| And never will be, either. |
SDEROT, Israel - Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi on Monday played down the prospects of deploying an international peacekeeping force in the Gaza Strip, saying conditions were not suitable. ProdiÂ’s comments during a visit to the southern Israeli town of Sderot came after his foreign minister, Massimo DÂ’Alema, had suggested Italy was prepared to consider sending troops to the coastal strip if requested by the Palestinian government.
‘While in Lebanon we sent international troops because there was a common request from the parties, here (in Gaza) certainly, for now there are not the conditions to do the same thing,’ Prodi told reporters near the Gaza border with Israel.
Prodi toured Sderot, a town that is frequently hit by makeshift rockets fired by Palestinian militants from Gaza, with Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni. |