Scores killed in raids on Gaza

The Israelis killed 60 Palestinians yesterday, almost half of them civilians, as part of her response to the rocket attack which killed a 44 year old Israeli in the town of Sderot last week. Since that attack 80 Palestinians have been killed.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon has called on both sides to halt the violence.

"While recognising Israel's right to defend itself, I condemn the disproportionate and excessive use of force that has killed and injured so many civilians, including children," said Mr Ban.

"I call on Israel to cease such attacks.

"I condemn Palestinian rocket attacks and call for the immediate cessation of such acts of terrorism."

Libya has drafted a resolution condemning Israel but, as it does not mention the Palestinian rocket attacks, it is not expected to survive the American veto.

"There is a clear distinction between terrorist rocket attacks that target civilians and action in self-defence," White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe said.

The clearest distinction between the two is in the sheer number of people killed. The Palestinian rocket attacks are far less successful at killing people than the Israeli air strikes in response, which we are told are not aimed at killing civilians, even though about thirty civilians were killed yesterday alone.

It does not help that Israel's deputy defence minister, Matan Vilnai, has promised that the Palestinians would experience a "Holocaust" if the rocket attacks did not cease.

Meanwhile, Israel was accused of ratcheting up its policy of obstructing Palestinian patients requiring care outside Gaza - despite a ruling by Israel's high court 'that even total criminals have a right to medical care'.

Officially, Israel permits hundreds of Palestinians through each month for medical treatment. But beneath that fact, The Observer has established, lies a secretive and increasingly harsh system of judging who is allowed to pass through the main Erez checkpoint by the security officials of Israel's Shin Bet.

The system, Palestinian medical professionals claim, has already caused the premature deaths of a number of Palestinians. And, amid increasing criticism of Israel for its 'collective punishment' of Gazans, this issue has become emblematic of Israel's harsh attitude.

This "disproportionate and excessive use of force" is being used at a time when Hamas are offering a ceasefire and a majority of Israelis want their government to negotiate with them.

But, as always appears to be the case with Olmert's government, they prefer starving the Palestinians into submission and launching air strikes - whilst refusing them medical care - rather than negotiating with them.

It's a spectacularly non-productive policy, especially if one remembers that the Lebanon war of eighteen months ago and it's parallel invasion of Gaza was ostensibly to secure the release of Gilad Shalit and two other Israeli soldiers. Eighteen months later young Mr Shalit and the two other Israeli soldiers are still not free and Beirut lies in ruins. Thousands died in Lebanon and all because Ehud Olmert chose to launch an invasion rather than to engage in a prisoner exchange.

And now, with 64% of Israelis wanting him to negotiate with Hamas - especially if it will result in the release of young Gilad - he is repeating the same mistakes made prior to the Lebanon war and thinking that force alone will get him what he wants.

According to the findings, Israelis are fed up with seven years of Qassam rockets falling on Sderot and the communities near Gaza, as well as the fact that Shalit has been held captive for more than a year and a half.

An increasing number of public figures, including senior officers in the Israel Defense Forces' reserves, have expressed similar positions on talks with Hamas.

But Olmert is simply offering more of the same tired and failed policies which he employed when he took Israel into an unwinnable war in Lebanon. Of course, in Gaza he is not facing Hizbullah so he is unlikely to suffer the kind of bloody nose which he earned during that conflict, but it is also highly unlikely that this orgy of violence will do anything to prevent rocket attacks or secure the release of any Israeli soldiers.

I've said it before but the Israeli populace are showing an understanding of what is needed which far outstrips that of their political leadership.

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Tags: Israel, Palestine, Gaza, Ehud Olmert, Gilad Shalit, Lebanon, Hamas, Hizbullah