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Israel vows retaliation for Gaza rocket fire
Outgoing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert vowed yesterday to hit back "severely" if militants in the Islamist Hamas-run Gaza Strip continue to fire rockets into Israel."If the rocket fire from Gaza continues, we will hit back severely, so much so that the terrorist organisations will understand that Israel is not ready to resign itself to this," Olmert said at the start of the weekly cabinet meeting. "At the end of the week, 11 rockets were fired against southern Israel," he said. "Defence Minister Ehud Barak will give directions so that Israeli forces bring calm to southern Israel." He spoke a day after seven rockets fired from Gaza landed in Israel without causing casualties although one smashed into an empty school, and a day before an international conference on rebuilding Gaza is to be held in Egypt. President Shimon Peres told visiting Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere that the billions of dollars expected to be pledged to the Palestinians for rebuilding Gaza by world powers at the Egyptian conference should be given to the Western-backed Palestinian Authority, not Hamas. Peres "detailed how the smuggling of weapons from Iran into the Gaza Strip has been renewed, and he requested that Europe emphasise that money for the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip be directed to the Palestinian Authority and the bodies of the United Nations in order to best help improve the lives of Palestinian citizens," said a statement from his office. "President Peres cautioned that in the past, a great deal of European money has been wasted in vain and diverted to supporting Palestinian terror activities," it said. Posted by: Fred 2009-03-02 |
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