RAFAH: Israel and the US were increasingly isolated as they faced global calls for a ceasefire in Gaza. Israel has pressed ahead with an offensive against Gaza’s Hamas rulers that it says could go on for weeks or months.
Much of northern Gaza has been obliterated, and hundreds of thousands have fled to ever-shrinking so-called safe zones in the south. Strikes overnight and into Tuesday in southern Gaza in an area where civilians have been told to seek shelter killed at least 23 people.
Meanwhile, Iran said Israel and United States would never manage to eliminate Hamas. Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian was speaking at a meeting at the United Nations in Geneva alongside his counterparts from other Middle Eastern countries.
At the same time, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu said his country enjoyed US support for its goals of destroying Hamas and recovering hostages held by the Palestinian militants, but the allies differ about what might follow the Gaza war. He reiterated his past refusal to countenance a return to Gaza rule of the Western-backed Palestinian Authority under President Mahmoud Abbas.
Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki, at a UN event to mark the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, accused Israel of starving Gaza, a charge swiftly rejected by an Israeli official.