"Israeli" leadership divided over enlarging war on Gaza

Source: AFP, 8-1-2009
The "Israeli" leadership is divided over whether to enlarge its war in the Gaza Strip amid increased international pressure to end its deadly offensive, officials said Thursday.
The differences surfaced during a meeting of the security cabinet on Wednesday, where ministers agreed to both continue the massive offensive and send a senior envoy to Cairo to discuss an Egyptian ceasefire proposal.
During the meeting, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and War Minister Ehud Barak were in favor of exploring the diplomatic channel while Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and several other ministers voiced a more hardline approach.
"During the meeting Ehud Barak came out in favor of a new truce while I and several other ministers were opposed," Deputy Prime Minister Haim Ramon told "Israeli" television.
The security cabinet again approved all the stages of the operation, leaving it up to Olmert, Livni and Barak to decide whether to launch any successive stages, officials told AFP.
But they also decided to send a top Barak aide, Amos Gilad, to Egypt for talks on a proposal by President Hosni Mubarak on how to end the 13-day-old war, "Israel's" largest military operation since the 2006 July War with Hizbullah, and one of its deadliest ever offensives in Gaza.
"Israel" launched Operation Cast Lead against Hamas on December 27 with a massive nearly simultaneous bombing of targets across the coastal strip. It followed with a week of air and naval strikes and poured ground troops into the territory on January 3. Since its start, "Israel's" offensive has killed at least 704 Palestinians, including 220 children, and wounded more than 3,100 others, according to Gaza medics. The civilian toll skyrocketed after the start of the ground offensive as "Israeli" infantry units shot at targets inside one of the world's most densely-populated places.
Speaking to the European Union's foreign policy chief Javier Solana on Wednesday, Barak hinted at his willingness to reach a ceasefire agreement. "We want the operation to create a safer reality for our citizens in the south. We will not forego this goal. In order to reach it we will take every necessary diplomatic or military step," Barak told Solana.
"We will examine the possibility of reaching an arrangement, only if it will really create a new reality," Barak's office quoted him as saying.