|
UN Facility Had Hamas Members, Israel Claims, But Not
Armed, UN Says
Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of
Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis
UNITED NATIONS,
January 6 -- Israel's shelling of
three facilities of the UN Relief and Works Agency in Gaza was
mentioned by
most speakers at Tuesday's Security Council meeting. Afterwards, Inner
City
Press asked Israeli Ambassador Gabriela Shalev to respond to the UN's
call for
an independent investigation of the bombings. "We investigate every
kind
of occurrence," she said. But she added, "by the way... among the
casualties were two senior Hamas members." Video here,
from Minute 4:44.
Inner City
Press went up to the UN spokesperson's office and asked, had the UN
found that
too? The spokesperson's answer was that
"our line is... we are defending our right to defend refugees." She
said there were "no armed men... they might have been Hamas" but they
were "there as refugees."
As the
Council meeting was suspended Tuesday night at nine, Libya's foreign
minister Abderrahmane
Mohamad Chalgan announced that the Libya-introduced draft resolution
has been
"put into blue," and could be voted on it 24 hours. This brought
howls of protest, most loudly by the French. Bernard Kouchner had
bragged at
the stakeout about Nicolas Sarkozy's visit to Egypt, that the Council
should
wait to see what happens "on the ground."
UN's Ban and France's Kouchner, reliance on
Egypt and preferential access not shown
The French
Council presidency, which invited only French journalists into the
Council for
some type of briefing, insisted that the Libyan draft resolution was
"dead." But then Libya said they would be calling for a vote, and
event that they had discussed this with France. Mais non,
the French said, there was an experts meeting earlier on
Tuesday, but nothing was negotiated.
News analysis: on
the one hand, the irony of
supposed human rights promoter France staking it all on an Egyptian
president
who disappears his opponents including critical media cannot be
ignored. On the
other, Libya's apparently pushing for a vote to draw a U.S. veto may
smack of
grandstanding at the expense of people in Gaza. More on how this plays
out
should be known on Wednesday, watch this site.
Click here for Inner City Press'
review-of-2008 UN Top Ten debate
Click here for Inner
City Press' December 24 debate on UN budget, Niger
Click here from Inner City Press'
December 12 debate on UN double standards
Click here for Inner
City Press' November 25 debate on Somalia, politics
Click here for Inner City
Press Nov. 7 debate on the war in Congo
Watch this site, and this Oct. 2 debate, on
UN, bailout, MDGs
and this October 17 debate, on
Security Council and Obama and the UN.
* * *
These
reports are
usually also available through Google
News and on Lexis-Nexis.
Click
here
for a Reuters
AlertNet piece by this correspondent
about Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army. Click
here
for an earlier Reuters AlertNet piece about the Somali
National
Reconciliation Congress, and the UN's $200,000 contribution from an
undefined trust fund. Video
Analysis here
Feedback: Editorial
[at] innercitypress.com
UN Office: S-453A, UN, NY 10017
USA
Tel: 212-963-1439
Reporter's mobile (and
weekends):
718-716-3540
Other,
earlier Inner City Press are listed here, and some are available
in the ProQuest service, and now on Lexis-Nexis.
Copyright
2006-08 Inner City Press, Inc. To request
reprint or other permission, e-contact Editorial [at]
innercitypress.com -
|
