A Palestinian man collects broken windows from his house in Gaza City on Friday.
Caesarea (Israel): Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told U.S. Defence Secretary Robert Gates on Friday that Israel was ready to act with “great force” in response to a spate of rocket fire by Gaza militants and a deadly bus bombing in Jerusalem.
Israel had been “subjected to bouts of terror and rocket attacks,” Mr. Netanyahu told reporters before going into a meeting with Mr. Gates.
“We stand ready to act with great force and great determination to put a stop to it,” he added, with police saying Israel had not been hit by any projectiles on Friday morning. Mr. Netanyahu said he had received a “very warm” telephone call from U.S. President Barack Obama on Thursday expressing his condolences after the latest flare-up in violence.
“Any civilised society will not tolerate such wanton attacks on its civilians,” he said.
Mr. Gates, a former CIA Director with years of experience in Washington, said U.S.-Israel security ties were as strong as they had ever been at a time when the region is in “turmoil”.
On Thursday, he said in Tel Aviv that Washington firmly backed Israel's right to respond to the both the rocket fire and the Jerusalem bombing, which he described as “repugnant acts”.
Popular unrest
But he suggested Israel should tread carefully or risk derailing the course of popular unrest sweeping Arab and Muslim countries.
The American defence chief is pressing Israeli and Palestinian leaders to take “bold action” for peace despite soaring tensions, saying political upheaval in the region offered an opportunity.
After his meeting with Mr. Netanyahu, Mr. Gates travelled amid heavy security to the West Bank city of Ramallah to meet Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, the first such visit by a U.S. defence chief. Mr. Fayyad told Mr. Gates it was a time of “great challenge throughout the region but also a time of opportunity, requiring a redoubling of the effort in pursuing the cause of peace, and justice and security”.
No comments:
Post a Comment