Humanitarian agencies warn situation in Gaza worsening

Israelis launched a strike yesterday in Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip. More than 40 Hamas targets were blasted. (Adel Hana/ Associated Press)

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - As Israel's offensive in Gaza entered its second week, desperate Gaza residents sheltered in their homes yesterday, and humanitarian agencies warned that food, water, and medical supplies were running short.

After bombing Gaza from the air and sea earlier in the day, the Israeli military fired artillery into Gaza last night and then sent tanks, armored vehicles, and infantry across the border for the first time in the offensive.

Even before the ground invasion was launched, the plight of the 1.5 million Palestinians crowded into Gaza was grim, relief workers said.

"Nobody feels safe," an International Committee of the Red Cross worker said in a report on the organization's website. "The problem is that we have nowhere to run for shelter."

Streets were almost empty yesterday with people too frightened to venture out. Most shops were closed. Bombs have damaged the water system, but it was too dangerous for aid workers to help with repairs, the report said.

Hospitals have a minimum supply of drugs and other basics to treat the wounded, but more will be needed in coming days, it said. Among the items provided were white sheets for the dead.

The United Nations said Gaza's utilities were barely functioning. The electric power plant has shut down, and the sanitation system cannot treat sewage.

In the winter cold, fuel for heating and cooking gas was no longer available.

"We do not sleep at all at night. We stayed awake the whole night because of the planes," said Umm Kamel, a Gazan mother of 11.

Israel has denied a humanitarian crisis is unfolding, and has allowed convoys of food and medicine to enter Gaza daily.

Israel launched the campaign, called Operation Cast Lead, on Dec. 27 to stop Hamas rocket attacks on southern Israel. More than 460 Palestinians have been killed in the offensive and about 2,000 wounded, and the UN estimated that at least a quarter of them were civilians.

Targets have included the Islamic university, government buildings, mosques, and civil police stations that Israel says are used as bases by Hamas militants.

Before the ground advance, at least 28 Palestinians were killed in yesterday's airstrikes.

An Israeli airstrike killed 13 Palestinian worshipers, including children, and wounded dozens at a mosque in Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza, Hamas officials and medics said.

Israel has targeted mosques previously, saying that Hamas had used them as command posts and bases.

An artillery shell hit a house in Beit Lahiya, killing two people and wounding five, the Associated Press reported, quoting members of the family living there. Ambulances could not immediately reach them because of the resulting fire, they said.

Earlier, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged world leaders to intensify efforts to achieve an immediate truce that includes international monitors to enforce it. He also asked Israel to "ensure the protection of civilians and that humanitarian assistance is able to reach those in need."

Arab nations demanded that the UN Security Council call for an immediate cease-fire. Libya circulated a draft statement to council members before emergency council consultations last night, expressing "serious concern at the escalation of the situation in Gaza."

Tony Blair, former prime minister of Britain, representing major powers sponsoring Middle East peace talks, planned to begin shuttling today between Israeli leaders in Jerusalem and Palestinian leaders in the occupied West Bank.

Tomorrow, President Nicolas Sarkozy of France is scheduled to go to Jerusalem. Israel had rejected Paris's calls for a 48-hour cease-fire to allow more humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip. But diplomats said the Europeans were drafting a new proposal for a truce.

Israel occupied Gaza in the 1967 Middle East War and after Palestinian uprisings formally ended its military rule in 2005. It still controls the borders.

International peace efforts aimed at creating an independent Palestinian state foundered after Hamas won elections in 2006 and drove Fatah forces loyal to the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, from Gaza a year later. Hamas called off a six-month truce with Israel last month and stepped up the rocket attacks, citing Israeli raids into Gaza and a continuing blockade.