaza Strip, saying it was only encouraging a continuation of the vast operation.
”The absence of international reaction is encouraging [Israeli Prime Minister] Ariel Sharon to assert that the operation will continue, although the situation is getting worse and the Palestinian people are enduring massacres,” said Palestinian negotiations minister Saeb Erakat.
Erakat was speaking shortly before an emergency session of the Palestinian Parliament to discuss the situation in the northern Gaza Strip, where almost 60 Palestinians have been killed during the five day Israeli operation.
Members of the Palestinian Legislative Council were set to meet in the West Bank city of Ramallah to discuss ways of defusing the crisis, said deputy speaker Hassan Khreishe.
”Sharon’s objective is to destroy the Palestinian Authority and the PLO [Palestine Liberation Organisation], and to reoccupy the Gaza Strip in order to turn it into one vast prison,” Erakat said, warning that the raid would lead to ”a flareup in violence and extremism”.
Resolution of the Palestinian question was unlikely in the wake of Israel’s ”state terrorism” in Gaza, he added.
Until now, nearly all of the 62 people killed since the start of Israel’s massive operation in northern Gaza late on Tuesday have been Palestinians. Three of the victims were Israeli, two of whom were soldiers.
Erakat’s comments were made shortly after Sharon confirmed that the operation, aimed at stopping the flow of Palestinian rockets fired at Israel, would continue.
”This is not a short operation. We should act for as long as the danger exists,” Sharon told Israel military radio.
Over the weekend, Egypt and France joined the growing chorus of international condemnation of the raid, which Spain, Switzerland, the International Committee of the Red Cross and Canada also expressing concern at the scope of the Israeli operation.
The Arab League, which is to hold an emergency session over the crisis on Sunday, also criticised the Middle East Quartet, comprising diplomats from the United Nations, the European Union, the United States and Russia, for not speaking out against the ongoing raid.
So far, the United States has refrained from criticising Israel, saying only that the Jewish state should use ”proportional force” and to avoid civilian Palestinian casualties. – Sapa-AFP