Israel
PM Netanyahu: Gaza operation to go on
Israeli
PM Benjamin Netanyahu has said the operation in Gaza will continue
according to Israel's security needs, even after Hamas tunnels are
destroyed.
BBC,
2
August, 2014, 20.31 GMT
Mr
Netanyahu said the militant group would pay an "intolerable
price" for attacks on Israel.
His
words came as hopes faded for talks on a truce going ahead in Egypt.
Some
1,670 Palestinians, mostly civilians, and 65 Israelis, all but two
soldiers, have died since the conflict began more than three weeks
ago.
A
Thai worker was also killed in Israel. Some 8,900 Palestinians have
also been injured, the health ministry in Gaza says.
Exchanges
of fire are continuing in Gaza, as Israel continues to hunt for a
soldier, Hadar Goldin, who went missing on Friday.
Israel
began an aerial campaign on 8 July with the intention of halting
rocket attacks from Gaza.
It
later launched ground operations to target rocket launching sites and
tunnels used by militants to infiltrate Israel.
There
have been numerous attempts to arrange ceasefires, but none have
lasted.
Both
sides have repeatedly accused the other of breaking truce agreements.
Israel's
military said earlier on Saturday that it was close to its objective
of destroying the Hamas tunnels.
And
unnamed Israeli officials suggested that Israel might make a
unilateral withdrawal from Gaza after the tunnels were destroyed.
But
speaking at a televised news conference, Mr Netanyahu said that this
would not be the end of the Gaza campaign.
"After
completing the anti-tunnel operation, the IDF (Israel Defense Forces)
will act and continue to act, in accordance with our security needs
and only according to our defence needs, until we achieve our
objective of restoring security to you, Israel's citizens," he
said.
Several
people have been killed in air strikes around the southern town of
Rafah
He
said Israel would not accept continued attacks on its citizens from
Gaza.
"Hamas
again mistakenly believes that the people of Israel do not have the
will and determination to fight them and Hamas again will learn the
hard way that Israel will do whatever it must do to protect its
people," he said.
However,
in an apparent response to Mr Netanyahu, Hamas spokesman Fawzi
Barhoum said the Islamist movement would "continue our
resistance until we achieve our goals", reports said.
Palestinian
health officials say that about 200 people have died since a
humanitarian truce broke down within just a few hours on Friday, many
of them in a series of air strikes on the southern town of Rafah.
Israel
blames Hamas for the breakdown of the ceasefire, saying militants
ambushed its troops leading to the capture of 2nd Lt Goldin. Hamas
maintains the incident happened before the ceasefire began.
Israel
is searching for the missing soldier, but Hamas military wing the
Qassam Brigades said it believed he had been killed.
In
a news conference on Saturday Lt Goldin's family appealed to the
military not to leave Gaza without finding him.
The
Israeli military said that 74 rockets were fired into Israel on
Saturday, including at Tel Aviv.
Analysis:
Mark Lowen, BBC News, Cairo
The
Cairo talks had been billed as the best chance yet to bring warring
parties in Gaza to the table for a sustainable solution. But in the
end, Israel will not send a delegation to Cairo.
Even
without Israel's attendance, talks will be complicated by a host of
conflicting sympathies and regional tensions.
Since
the Muslim Brotherhood was overthrown and Mohammed Morsi deposed last
year, the Egyptian government of Abdul Fattah al-Sisi sees Hamas, an
offshoot of the Brotherhood, as a terrorist organisation.
Turkey
and Qatar, the two regional negotiators, now have poor relations with
Egypt due to their support for the Brotherhood.
And
of course the US refuses to talk directly to Hamas. Amidst this
complex atmosphere full of animosity, it's unsurprising that there's
little optimism here about a diplomatic end to this crisis.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: only a member of this blog may post a comment.