US renews Gaza humanitarian concerns

[DogPoundPup]

Source: A/P

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Bush administration on Thursday renewed its grave concern about the humanitarian situation in Gaza and called again on Israel to do everything it can to avoid civilian casualties in its ongoing military operations there.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice spoke to Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Defense Minister Ehud Barak to relay that message after Israel shelled the United Nations headquarters in the Gaza Strip, engulfing the compound and the main warehouse in fire and destroying thousands of pounds of food intended for Palestinian refugees.

"We're deeply, deeply concerned about the humanitarian situation," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters. "We have from the very beginnings of this talked about our concerns that innocents not be wrapped up in any of the combat, and the Israelis have assured us that they are taking every possible measure to avoid that."

He declined to comment on whether or not Israel was abiding by its assurances.

Read more: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_MIDEAST?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2009-01-15-10-56-47

[Barack_America]

1. Condi didn't speak to Olmert?

I wonder why. :eyes:

It's interesting that Livni and Barak continue to give a different account for the UN incident than does Olmert. Barak has repeatedly called it a "grave mistake" whereas Olmert has seemed to say, "maybe we shouldn't have, but Hamas fired at us, so we did" (though any reasonable person has to doubt that Hamas claim at this point).

Israel's government certainly seems to be in a bit of crisis at moment, but should we be glad that the US seems to be siding with Livni/Barak over Olmert?

[balantz]

2. It's all a chess game to them. Meanwhile innocents die and suffer a horrendous assault. n/t

[ShadesOfGrey]

7. Seems about right. I hope that Karma is real. nt

[Jefferson23]

3. Oh yea, the obligatory, "we are sooo concerned" moment by the Bush Regime.

[Marrah_G]

4. Fuck you Condi, you useless piece of crap

[Vilis Veritas]

5. Oh! Now they are concerned! 3 days left and they

get a fucking conscious?

WAR CRIMINALS.

[Spazito]

6. Empty rhetoric while they continue to give the okay on this...

"He declined to comment on whether or not Israel was abiding by its assurances." This says it all, imo.

[struggle4progress]

8. Rice cautions Israel over warehouse bombing (Reuters)

WASHINGTON, Jan 15 (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Thursday she had told Israel's defense and foreign ministers that more care must be taken to avoid incidents such as the bombing of a U.N. warehouse in Gaza.

"We had a discussion of the difficulties that this (the bombing of the warehouse) had caused and the need to try to avoid such incidents," said Rice when asked whether she had protested to Israel's government after the warehouse bombing.

The compound shelled on Thursday belongs to the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, known as UNRWA. A separate attack hit a vocational training center there. Three people were injured in the two attacks.

Rice said she had spoken on Thursday to both Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak as well as Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni after the attack on the U.N. warehouse ...

http://uk.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUKN15544088

[struggle4progress]

9. US suspends munitions delivery to Israel (Guardian)

Ship's journey delayed amid fears cargo would be used in Gaza

* David Pallister
* guardian.co.uk, Thursday 15 January 2009 15.50 GMT

The Pentagon has suspended the delivery of a shipload of munitions to Israel after international concern that it could be used by Israeli forces in Gaza.

The German-owned cargo vessel, Wehr Elbe, under charter by the US Military Sea­lift Command, is currently in Greek waters with its transponder tracking turned off to prevent its location being identified.

Amnesty International has written to the foreign secretary, David Miliband, asking him to make "urgent approaches to the US, German and Greek governments to prevent this, or any pending or future shipments of weaponry until it can be verified that they will not be transferred to the Israeli Defence Forces or other parties to the conflict in Gaza.

"We urge you to ensure that no EU member state will allow their ports or other facilities to be used to transit these or any other weapons to any of the parties to this conflict" ...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/15/pentagon-munitions-israel-gaza