The Israeli Invasion of Gaza: Updates (21 January)

See also: It's Morning in America: The Day after the Inauguration

12:10 a.m. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon has reported to the UN Security Council after his trip to Gaza and Israel, and he's just a bit upset. Speaking about (or rather having his deputy speak, as Ban had lost his voice) the "several incidents of outrageous attacks against U.N. facilities," Ban said, "I expect to receive a full explanation of each incident and that those responsible will be held accountable for their actions."

This does not make up for the UN leadership's impotence in this conflict --- Ban admitted a "collective political failure" --- but at least it shows that, once he realised how badly Israel had damaged his facilities and threatened his staff, Ban could put his de facto support of Tel Aviv into a critical context.

10:20 p.m. Trying to counter Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni's courtship of European nations to join Israeli effort to isolate Hamas further, Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal has made his own appeal: "I tell European nations ... three years of trying to eliminate Hamas is enough. It is time for you to deal with Hamas, which has gained legitimacy through struggle."

Meshaal may have an opportunity. France, rather quietly, indicated Tuesday that it may be ready to talk to Hamas, even in advance of the organisation's recognition of Israel.



9:45 p.m. Israeli Prime Ministerial candidate and Minister of Defense Ehud Barak blows smoke: ""The IDF has drastically changed the unbearable reality in Israeli communities surrounding the Gaza Strip. This outstanding operation has increased Israel's deterrence in the entire region; the IDF's clear victory was the result of meticulous planning and skilled execution."

Even if you accept the red herring of stopping Hamas' rocket fire --- when regime change was the primary aim of the Israeli operation --- Israel is in the same position that it was, say, from June-October 2008. Politically, it is no better and, possibly, worse off.

8:45 p.m. Israeli Supreme Court has reversed the ban on two Arab political parties, imposed last week, from standing in next month's elections.

7:45 p.m. Alive in Gaza has posted its latest written report from correspondents in Gaza. The correspondents report general calm, but there are naval battles between Israeli and Palestinian forces and a child has died after stepping on an unexploded cluster bomb.

7:35 p.m. Welcome to the New White House Spin Zone. Press secretary Robert Gibbs passes on news of the Obama calls to Olmert and Abbas, "He used this opportunity on his first day in office to communicate his commitment to active engagement in pursuit of Arab-Israeli peace from the beginning of his term, and to express his hope for their continued cooperation and leadership."

Surprisingly, there was no reference to a call to Hamas.

7:25 p.m. Shhhh, don't tell the Israeli Air Force: local residents say some smuggling tunnels between Egypt and Gaza have reopened.

7:15 p.m. Obama has called Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert as well as Palestinian Authority head Mahmoud Abbas.

5:55 p.m. Confirmation that Obama called the head of the Palestinian authority on Wednesday: “Obama reiterated that he and his administration will work in full partnership with President [Mahmoud] Abbas to achieve peace in the region,” Saeb Erekat, the PA’s chief negotiator, said.

No word on whether Obama called the leaders of Hamas.

5:05 p.m. A Belgian court has been petitioned by attorneys, of behalf of French and Belgian relatives of slain Gazans, to arrest Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni when she arrives in Brussels later on Wednesday.

4:30 p.m. Hamas reasserts control over security in Gaza: an Interior Ministry spokesman says, "The internal security service was instructed to track collaborators and hit them hard. They arrested dozens of collaborators who attempted to strike the resistance by giving information to the occupation about the fighters."

4:15 p.m. In an excellent article in today's New York Times, Sabrina Tavernise speaks with Gazan residents whose farming village was reduced "to rubble":

In [Juhr el Dik's] center is now a giant swath of destruction where about 40 houses once stood. “It’s an earthquake,” said Salim Abu Ayadah, the mayor of the town, whose house was among those destroyed. “When I saw it, I couldn’t believe my eyes. I couldn’t walk.”

2:15 p.m. Vice Premier Haim Ramon to Israel radio: "Let's not fear President Obama. I am convinced that President Obama and his team want to achieve what is essential to Israel -- two states for two peoples."

2:10 p.m. Estimated cost of reconstruction of Gaza: $2 billion

12:30 p.m. No Kidding Story of the Day: "Egypt dominance as Mideast mediator in doubt" (Reuters may want to make the minor correction, however, that Egypt was never a mediator in this conflict, rather a channel to achieve Israel's aims as well as Cairo's).

12:20 p.m. Iran says that "Palestinian resistance", not-too-subtle code for Hamas, has right to arms. (Not news to me --- in an interview for Iranian News Agency on Monday, I was asked several times in several ways if Gaza should have "tanks and helicopters" for self-defence)

11:10 a.m. Ayman Moyheldin of Al Jazeera reports firing by Israeli navy off Gaza coast, although it is unclear whether it was aiming at shore targets or deterring Gazan fishermen. Israeli forces still massed on Israel's side of the border.

11:05 a.m. Israeli Defense Forces come close to admission to use of white phosphorous, with spokeswoman Amital Leibovich insisting, "We used munitions according to international law." More significantly, "Ma'ariv reported that the IDF had privately admitted using phosphorus bombs and that the Judge Advocate General's Office and Southern Command were investigating."

11 a.m. Press TV of Iran's top stories: 1) Iran wants Israeli leaders to stand trial for war crimes; 2) Israel withdraws from Gaza; 3) Obama promises "better relations" with Muslim world. Al Jazeera focuses on Obama's likely appointment of former Senator George Mitchell as his Middle East envoy.

9:40 a.m. Israeli officials are busily telling the press that "Barack Obama is a 'true friend of Israel' who identifies emotionally not only with the state, but also with the people of Israel".

Morning update (9:30 a.m. Israel/Gaza time): The Israeli Army did not complete its withdrawal from Gaza in time for the Obama Inauguration, but it has now stated that all units have left the area.

No further moves on the diplomatic or humanitarian front, especially on the issue of rebuilding Gaza. However, the Israeli YNetNews is reporting that European Union Foreign Ministers will announce on Wednesday "their intention to contribute units, vessels, and technological means in order to curb weapon transfers from Iran to Hamas". Just as intriguing is the claim that "Israel and Western countries are currently engaged in a race against Iran in an effort to prevent Tehran from leading the Gaza reconstruction efforts".

Our colleagues at Alive in Gaza have posted an interesting audio interview with photojournalist Sameh Habeeb on Gazan reaction to the arrival of President Obama --- "Obama neglected the Palestinians" --- as well as a transcript of an earlier interview during the conflict.

Hello? Gaza is Not Tehran

You may have noticed that we have been trying to make the point that fighting Hamas in Gaza should not be a proxy war for fighting the Iranian Government. We have featured some of the dubious attempts by US commentators to establish, "We are Killing Gazans so We Can Defeat Iran", and we have posted more thoughtful analyses of Iran's strategy, its complex politics, and its current caution in the Gaza conflict.

But still the myth gets told. In The New York Times' Week in Review, which prides itself on all the interpretation fit to print, Robert Worth --- based on an interview with one official in Jordan --- reduces the Israel-Gaza confrontation to this:

Today’s inter-Arab tensions are not just about Gaza, or relations with the West, or even personal disputes. Many Arab leaders believe that Iran is aiming to become the dominant power in Middle East, and is using the Palestinian issue to batter its rivals through Hamas, its client.

You might think that Mr Worth, or any other analyst of note, might recall that Iran is a Shi'a-led country and Hamas is a Sunni movement, that it was Israel rather than Tehran which initially supported the organisation, that the Iranian Government --- driven by pragmatism rather than blind ideology --- uses support for Hamas to keep Israel in check, give the US something to think about, and to advance its regional goals. They might ponder that Iran's immediate concerns are its position in the Persian Gulf and Central Asia, so it is devoting primary effort to what happens in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the Caspian Basin.

And you might, at this critical, that analysts might want to give some thought to other reasons for concern for "many Arab leaders": Egypt's apparent manoeuvring with Israel for a new Gaza arrangement, Saudi Arabia's shifting position to the point where it is taking a passive role, the rising discontent amongst their populations, the international community's ineffectiveness in limiting the Israeli operation.

But that thoughtfulness doesn't fit a scenario which still needs a Big Enemy to rationalise other confrontations. Once more to the words of Kurt Vonnegut:

And so it goes.

The "Violent Semi-Peace" in Iraq

Last week, after the formal handover of sovereignty from US occupying forces to Iraqi authorities, we noted an Orwellian description in The New York Times that the country was now in a "violent semi-peace".

Although attention has turned away from Baghdad, because of events in Gaza and also the (misguided) sense that the long aftermath to the 2003 war is ending, the tension in events keeps sneaking back. On the one hand, an interesting blog on the website Alive in Baghdad recounts last week's Shi'a commemoration of Ashura: "This year many Iraqis have noted a dramatic decrease in violence. With the exception of a suicide attack on Iranian pilgrims in Kadhamiya, Shi’a in Iraq were able to celebrate 2009’s Ashura Festival in relative peace."

On the other, this morning's headlines highlight that violence: "A string of bombings around Iraq's capital has killed eight people, including three Iraqi soldiers who died when their weapons truck was hit, and wounded at least 32."

As the political complexities get even more tangled in advance of provincial elections --- the latest is that Iraqi Sunni parties cannot agree on a replacement for the Speaker of the Parliament, who resigned in the midst of the debate over Muntazar al-Zaidi's shoe-throwing --- the half-full, half-empty state of "violent semi-peace" is likely to continue.

Follow-Up: The Zeitoun Mass Killing

We noted this in yesterday's updates but, given the significance of the story, we believe that it has get as much exposure as possible:

If you haven't seen it, the reportage by Taghreed El-Khodary and Isabel Kershner in yesterday's New York Times is a stunning exposure of the atrocity that took place last week, killing about 30 members of the al-Samouni clan and dozens of others in the vicinity:

“I could feel the blood dripping inside my head,” Ahmed said, recalling the days he lay wounded in the bombed-out building. “My father was crawling — he couldn’t move his legs,” he said. His cousin Abdallah, 10, was trying to stand up but kept falling down; his brother Yaqoub, 12, kept removing large pieces of shrapnel from his own stomach; and his sister Amal, 9, was not moving at all. Another brother, Ishaq, 12, was wounded in the legs. He bled for two days before he died.

No wonder that this has "horrified many" since the Red Cross, four days after the Israeli shelling, finally got to the dead and wounded. And no wonder that at least one UN official was moved by this to call for a war crimes investigation. The reaction of the Israeli military spokeswoman: the army had “no intention of harming civilians".



For Arab Clan, Days of Agony in a Cross-Fire
By TAGHREED EL-KHODARY and ISABEL KERSHNER

GAZA — Israel’s attack has razed buildings and upended families in much of crowded Gaza. But few neighborhoods suffered more than Zeitoun, a district of eastern Gaza City. And few families felt the wrath of the Israeli military more than the Samounis.

Israeli troops swarmed Zeitoun shortly after the ground invasion of Gaza began a week ago, and members of the extended Samouni family said they were moved from house to house as soldiers took over the neighborhood. On Monday, with nearly 100 Samounis huddled together in one house, the shooting and the shelling began, according to accounts of family members and witnesses that were partly corroborated by the Red Cross and the United Nations.

Thirty Samounis died, not all of them quickly. Ahmed al-Samouni, 16, survived.

“I could feel the blood dripping inside my head,” Ahmed said, recalling the days he lay wounded in the bombed-out building. “My father was crawling — he couldn’t move his legs,” he said. His cousin Abdallah, 10, was trying to stand up but kept falling down; his brother Yaqoub, 12, kept removing large pieces of shrapnel from his own stomach; and his sister Amal, 9, was not moving at all. Another brother, Ishaq, 12, was wounded in the legs. He bled for two days before he died.

Ahmed, speaking from his hospital bed, said he wanted to call for help. But his mother, Laila, was among the dead, and her cellphone was nowhere to be found.

The story of the Samouni family has horrified many since Red Cross officials on Wednesday publicized their discovery of four emaciated Samouni children trapped for days in a home with the corpses of their mothers. The Red Cross said the Israeli military denied its paramedics access to the area for several days after the ground invasion began on Jan. 3, part of the offensive against Hamas that Israel says is intended to stop the firing of rockets into southern Israel.

Israeli officials said they were still looking into the Zeitoun episode. A military spokeswoman, Maj. Avital Leibovich, said Monday that the army had “no intention of harming civilians.” Hamas, which governs Gaza, “cynically uses” civilians for cover by operating in their midst, she said.

But some international aid officials are arguing that the plight of civilians in Zeitoun, as well as the shelling of a United Nations school where civilians had sought refuge, should be investigated as war crimes.

“Accountability must be ensured for violations of international law,” Navi Pillay, the United Nations high commissioner for human rights, said in an address in Geneva to a special session of the Human Rights Council focused on Gaza. The council has a reputation for censuring Israel. Ms. Pillay is a respected South African judge who recently assumed the top United Nations human rights job, which is separate from the council.

Ms. Pillay said, “Violations of international humanitarian law may constitute war crime, for which individual criminal responsibility may be invoked.” She suggested that the council weigh dispatching a mission to assess violations committed by both sides.

The Israeli military has not said whether the strike on the house in Zeitoun was intentional or a mistake. In the case of the United Nations school, Israel has said that Hamas militants were firing mortars from a location near the school.

According to Ahmed and other witnesses interviewed at the hospital, soldiers came to several of the Samouni homes that make up a section of Zeitoun soon after the ground invasion started. They told family members to vacate their homes and to gather together in one home down the street. Ahmed said they were moved a second time as well, until nearly 100 of his relatives crowded into one house.

Soldiers searched and occupied the now-empty houses. The Zeitoun neighborhood is strategically located and is known to have many supporters of Hamas. Ahmed said the Israelis wanted to turn it into “a military camp.”

Samouni family members did not deny that Hamas militants operated in the area. A family member said there was no active Hamas resistance in the immediate vicinity, although militants were firing rockets at Israel a little more than a mile away.

At about 6 a.m. on Monday morning, Ahmed said, tanks started demolishing a wall of the house where the extended clan was sheltered. His father moved toward the door, presumably to warn the soldiers that civilians were inside, but the troops started shooting, he said.

The shooting then stopped, and the soldiers appeared to withdraw. But a short time later, three rockets and several shells hit the building and tore apart the rooms where his family was gathered.

Ahmed said he and his brother Yaqoub pulled blankets over their relatives and managed to shut the doors in an attempt to hide from the tanks and soldiers outside. Everyone was crying, he recalled, and he did not immediately realize the scope of the damage.

Some relatives, like Masouda Samouni, 20, Ahmed’s sister-in-law, managed to crawl out by themselves and arrived at the hospital that same day. A few hours after the attack on Monday, she recounted how she had lost her mother-in-law, her husband and her 10-month-old son.

At that time, witnesses and hospital officials believed that 11 members of the extended family were killed and 26 wounded, with five children age 4 and under among the dead. The first survivors who arrived at the hospital may not have been aware of the full extent of the disaster and apparently had not counted all those left behind.

Ahmed, rescued nearly three days later, named 27 relatives who died in the building where he was hiding; the Red Cross said three more corpses were found in a house nearby.

The survivors ate tomatoes, drank water and cooked noodles over a fire, but tried to avoid attracting the attention of soldiers in the area. Relatives who escaped repeatedly asked the Red Cross to send help, but Red Cross officials said their requests to respond to the emergency were rejected by the Israelis during the initial days of the siege.

It was 3:30 p.m. on Wednesday when help finally came, half an hour before the end of a three-hour pause in the fighting ordered that day by Israel to allow humanitarian aid and rescue workers to enter Gaza.

Antoine Grand, the head of Red Cross operations in the Gaza Strip, said in a telephone interview on Thursday that the first rescue team on Wednesday had to leave the dead and take out only the wounded, “horrible as that seems,” because they had only limited time and only four ambulances.

“We had no other choice,” Mr. Grand said.

He added that the ambulances had to stop on one side of an earth mound put up by the military. The team had to walk a mile to the houses and bring back the wounded in a donkey cart.

On Thursday, they went back to the same area and brought out another 103 survivors, three of them wounded.

A report issued by the United Nations Office for Humanitarian Affairs on Thursday, based on telephone interviews with several members of the Samouni family, largely corroborated Ahmed’s version of events, saying about 30 people were killed when the house was shelled repeatedly. The report said the attack on the Samouni home was one of the “gravest incidents” in the Israeli campaign.

In another statement issued on Friday, the humanitarian affairs office emphasized that its report was not intended to render a legal verdict on the attack.

In a rare public statement on Thursday, the Geneva-based International Committee of the Red Cross said it believed that in this instance, the Israeli military failed to meet its obligation under international humanitarian law to care for and evacuate the wounded. The delay in permitting entry to rescue services was “unacceptable,” it said.

The rescue team found “four small children next to their dead mothers in one of the houses,” the Red Cross said. “They were too weak to stand up on their own.”

The Red Cross added that Israeli soldiers were posted at a military position some 80 yards away from the house, and there were several other army positions and two Israeli tanks nearby.

Mark Regev, a spokesman for the Israeli government, said Friday that it was important that “we have better channels of communication and coordination” with the Red Cross and other aid groups. He said Israel had an interest in the Red Cross’s “successfully carrying out its mission.”

Taghreed El-Khodary reported from Gaza, and Isabel Kershner from Jerusalem. Neil MacFarquhar contributed reporting from the United Nations.

The Israeli Invasion of Gaza: Rolling Updates (11 January)

Latest Post: Reading Israeli Intentions
Latest post: Israel's Other War: US Rejected Aid for Attack on Iran
Latest post: “Alive in Gaza” Now On-Line

1:02 a.m. As we get some downtime, it looks like Israeli action is hovering between a show of force before stopping in place, declaring "victory", and pressing ahead into the cities. I still think the decision will hinge on what Tel Aviv gets out of its bilateral talks with Egypt tomorrow --- an Egyptian commitment to patrol the borders and possibly southern Gaza is enough to satisfy Israel that it has achieved some of its objective, an Egyptian rejection is likely to spur Tel Aviv to a more aggressive display of force.

1 a.m. Talks in Cairo today (unsurprisingly) "inconclusive".

Israeli navy has fired about 25 shells into Gaza City in last hour. Aerial bombardment continues. Gazan death toll now 890

12:25 a.m. Now here's a story I haven't seen anyone report. From an Israeli human rights website:

In a hearing on two court petitions submitted by human rights groups in Israel, the High Court [on Friday] ordered the state to explain the delay in permitting evacuation of wounded persons in Gaza and the reason for barring electricity supply for Gaza's crumbling infrastructure.

The Government has been given until Tuesday to provide the explanation.

12 midnight: We've posted a separate special analysis pausing and reflecting on Israel's next move.



9:55 p.m. Al Jazeera offers clarification on the Israeli reservist story:

"I can confirm that a few reserve units have entered Gaza to participate in the operation," [said] major Avital Leibovich, an Israeli military spokeswoman. "We are not talking about a massive amount of forces, rather a limited one to join in the fighting."

Al Jazeera's interpretation, which I think is correct, is that Israel is covering all bases with this move.

9:25 p.m. At least 17 rockets hit southern Israel on Sunday.

9 p.m. Some confusion over the report of Israeli reservists going into #Gaza --- apparently Israeli military spokeswoman Major Amital Liebovich is now saying it is only a response to a "flare-up". No major television network running the story.

8:25 p.m. Beyond Gaza: we've posted an analysis of Barack Obama's apparent shift from immediate closure of Guantanamo Bay detention camp.

8:22 p.m. Israeli chief military spokesman says some units of reservists ordered into Gaza Strip; thousands awaiting orders to move.

8:20 p.m. "Gazamom" reports two Israeli F-16s drop bombs on Gazan Ministry of Education.

8:13 p.m. Breaking ranks? Publicly, at least: King Abdullah of Jordan has distanced himself from the US-Israel position and the Mubarak-Sarkozy process, arguing for world to "force" Israel to observe the United Nations cease-fire resolution.

6:50 p.m. Israeli Government needs to get its story straight. It has briefed media all day that Hamas was a broken force, with fighting fleeing. However, the head of Israeli military intelligence, Major General Amos Yadlin told the Israeli Cabinet that, while "there were cracks in Hamas resilience", the organisation "was not about to succumb, and was still capable of striking Israel and the Israeli Defense Force".

Even worse for Israeli "information", someone passed Yadlin's briefing to The Jerusalem Post. So the illusion of an overwhelming Israeli victory, for the moment, has been suspended.

6:30 p.m. Still no word on any change in Israeli policy.

Rockets still landing in southern Israel, the latest in Ashdod.

5:30 p.m. Al Jazeera: Doctors in Gaza say "people have been admitted suffering burns consistent with the use of...white phosphorus". A resident in Jabaliya reports, "It's suffocating and has a deadly poisonous smell that I am sure will cause a lot of sickness and disease on all of the civilians here."

5:25 p.m. Israel claims its troops came under fire from Syrian forces in the Golan Heights.

4:35 p.m. Following up on the Zeitoun mass killing: if you haven't seen it, the reportage by Taghreed El-Khodary and Isabel Kershner in yesterday's New York Times is a stunning exposure of the atrocity that took place last week, killing about 30 members of the al-Samouni clan and dozens of others in the vicinity:

“I could feel the blood dripping inside my head,” Ahmed said, recalling the days he lay wounded in the bombed-out building. “My father was crawling — he couldn’t move his legs,” he said. His cousin Abdallah, 10, was trying to stand up but kept falling down; his brother Yaqoub, 12, kept removing large pieces of shrapnel from his own stomach; and his sister Amal, 9, was not moving at all. Another brother, Ishaq, 12, was wounded in the legs. He bled for two days before he died.

No wonder that this has "horrified many" since the Red Cross, four days after the Israeli shelling, finally got to the dead and wounded. And no wonder that at least one UN official was moved by this to call for a war crimes investigation.

The reaction of the Israeli military spokeswoman: the army had “no intention of harming civilians".

4:30 p.m. Return from a break to find a quiet period in coverage. No news from Cairo of any "diplomatic efforts" and no significant report of military activity.

2:25 p.m. Israel's next step? CNN finally has a summary recapping what we have updated all morning.

2:20 p.m. From the live feed in Gaza City: "Apaches launching hellfires above Gaza city in support of infantry engagement on the ground. Extremely heavy artillery fire also visible. Israeli drones are also overhead, some low enough to be seen on live feed."

1:50 p.m. Heavy fighting in Jabaliya despite supposed "respite".

1:30 p.m. This from a colleague on Twitter as he watches the live feed from Gaza City: "Watching new strikes in Gaza. BBC reports fighting in the 'outskirts'. 4,000 people per square kilometer, WTF does 'outskirts' mean?"

1:10 p.m. Three rockets land in southern Israel in last hour.

1 p.m. Explosions continue outside Gaza Strip as uncertainty persists over Israel's next move. However, military operations will persist at least until Israel Defense Ministry representative holds talks in Cairo, either today or tomorrow.

12:30 p.m. Something's up but I can't quite figure it out. Israeli media and networks are spreading the story that Hamas has taken heavy losses and, in some cases, "thrown in the towel" and fleeing. This seems to be a set-up for two diverse alternatives: declaring "victory" and limiting operations or, conversely, escalating with push into cities.

Meanwhile, the "respite" hasn't stopped Israeli artillery attacks.

12 noon: A bit of a lull, possibly because of Israeli concerns over further operations, indecision, or even a diplomatic resolution that we don't know about (see earlier post on the scheme to get strengthened Egyptian presence in Gaza). Israeli tanks are reportedly pulling back a bit toward Netzarim, and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert says before Cabinet meeting, "Israel may be close to achieving its goals."

Today's three- hour "respite" has started. Still, the humanitarian crisis is worsening. Gazan death toll is now 875

10:35 a.m. An interesting post in The Jerusalem Post that "the Israeli Defense Force will likely expand its operations". Plan is being supported by psychological warfare, including assertions of more than 300 Hamas fighters killed and "entire battalions wiped out".

The twist is that the reason given is "to press Egypt to declare its readiness to stop the weapons smuggling from the Sinai Peninsula into Gaza". That indicates Israel is seeking an expanded Egyptian military presence on the Egypt-Gaza border and possibly in southern Gaza. Israeli Defense Ministry official Amos Gilad, is travelling to Cairo on Monday for discussions.

Morning update (10:15 a.m. Israel/Gaza time): The ground offensive is turning out not to be a dramatic charge but a gradual, step-by-step advance to the edge of cities. Israeli forces and Hamas fighters clashed north and east of Gaza City overnight.

In southern Gaza near Khan Yunis, one civilian was killed and 49 severely burned when Israeli shelling set several building on fire, including a United Nations school. In Jabaliya, nine members of the same family were killed by an Israeli shell.

Demonstrations took place throughout Europe on Saturday. The largest was in London, while others protested in Newcastle, Edinburgh, Milan, Innsbruck, Paris, Berlin, and Oslo. At least 3000 demonstrators gathered in Lafayette Park outside the White House in Washington.

More than 850 Gazans have been killed since the start of the conflict 15 days ago. Twenty rockets were fired into southern Israel on Saturday, injuring four Israelis.