By Tobias Buck in JerusalemPublished: January 5 2009 11:01 Last updated: January 5 2009 13:39
Israeli forces pressed on with their ground operation in the Gaza Strip on Monday, clashing with Hamas fighters and once again destroying a mosque which the army said had been used as a weapons depot.
The Israeli assault on Gaza, which began with a massive bombardment by warplanes nine days ago, has so far claimed the lives of at least 512 Palestinians and wounded at least 2,000. Gaza-based medical sources and international agencies say there have been many civilian casualties among the victims, including three children who were reportedly struck by an Israeli tank shell on Sunday. At least 53 Israeli soldiers have been wounded since the ground operation began late on Saturday including four who have sustained serious injury. One Israeli soldier was killed, the fifth Israeli to die since the outbreak of hostilities more than a week ago.
Diplomatic efforts to end the fighting are expected to enter a new phase on Monday, with the arrival in Israel of Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president. Mr Sarkozy has been at the forefront of international leaders calling for a ceasefire, but the US on Sunday blocked a United Nations Security Council call for an immediate ceasefire in the Middle East.
Hamas and other militant groups in the Gaza Strip have kept up a steady barrage of rocket attacks on nearby Israeli towns throughout the Israeli offensive, with at least ten rockets fired from the strip on Monday morning.
Ehud Barak, the Israeli defence minister, said on Monday that ”Hamas has so far sustained a very heavy blow from us, but we have yet to achieve our objective and therefore the operation continues”.
Mahmoud Zahar, a top Hamas leader in the Gaza Strip, on Monday vowed that the Islamists were heading to “victory” against Israel. At the same time, he lashed out at the UN and the West, accusing the international community of doing nothing to prevent the devastating Israeli offensive. He called for an ”end to the aggression, the withdrawal of [Israeli] forces and the lifting of the blockade” that Israel imposed on Gaza after Hamas seized control of the territory in June 2007.
A delegation of senior Hamas officials was due in Egypt for talks on how to end the war in the tiny territory that is sandwiched between Israel and Egypt. Mr Sarkozy was due to confer with Egypt’s president, Hosni Mubarak, before meeting Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority which rules the West Bank but not Gaza, and Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister.
Israel has so far rejected mounting international pressure for an immediate ceasefire, amid rising concern over the fate of civilians in the Gaza Strip. The territory is home to 1.5m Palestinians, who have nowhere to flee as both Israel and Egypt have shut their borders with the strip.
The fate of the inhabitants of Gaza City and the northern towns of the strip is especially uncertain, after Israeli troops moved to split the territory in two and surrounded the northern part of the Gaza Strip with tanks and troops.
The Israeli government says the offensive is aimed at taking control of key areas of the Gaza Strip, which are used by Hamas and other groups to fire rockets on Israel. Officials insist that the government will only consider a ceasefire if it achieves the same goals currently pursued by the military: an end to rocket fire from the Gaza Strip and a guarantee that Hamas will not rearm itself after the guns fall silent.
Israel on Monday rebuffed European proposals for international observers in the Gaza Strip after any ceasefire, pushing instead for teams that will help search out and seal off tunnels that could allow Hamas to rearm.
Tzipi Livni, the foreign Minister who is a leading candidate to become Israel’s next prime minister in a February 10 election, said she saw no reason for an observation and monitoring force, one of several proposals made by European powers in their bid for a truce to end Israel’s 10-day-old military offensive in Gaza.
