IDF don't mess with Tutu on his long-blocked visit to Gaza strip

Bishop Desmond Tutu, in Gaza today, spoke to survivors of the Beit Hanoun shelling, which killed 19 civilians, 8 of them kids, in their sleep. It was a long-postponed fact-finding mission for the Human Rights council in Geneva. Israeli authorities had denied the peace envoy and Nobel laureate entry to the Gaza strip in December 2006, so he entered through Rafah, the crossing controlled by Egypt. There had been fears that security concerns cited by the Israelis, who by treaty have a say in the operation of this border, would block his entry again. Had that occurred, peace advocates had suggested that the Bishop might resort to moving from Port Said, Egypt to Gaza City port in a flotilla or even a zippy Zodiac craft (which might have been legally thwarted by Israeli naval officers.)

Tutu said he had asked Ismail Haniya, prime minister of Gaza's Hamas government: "Can you stop the firing of rockets into Israel?"

Haniya was dismissed by Mahmud Abbas, the Palestinian president, last June when Hamas seized control of Gaza from forces loyal to Abbas."The incident we are meant to investigate was a violation of human rights in the fact that civilians were targeted," Tutu said.

"We have said to the prime minister [Haniya] that equally, what happens with rockets fired at Sderot is a violation."

Tutu was referring to the town in southern Israel that has borne the brunt of rocket and mortar fire by Gaza fighters.

He also condemned the blockade that Israelis say puts pressure on the Hamas authorities to end the attacks by their gunmen and rocket launchers.

"What is happening in Gaza is unacceptable. We have already seen and heard enough to move us to tears," Tutu said after his 40-minute meeting with Haniya.

Tutu, who was a prominent anti-apartheid activist when South Africa was still under white minority rule, said it was crucial that the two sides negotiate.

"That was our experience in South Africa. Peace came when former enemies sat down to talk," he said.

On Wednesday, the team was due to visit Beit Hanoun, where the 2006 killings occurred, to interview witnesses and survivors of the attack.

They will prepare a report to present to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.

The Israeli attack on Beit Hanoun on November 8, 2006, was widely condemned by the international community for killing 19 civilians, including five women and eight children, in their homes.

In February, the Israeli army announced that no charges would be brought against Israeli soldiers over the attack.

After conducting an internal investigation, Israel concluded that the shelling of the civilians' homes was "a rare and grave technical error of the artillery radar system".

BBC Man Freed in Gaza after 114 Days

Alan Johnston's ordeal ended in the early hours of this morning when he was released unconditionally.

He appeared pale but in reasonable health after 4 months of solitary confinement and was articulate even during a chaotic press conference held at the home of the sacked Palestinian Prime Minister, Ismail Haniya. Colleagues in Jerusalem praised Alan, a 45-year-old Scot, as "superman" for his professional calm. Since March, the BBC had urged Hamas not to resort to a military rescue, and the reporter's release followed Hamas's exchange of prisoners with the Army of Islam faction, Jihadists who dooperate with the criminal Dogmush clan. Late Tuesday, Hamas militia on rooftops surrounding the windowless room where Johnston was held engaged in a firefight which killed a civilian in crossfire. Johnston survived captivity unharmed and finally is headed home.

Israelis anxiously await the release of the other Gaza captive, Corporal Gilad Shalit, siezed by the same renegade Jihadist faction more than a year ago, when they tunneled under the border into Israel. Poignantly, today marks the 31st anniversary since the Entebbe raid, a secret mission when Israeli special forces freed hostages held at Entebbe Airport in Idi Amin's Uganda. One Israeli soldier, 45 Ugandan soldiers, six hijackers, and three hostages were ultimately slain during the rescue action; 100 hostages were let go. Haniya, chuffed from the release of Johnston, told the press that "the ball is in Israel's court" and wants to swap prisoners.

IDF takes aim at Gaza while the Strip self-destructs and blood flows

How can cooler heads possibly prevail when the blood-soaked region is on the verge of all-out war?

According to a UN envoy the entire Middle East is set to flare into pitched combat on at least four fronts and get engulfed in war. All the usual suspects, alas. Already in Gaza, the bodycount increases daily, even though analysts say that fighting has yet to peak. The BBC reports today that Hamas are countering an assassination attempt against Prime Minister Ismail Haniya with an assault on Fatah bases. They may try a power grab, fears the weak Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas; so far 19 Gazans have been killed in the past 24 hours. Gunbattles inside Gaza's hospital wards, where rival factions executed the wounded, are a new low point. Elsewhere in the brutalized Gaza Strip, militants have resorted to hurling handcuffed prisoners to their deaths from high rise buildings. Lately, the internecine bloodletting tends to lull as soon as militants rocket Israeli towns in the Negev and provoke a military response from the IDF. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has pledged that airstrikes will continue until the Qassam rocket barrages stop and infiltrators are thwarted. Outrage over a report that Palestinian militants posed as journalists and attempted an attack on Israelis at a checkpoint by using a white jeep labelled with "TV" markings has been met with cynicism. Senior correspondents point out that journalists never are waived through without credentials being scrutinized; it is just as likely that the shot-up jeep was taped up as a TV vehicle after the fact in order to make the point that journos should lie low. Meanwhile, Gaza implodes.
Nasty.