RAMALLAH, West Bank, 7 June 2008 — Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert yesterday raised the specter of a full-scale military operation in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip despite Egyptian attempts to mediate a truce.
“According to the information as it is now, the pendulum is much closer to tough military action,” Olmert told journalists on arrival in Israel following a three-day trip to the United States.
Olmert said that “Israel is close to a decision on the issue of Gaza.” On Thursday evening, moments before lifting off the tarmac in Washington en route back to Israel, Olmert old reporters that “Israel is close to launching an operation in Gaza.”
Olmert said he sees eye to eye with Defense Minister Ehud Barak on the latter’s assessment of the probable necessity at hand to launch a wide-scale counterterrorism operation in the Gaza Strip. “We’re nearing a crossroads in Gaza, both in terms of setting a timetable and the exacerbation of the problem,” said the Israeli prime minister.
During a tour of the kibbutz factory hit by a Hamas mortar barrage earlier in the day, Barak said such “military action is closer than even, it appears likely there will be an operation prior to the calm” agreement with Gaza-based Palestinian armed groups.
Meanwhile, the Israeli daily Jerusalem Post said that amid increasing international impatience with the policy of isolating Gaza Strip, both Israeli and Palestinian officials are floating ideas to enable the opening of one or more of the four crossings from Israel into the Strip.
The Post quoted a Western diplomatic official as saying that “there has been an evolution in the international community on how to handle the Gaza Strip. There is a consensus that the current strategy that is being pursued is not achieving that much that is positive, whether for Israel, the Palestinian Authority or Egypt.”
Also yesterday, Israel sent aircraft, tanks and ground troops to pummel the Gaza Strip, killing one Palestinian and injuring 17. One Palestinian was killed and two were injured early yesterday in a gunbattle between troops and activists that erupted after Israeli tanks and bulldozers crossed into central Gaza.
Fifteen Palestinians were wounded in a second aerial attack on a Hamas base in northern Gaza later in the day, doctors said.
— With input from agencies
