Paul Ohia
6 January 2009
Lagos — As the number of people killed in Israeli military invasion of Gaza rose to 500 yesterday, Isreali Defence Minister Ehud Barak has insisted that the offensive in the contentious strip will continue.
He also hinted that Palestinian militant group, Hamas, suffered a "hard blow" in the course of the military attack.
Barak also yesterday told Israeli Members of Parliament that the country is yet to achieve its objective in the strip.
The Defence Minister said the offensive would continue until "peace and tranquillity" was secured for Israeli civilians, referring to Israeli towns that have come under rocket attack by militants
Israel said its forces had carried out ground, air and sea attacks across Gaza while Palestinian sources said a family of seven was among those killed.
A top Hamas leader in the Gaza Strip, Mahmoud Zahhar, said the Islamists were heading for "victory" against Israel.
Speaking on Hamas-run al-Aqsa TV, Zahhar praised those fighting for Hamas and hinted that Palestinian militants would try to target more Israeli civilians.
Intense diplomatic efforts are under way to try to secure a ceasefire in Gaza, with separate missions to the Middle East being led by the French president, and a high-level EU team.
But Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, after meeting EU diplomats, rejected calls for an immediate truce.
Palestinian medical sources also said that about 2,500 people were wounded though these figures cannot be independently verified.
Five Israelis have been killed since the start of Israel's military operation, which is now in its tenth day, the BBC reported.
Palestinian militants fired 20 missiles into southern Israel on Monday, the Israeli army said.
Israeli sources said about 4,000 infantry are inside Gaza, backed by tanks.
International journalists are still not allowed inside the Gaza Strip to verify reports of troop movements or casualties.
However, the ground operation - which began late on Saturday - seems to be focused on areas in northern Gaza.
Israeli troops have been fighting Hamas militants around Beit Hanoun and Jabaliya. Gaza city itself - a little further south - has been encircled.
As yet, Israeli tanks and heavy armour do not appear to have entered the most densely-populated areas, BBC correspondent said.
The Palestinian health ministry claimed 90 people have been killed in Gaza since the ground operation began and there were reports that casualties are continuing to pour into the territory's overstretched hospitals.
One resident of a refugee camp in the Gaza beach area, Abu Aisha, told the BBC he lost several members of his family to the Israeli attack.
"The attack resulted in the death of my brother, his two wives and four children. We took out three bodies and the rest we could not find. There are four or five bodies under the rubble, and we cannot take them out."
For the people of Gaza, living conditions are deteriorating sharply. supplies of fuel, food, water, and wheat are said to be running desperately low.
A spokesman for Unrwa, the UN aid agency for the Palestinians, said food was urgently needed and people were facing "serious hunger", with supplies for just 48 hours.
"One million people are without electricity. Crucially the hospitals in Gaza are running on emergency generators. This in my book amounts to a humanitarian crisis," Christopher Gunness told the BBC.
Israel said it had allowed a convoy of 80 lorries carrying food and medicines through Gaza's southern frontier.
Away from the frontline, diplomatic efforts to halt the fighting in the Gaza Strip are moving into high gear.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy will be shuttling across the Middle East, taking in Egypt - which mediated a recent six-month truce between Hamas and Israel - as well as Jerusalem, the West Bank and Syria.
Yesterday morning, a European Union,EU, delegation met Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.
At the end of the meeting, a spokesman for the French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner told the BBC that Europe wanted the fighting to stop now.
"We need and we ask for an immediate ceasefire, which is mainly first a humanitarian truce, which we hope will lead to a durable ceasefire in order to restart the political discussions," said Eric Chevalier.
"The impact on the civilian population is absolutely disastrous and we need, and the people of the region need, an immediate ceasefire.
But Ms Livni said Israel was aiming to "change the equation in the region". "When Israel is being targeted, Israel is going to retaliate," she said.
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