Jordan Times
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Jordan demands Israel end violations in Gaza
JT and agencies
Jordan on Monday demanded Israel to stop its military violations in Gaza and end “all forms of blockade” on the strip.
Minister of Foreign Affairs Salah Bashir called Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni with a demand on her country to stop its military operations in Gaza and to end its policy of collective punishment against the Palestinian people, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported.
Meanwhile, His Majesty King Abdullah ordered urgent humanitarian aid to Gaza, the agency said, quoting an official as saying the shipment would arrive in Gaza Wednesday.
Secretary General of the Jordan Hashemite Charity Organisation Abdul Salam Abbadi told Petra that 15 truckloads of food and medical assistance will head to the impoverished strip, noting that the convoy is the 234th destined to the Palestinian lands in three years.
Earlier in the day, Prime Minister Nader Dahabi said Amman was trying to stop Israeli violations in Gaza, which is under a punishing blockade in response to rocket fire from the Hamas-run territory.
"Jordan's political and diplomatic efforts are currently focusing on ending Israel's military violations in the Gaza Strip," Dahabi told his visiting Palestinian counterpart Salam Fayyad.
Dahabi’s remarks echoed a statement by King Abdullah on Sunday during a meeting with EU envoys in Amman.
Jordanians reacted angrily to continued Israeli aggression in Gaza, expressing anti-Israeli sentiments through rallies in Amman and press statements by political and civil society organisations.
Her Majesty Queen Rania also condemned the Israeli attacks and blockade in Gaza (see story on page 3).
The Kingdom "is deeply concerned about the humanitarian situation in Gaza", Petra quoted Dahabi as saying.
As the Israeli closure entered its fourth day on Monday, the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) warned it would be forced to stop food distribution to hundreds of thousands of Gaza residents within days if the lockdown continues.
The territory's sole power plant already shut down for want of fuel on Sunday evening, plunging much of Gaza City into darkness.
Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak ordered the crossings into Gaza closed late Thursday, saying the move was aimed at pressuring Palestinian armed groups inside to stop firing rockets and mortars into Israel.
Judeh briefs House on Jordan efforts to lift siege
Also Monday, Minister of State for Media Affairs and Communications Nasser Judeh briefed the Lower House on efforts the government is taking to bring an end to the Israeli aggression on Gaza.
He told a House meeting that King Abdullah is leading efforts to alleviate the suffering of the Palestinian people, referring to the Monarch’s meeting with the EU ambassadors.
He also pointed out the humanitarian assistance the Kingdom has been sending to Gaza and the West Bank.
Protesters rally against Israel, US
Around 2,500 people demonstrated in the capital on Monday in protest against Israel's blockade of the Gaza Strip.
Waving Jordanian flags, they marched peacefully after midday prayers from the headquarters of the Islamic Action Front (IAF) to the Parliament building in Abdali.
"[US President George W.] Bush, [Israeli Prime Minister Ehud] Olmert, you are despicable. Our blood is not cheap," chanted the protesters.
"Thousands of greetings to [dismissed Hamas prime minister Ismail] Haniyeh, all Jordanians are Hamas," they shouted, waving banners of the IAF, which shares the Muslim Brotherhood-inspired ideology of the Palestinian faction which rules Gaza.
"Gaza does not need Annapolis, it needs a sword and a shield," the demonstrators chanted, referring to the US peace conference which relaunched negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians last November.
"Today we protest a new massacre committed against our people in Palestine by the Zionist enemy and Arab conspirators," IAF Secretary General Zaki Bani Rsheid told the crowd.
IAF spokesman Jamil Abu Bakr urged the government to scrap the “disgraceful" peace treaty it signed with Israel in 1994.
The People’s Democratic Party (Hashd) was also planning a rally in Irbid refugee camp on Monday evening.
The Committee for the Defence of the Right of Return for Palestine Refugees yesterday issued a statement calling for Arab and Islamic pressure on Israel to lift the siege and stop the killings. The committee also urged Egypt to open the Rafah border crossing with Gaza, among a list of other demands.
Similar calls were also made by the Jordan Nurses and Midwives Association and the Islamic Conference for Jerusalem, which issued a joint statement with the Islamic-Christian Commission, according to Petra.
Israel allows humanitarian material
Israel decided on Monday to ease its blockade of the impoverished Gaza Strip, allowing in some fuel and medicine, amid mounting international concern and warnings of a humanitarian crisis.
The move was welcomed by Khaled Mishaal, the exiled chief of the Islamist Hamas movement that has run the Palestinian coastal territory since it ousted forces loyal to Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas last June.
However Mishaal reaffirmed his movement's commitment to armed struggle against Israel.
Barak authorised Gaza to be resupplied from Tuesday with fuel for its sole electricity plant which was forced to shut down and with medicine for its hospitals on Wednesday, his ministry said.
Abbas took credit for Israel's reversal and "succeeded in convincing the Israeli side to restore fuel supplies to the Gaza Strip in the coming hours", his spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeina told AFP.
The Damascus-based Mishaal thanked Abbas for his efforts.
"At a time when we are all facing Zionist aggression we must welcome the efforts of everyone in the West Bank and abroad," he said in an interview with Hamas-run Al Aqsa television.
But Mishaal added that Hamas remains committed to ending the occupation.
"Our goal is to end the occupation and liberate our country. The return of electricity by degrees or in full is one step towards addressing an unjust situation, but is not what our brothers aspire to in the West Bank or in Gaza." And after a fourth day of hardship Hamas also said its armed wing had fired more rockets at Israel.
In New York, the 15-member UN Security Council was to meet at 3:30pm (2030 GMT) in emergency session after a request from Arab ambassadors, a UN spokeswoman said.
The European Union slammed what it termed the "collective punishment" of Gaza's 1.5 million residents, while Washington's UN ambassador said Israel has the right to defend itself but must take civilians into account.
"We do believe that rocket attacks against Israel are unacceptable, that Israel has the right to defend itself," Zalmay Khalilzad told reporters. "But when Israel defends itself, it has to take the impact on the civilians into account." Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov urged Mishaal in a phone call to halt rocket attacks on Israel, his ministry said in a statement.
The United Nations had warned it would be forced to stop distributing food to hundreds of thousands of people unless Israel allowed in supplies.
"If the present situation pertains, on Wednesday or Thursday we are going to have to stop food distribution to 860,000 people," Christopher Gunness, a spokesman for the UNRWA, told AFP.
With Gaza crossings closed, the International Committee of the Red Cross warned that hospitals had only a few days' worth of fuel left for generators.
Israel earlier dismissed warnings of a humanitarian meltdown, saying Hamas was exaggerating the situation.
"As far as I'm concerned, all of Gaza's residents can walk, and have no fuel for their cars because they are governed by a murderous terrorist regime," Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said in remarks broadcast on army radio.
Olmert accused Hamas of deliberately intensifying the crisis "in order to create pressure from the international community on Israel". EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero Waldner hit out against the collective punishment of the people of Gaza. “I urge the Israeli authorities to restart fuel supplies and open the crossings for the passage of humanitarian and commercial supplies," he said.
Gunness said that Gaza faced "a desperate humanitarian situation that continues to deteriorate alarmingly". Following Barak's decision, foreign ministry spokesman Arye Mekel told AFP later that supplies allowed in would include 2.2 million litres of fuel for the power plant, another 500,000 litres of fuel for generators and cooking gas.
Fifty truckloads of humanitarian aid, including basic food and medicine, would also be permitted to enter.
The Oxfam International aid agency warned in a statement earlier that most of Gaza's remaining water pumps would soon stop operating because of dwindling fuel supplies, and that it feared an outbreak of waterborne diseases.
Over the past week Israeli raids in Gaza have killed 37 people, mostly from the armed resistance, while gunmen have launched some 200 rockets or mortar bombs into Israel, lightly wounding at least 10 people.