Operation Cast Lead
Day 14 - Friday 09 January 2009
Over 30 rockets and mortars have been fired at Beersheba, Ashdod, Ashkelon, and other southern communities since Friday morning. A rocket was also fired at the Kerem Shalom crossing, used to transfer humanitarian aid from Israel to Gaza. Since the beginning of the IDF operation in Gaza (Dec 27, 2008), four Israelis have been killed and over 200 wounded by rocket fire. Almost 600 rockets and mortars have been fired at Israel. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's reaction : "This morning's rocket fire against residents of the south only proves that the UN Security Council Resolution 1860 is not practical and will not be honored in actual fact by the Palestinian murder organizations." FM Livni: "Israel has acted, is acting and will act only according to its considerations, the security needs of its citizens and its right to self-defense."
On Thursday night (Jan. 8), the IAF struck over 50 targets in the Gaza Strip throughout the night. Among the targets were Hamas naval police outposts; five rocket launching sites, one of which was situated next to a mosque; more than 15 weaponry storage facilities, some of them inside Hamas operatives' houses; five weaponry manufacturing sites; an office of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad; a few storage facilities used to store explosives; Hamas outposts and headquarters, and more than five Hamas operative centers.
The Israel Navy aided ground forces and operated in the northern and central Gaza Strip throughout the night. In the central Gaza Strip, the naval forces operated in the area of the village Deir El Balah. In the northern Gaza Strip, they hit Hamas launching sites in order to thwart the firing of rockets at Israeli territory.
The aerial and naval strikes during the night are part of the support given by the IAF and the IN to the Ground Forces operating in the Gaza Strip throughout Operation Cast Lead. Among the ground forces are the Infantry Corps, the Engineering Corps, the Artillery Corps, the Intelligence Corps, and the Armored Corps. Over the course of these night time operations, two IDF soldiers were lightly wounded and evacuated to hospital to receive medical treatment.
After assessing the current situation, the Minister of Defense decided to put the Judea and Samaria region under closure until Sunday (Jan. 11). During the closure, only humanitarian, medical and other exceptional cases, assessed by the Coordination and Liaison District will be considered valid reasons to cross. During the night, IDF forces arrested three wanted terrorists in the Judea and Samaria region; they were taken for questioning by the security forces.
The UN Security Council has adopted a resolution calling for an immediate and durable ceasefire between Hamas militants and Israeli forces in Gaza. It also welcomed the prospect of an international conference on the Middle East peace process in Moscow in 2009. The resolution was passed by 14 votes to 0 with the US abstaining. The resolution also called for the Israeli military to pull out from Gaza, for measures to stop the smuggling of arms into the region, and for checkpoints on the Gaza border to be reopened. "The UN Security Council demands to secure unhindered delivery of humanitarian aid on the territory of Gaza, including food, fuel and medicine. It welcomes initiatives aimed at the creation and opening of humanitarian corridors, and other mechanisms to secure the stable delivery of humanitarian aid," the resolution reads.
Following is Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's reaction to diplomatic developments and UN Security Council Resolution 1860: "The State of Israel has never agreed that any outside body would determine its right to defend the security of its citizens. The IDF will continue operations in order to defend Israeli citizens and will carry out the missions with which it has been assigned in the operation. This morning's rocket fire against residents of the south only proves that the UN Security Council Resolution 1860 is not practical and will not be honored in actual fact by the Palestinian murder organizations."
Officials in Tel-Aviv have once again underlined that the military operation in Gaza will not stop until all its objectives are complete. "Responsibility for the current hostilities lies squarely with Hamas. The international community must focus its attention on the cessation of Hamas' terrorist activity and make clear that a terrorist organisation can never be a legitimate leadership," said Gabriela Shalev, Israeli Ambassador to the UN.
A Hamas spokesman in Beirut, Usama Hamdan, also rejected calls for an end to fighting. Speaking on Arabic television, he said Hamas does not feel bound by the U.N. resolution and will not implement it. Hamas needs to be included in talks beforehand, he said, since it is the power on the ground in Gaza.
A U.N. report citing Palestinian Ministry of Health tallies, says that nearly 760 people have been killed in Gaza since the Israeli offensive began December 27. - including nearly 260 children. Other Palestinian medical sources have put the casualty figures higher. Israel says its air and ground attacks are targeting only Hamas-related targets and it blames Hamas for positioning its fighters and rockets in civilian areas.
International Committee of the Red Cross Deputy Director of Operations Dominique Stillhart says health workers, particularly from the Palestine Red Crescent Society, must be granted around-the-clock safe, unlimited passage to reach the wounded, treat them and take them to hospitals if needed. Stillhart says during the three-hour break in hostilities Wednesday, Israeli officials finally allowed a Red Cross-Red Crescent team to go into houses shelled four days earlier in the Zaytun neighborhood of Gaza City. He says the rescuers found 15 dead and 18 wounded, including found four small children too weak to stand on their own next to their dead mothers. "And, this only 80 meters away from an IDF, Israeli military post who were clearly aware what was happening in these houses and they did not allow the Palestinian Crescent and ICRC to access these places," he said. The Israeli Ambassador in Geneva, Aharon Leshno-Yaar, says his country respects international humanitarian law and did not fail in its humanitarian obligation. He says it only became possible for humanitarian teams to evacuate the wounded once the military activity was over.
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