UK urges Israeli withdrawal from Gaza

Sun, 18 Jan 2009 18:37:46 GMT  |  PressTV

Britain's Prime Minister Gordon Brown The UK premier has called for an immediate withdrawal of Israeli soldiers from Gaza, after Hamas gave a one-week ultimatum to Tel Aviv.  "This fragile ceasefire has got to be followed immediately, if it is to be sustainable, by humanitarian access... by troop withdrawals, by an end to arms trafficking," British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said at the end of a summit on Gaza in Egypt on Sunday.  Brown also urged Israel to allow aid workers to operate freely in Gaza and to re-open border-crossings into the coastal strip following the ceasefire announcement.  Late Saturday, Tel Aviv announced a 'unilateral ceasefire' that did not include any negotiations with Hamas and would keep Israeli forces in the Gaza Strip and authorize them to open fire if necessary - as a result Hamas rejected the ceasefire.  Earlier on Sunday, however, a Hamas official in Cairo, Ayman Taha, said that the resistance movement was observing a ceasefire setting next Sunday as a deadline for Israel to pull out its troops from the costal sliver.  Taha also called on Israel to open all border-crossings to allow in 'the basic needs of the people', including food, medical supplies and other goods.  Brown, meanwhile, said that Britain would provide GBP 30 million (USD 44m) in humanitarian aid for Gazans. The British navy would also patrol the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden to prevent arms trafficking.  "Too many innocent civilians, including hundreds of children, have been killed during the military offensive. Our first priority, a humanitarian imperative, is to get food and medical treatment to those who so urgently need it," Brown told reporters.  The comments came after 22 days of continuous Israeli aggression which began on December 27, and left over 1,300 Palestinians killed and more than 6,000 others wounded.