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UNITED NATIONS: UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has added his voice to calls for an immediate end to hostilities in the Gaza Strip and urged Israel to allow humanitarian aid into the poverty-stricken Palestinian territory.
Ban "joins the Security Council's call for an immediate stop to all violence and all military activities. He deplores that violence is continuing today, and he strongly urges once again an immediate stop to all acts of violence," his spokeswoman Michele Montas said in a statement Sunday.
The 15-member UN Security Council earlier Sunday issued a non-binding statement calling for "an immediate halt to all violence" in the Gaza Strip and urged the parties "to stop immediately all military activities."
The statement followed massive Israeli air raids on Gaza on Saturday and Sunday, in retaliation for Palestinian militants' repeated rocket attacks on Israel. The Israeli attacks have so far killed more than 300 people and wounded some 600, medics said.
The UN secretary general also expressed his sadness at Palestinian casualties suffered during Israeli air strikes, among them eight trainees and one staff member of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, and one Israeli casualty.
"The secretary general also expects the Security Council's call for all parties to address the humanitarian and economic needs in Gaza to be fully heeded, in particular for border crossings to be open by Israel for the continuous provision of humanitarian supplies," the spokeswoman said.
Montas said the UN humanitarian coordinator in Gaza received a guarantee from Israeli officials on Sunday that "all required humanitarian supplies and personnel" would be allowed into Gaza.
"The secretary general fully expects this cooperation to continue on a rolling basis in the coming days," she added.
Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak on Sunday authorised the transfer of more than 100 truckloads of aid into Gaza.
More than 100 trucks will transfer the goods on Monday through the Karni, Nahal Oz and Kerem Shalom crossings between Israel and the territory ruled by the Islamist movement Hamas, Barak's office said.
These assurances notwithstanding, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay called on Israel to lift the air, sea and ground blockade imposed on Gaza, while voicing her grave concern about the escalating violence there and the enormous loss of life.
While denouncing the rocket attacks against Israel by Hamas, Pillay also strongly condemned Israel for what she called "disproportionate use of force" resulting in widespread civilian casualties, according to a news release issued today by the Office of the High Commissioner.
Pillay called on Israeli leaders to uphold the principles of international humanitarian law, especially those relating to proportionality in the use of military force and the targeting of civilians.
Echoing Pillay's statement, UN Special Rapporteur for human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories Richard Falk said the Israeli air strikes represented "severe and massive violations" of international humanitarian law.
"Certainly the rocket attacks against civilian targets in Israel are unlawful," Falk noted in a statement.
"But that illegality does not give rise to any Israeli right, neither as the occupying power nor as a sovereign state, to violate international humanitarian law and commit war crimes or crimes against humanity in its response."
- AFP/yb
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