India’s UN ambassador, Hardeep Singh Puri, described the four separate statements, made by the eight council members from the Non-Aligned Movement, the four European members, Russia and China – as a “Plan B” after it was clear the United States, was likely to veto a legally binding resolution on the issue. -AP File Photo

UNITED NATIONS: By In a rare move on Wednesday, all but one of the 15 members of the UN Security Council made statements at the United Nations opposing Israeli plans to expand Jewish settlements around Jerusalem after the United States repeatedly blocked attempts to take stronger action.

India’s UN ambassador, Hardeep Singh Puri, described the four separate statements, made by the eight council members from the Non-Aligned Movement, the four European members, Russia and China – as a “Plan B” after it was clear the United States, was likely to veto a legally binding resolution on the issue.

“Consultations (on a resolution) were held amongst the members of the council and an attempt was made … (to see) if the 15th member could be accommodated,” said Puri, referring to the United States.

“But when we came to the conclusion that that was not likely to happen … it was felt that Plan B – which is what this is essentially – was for members of the council to come out individually and in groupings to make statements,” he said.

All the statements were made at UN headquarters after a Security Council briefing on the situation in the Middle East.

While the United States has also condemned Israel’s plans, it did not make a statement at the United Nations.

The United States, traditionally Israel’s protector on the Security Council, blocked a resolution in February last year condemning Israeli settlements. Any of the five permanent members of the council – the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China – can veto a resolution.

When asked about the planned statements by Security Council members at the United Nations, US State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said that “each country ought to make its own representations … and that’s the way we’ve proceeded.”

The Security Council resumed talks on a resolution condemning settlements after Israel said last month it would build 3,000 more homes in the West Bank and East Jerusalem – areas Palestinians want for a future state, along with Gaza.

But it became apparent that the United States was unwilling to support a resolution, diplomats said.

Approximately 500,000 Israelis and 2.5 million Palestinians live in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. The Israeli announcement came a day after the UN General Assembly upgraded the Palestinians’ status at the world body to “non-member state”- a de facto UN recognition of statehood.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday his government would press ahead with expanding Jewish settlements around Jerusalem, despite Western criticism.

Speaking in Washington, Nuland said the United States said it was “deeply disappointed” by the plan and said it put the goal of a two-state solution at risk.”

‘Fatal Blow’

The current European members of the Security Council – permanent members Britain and France, as well as Germany and Portugal – said Israel’s announcement of an acceleration of settlement construction was “undermining faith in its willingness to negotiate.”

Diplomats made clear that the issuance of the statements were targeted as much at the United States as they were at Israel and the Palestinians for a lack of progress towards a peace plan.

“We’re making clear to both parties and the US that the window of opportunity (for peace) is closing,” said a senior Western diplomat.

The Non-Aligned Movement caucus of the Security Council – Togo, South Africa, Morocco, Pakistan, India, Guatemala, Colombia and Azerbaijan – expressed grave concern at the “continuing illegal Israeli settlement activities,” which it said breached international humanitarian law.

Russia and China also separately said they were concerned by the settlement plans. All the statements on the issue were made outside the Security Council on Wednesday.

UN Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs Jeffrey Feltman told the Security Council on Wednesday that settlement construction in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, violated international law.

“If implemented, these plans would represent an almost fatal blow to remaining chances of securing a two-state solution,” Feltman said. “We strongly urge the Israeli government to heed the wide international calls to rescind these plans.”

Israeli analysts see the settlement drive as an effort by Netanyahu to enhance support for his right-wing Likud party against other hawkish rivals in a Jan 22 parliamentary election he is expected to win.

Israel’s UN Ambassador Ron Prosor questioned why the Security Council should single out the settlements’ dispute all the other events going on in the Middle East this week, including a bombing in a Palestinian refugee camp in Syria and the explosion of a Hezbollah warehouse in Lebanon.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton makes a statement after a meeting with Israeli President Shimon Peres in Jerusalem on July 16, 2012. – Photo by AFP

JERUSALEM: Iran’s proposals in nuclear talks with world powers are unworkable, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Monday, warning the US would use “all elements of its power” to prevent Tehran going nuclear.

Speaking at a press conference in Jerusalem following a day of talks with top Israeli officials, Clinton said Iran had yet to make the decision to turn back from its nuclear ambitions, which much of the West believes masks a drive for atomic weapons.

“I made very clear that the proposals we have seen thus far from Iran within the P5+1 negotiation are non-starters,” she said of the latest round of talks, which took place in Istanbul earlier this month.

“Despite three rounds of talks it appears that Iran has yet to make the strategic decision to address the international community’s concerns and fulfill its obligations.” Iran’s leaders still had the opportunity to make the right decision, but if it failed to do so, Washington would stop at nothing to prevent it from developing a nuclear weapon, she said.

“We will use all elements of American power to prevent Iran obtaining a nuclear weapon,” she said in remarks which carried an implied threat of military action – a course of action never ruled out by Washington.

She made her remarks just days after the United States imposed a wave of fresh sanctions on Iran, targeting companies tied to Tehran’s procurement, petroleum, and shipping networks.

Thanks to US efforts to rally the international community to tackle the Iranian nuclear threat, Tehran was “under greater pressure than ever before,”she said.

“That pressure will continue and increase,” she added.

Israel believes a nuclear Iran would pose an existential threat to the Jewish state and has refused to rule out a military strike on its nuclear facilities. It has warned that the current level of diplomatic pressure and sanctions is not putting enough pressure on the Republic.

But Clinton said the Obama administration was “in close consultation” with Israel over ways to increase the pressure on Tehran.

“We talked about concrete steps that we can take to continue to build the pressure,” she said. “We are pressing forward in close consultation with Israel.

“And I think it is fair to say we are on the same page at this moment, trying to figure our way forward to have the maximum impact on effecting the decisions that Iran makes,” Clinton said.

“We all prefer a diplomatic resolution and Iran’s leaders have the opportunity to make the right decision. The choice is ultimately Iran’s.”

Earlier, Clinton told President Shimon Peres the US was “committed to building and maintaining a wide coalition to deny Iran the ability to acquire nuclear weapons.”

She reassured the Israeli leader that the tough economic sanctions imposed on Tehran “will continue to become harsher,” a statement from the Israeli president’ office said.

Pere, who is known to favour diplomacy over the idea of a military strike, expressed confidence in Washington’s tough stance.

“I think the coalition we have built, and the measures you have taken are beginning to have their impact… they are the right start,” he said.

“We appreciate very much your position. We trust its depth and dedication and determination and we feel partners of this coalition.”

This US Navy photo shows Afloat Forward Staging Base-Interim USS Ponce (AFSB-I) as it transits the Persian Gulf on July 4, 2012. Ponce is deployed to support maritime security operations and mine countermeasure efforts in the US 5th Fleet area of responsibility.   — Photo by AFP

DUBAI: A US navy ship that had been slated for decommissioning has been sent instead to the Gulf to help mine-clearing operations, the US Fifth Fleet based in Bahrain said, the latest move in a gradual US build-up as tensions with Iran smoulder.

A fleet spokesman in Manama said the USS Ponce, described as a “afloat forward staging base” (AFSB), had arrived on Thursday after undergoing refitting for its new mission.

“Ponce’s primary mission is to support mine countermeasures operations and other missions, such as the ability to provide repair service to other deployed units,” the spokesman said in a statement.“Additionally, Ponce also has the capability to embark and launch small riverine craft.”

Vice Admiral John Miller, commander of regional navy forces, said the Ponce boasted “enhanced capability to conduct maritime security operations, and gives us greater flexibility to support a wide range of contingencies with our regional partners”.

Four US minesweepers arrived in the Gulf last month to bolster the Fifth Fleet and ensure the safety of shipping routes in a waterway through which 40 per cent of the world’s seaborne oil exports flow.

They arrived amid a flaring war of nerves between the United States and Iran over Tehran’s disputed nuclear energy programme and Iranian threats to block the Strait of Hormuz, the slender oil shipping channel out of the Gulf, in retaliation for a new European Union ban on its oil exports.

The four minesweepers were ticketed for a seven-month deployment in an area of operations that includes the Gulf, Gulf of Oman, Red Sea and parts of the Indian Ocean.

Tensions have simmered in the Gulf with big-power diplomacy to ease the nuclear dispute at an impasse and Israel renewing veiled threats to attack Iranian atomic sites from the air if sanctions and negotiations fail to curb Iran’s nuclear advances.

A string of hawkish Iranian statements, including a renewed threat to close the Strait and destroy US bases in the region “within minutes” of an attack, over the past week helped thrust benchmark Brent crude oil prices above $100 for the first time since June.

Iran has repeatedly warned of reprisals for any Israeli or US-led strike on its nuclear installations, whose activities it says are purely peaceful but the West suspects are geared to developing the means to produce nuclear arms.

A view of the Israeli-Egyptian border.   — File Photo by Reuters

JERUSALEM: An Israeli citizen and two militants were killed in an attack on the Egyptian border on Monday, Israeli media said.

Army Radio said an explosive device was detonated where Israel is building a border fence, killing one workman, and that militants had infiltrated Israel, opening fire at the site.

Three gunmen, initially believed to be Palestinians, opened fire towards a convoy of vehicles carrying Israeli construction workers to the place where they were building part of the vast border fence along the frontier, prompting Israeli troops in the area to open fire.

Initial reports said two of the gunmen were killed along with one of the Israeli construction workers.

A military spokeswoman confirmed there was a clash, but gave no further details. It was not immediately clear if the gunmen crossed through from Egypt or from the southern Gaza Strip.

— File photo

NEW DELHI: Indian police say a bomb attack on an Israeli diplomat’s wife in India is connected to a failed attack in Bangkok the next day blamed on a group of Iranian men.

Israel has accused Iran of carrying out both attacks as well as a failed bombing in the former Soviet republic of Georgia. Iran has denied any involvement.

Indian police issued arrest warrants earlier this week for three Iranians who had left the country and were accused of involvement in the Delhi blast on Feb. 13.

Delhi Police Commissioner B.K. Gupta told reporters Friday that one of those men had been in contact with Masoud Sedaghatzadeh, who was arrested in Malaysia and is accused of involvement in the blast in the Thai capital, Bangkok.

Yusef was freed on August 4 as part of a mass release of Israeli and Palestinian prisoners. - AFP Photo

RAMALLAH, Palestinian Territories: Israel has rearrested a top leader of the Hamas movement in the West Bank, just weeks after releasing him from jail, the Israeli military and Hamas sources said Thursday.

Hassan Yusef was detained on Wednesday night as he tried to cross a checkpoint between the West Bank cities of Ramallah and Nablus, a Hamas source told AFP.

The Israeli military confirmed it had detained Yusef, who was released from prison in early August after serving a six-year term for “membership of a terrorist organisation,” but declined to give any additional details.

Yusef was freed on August 4 as part of a mass release of Israeli and Palestinian prisoners due to overcrowding. He had six weeks left of his sentence.

Last March, Yusef disowned his son after he admitted to having spied on Hamas for Israel and played a major role in the arrest of senior militants.

Mosab Hassan Yusef, 32, said he was a top informer for Israel’s Shin Bet internal security agency and was known by the codename “The Green Prince.” He converted to Christianity 10 years ago and now lives in California.

He reportedly worked for the Shin Bet at the height of the second Palestinian intifada, or uprising that began in 2000, when Hamas carried out dozens of suicide bombings and Israel waged all-out war on the Islamist movement.

Hamas has said the elder Yusef worked entirely in the public political wing of the movement. He was elected to the Palestinian parliament in 2006, while in Israeli custody.

Adham Abu Selmiya, a spokesman for Gaza's emergency services had initially put the toll at six dead in raids which began early on Wednesday. - File Photo

GAZA CITY, Palestinian Territories: A series of Israeli air strikes on Gaza over the past 24 hours have killed five Palestinians and injured 30, a spokesman for the emergency services told AFP on Thursday.

Adham Abu Selmiya, a spokesman for Gaza’s emergency services had initially put the toll at six dead in raids which began early on Wednesday, but later revised down the toll, citing confusion over a body which reached the morgue in several pieces.

Of the five dead, two were Islamic Jihad militants.

The first attack on Wednesday hit a car in the southern city of Rafah, killing 34-year old Jihad militant Ismail al-Ismar.

Later, medics found the body of Ismail Amum, a 65-year-old civilian who was killed during an earlier raid near Deir al-Balah in central Gaza.

During the evening, the air force struck a target in Gaza City, killing another Jihad militant, 20-year-old Atiya Muqat; another strike on Rafah killed Hisham Abu Har, a civilian working inside the cross-border smuggling tunnels.

Early Thursday morning, an air strike on a sports hall in the northern town of Beit Lahiya killed civilian Salam al-Masri, and injured another 20, one critically.

“We initially reported two dead in Beit Lahiya because the body arrived in two halves,” Abu Selmiya told AFP, saying they later realised it was the same person.

Over the same 24 hour period, Gaza militants fired 19 rockets and mortars into southern Israel, lightly injuring an infant, the military said.

“Two rockets fired at the city of Ashdod caused damage and injuries at a synagogue and school,” a statement said. - AFP (File Photo)

JERUSALEM: Two Israelis were injured, one seriously, when a Grad rocket fired by militants in Gaza slammed into the coastal town of Ashdod in southern Israel early on Friday, police said.

“One person was seriously wounded in the attack, and another person was lightly hurt,” police spokeswoman Luba Samri told AFP, saying two rockets had hit the town. The second caused no damage or injuries, she said.

The Israeli military confirmed the strike saying a school and a synagogue had been damaged in the attack.

“Two rockets fired at the city of Ashdod caused damage and injuries at a synagogue and school,” a statement said.

The latest firings raised to 12 the total number of rockets fired from Gaza into southern Israel since midnight, the military said.

The increased rocket fire came a day after militants Israel said were from Gaza staged a coordinated series of attacks on a desert road near the Red Sea resort town of Eilat, killing eight Israelis.

The air force hit back, striking targets across the strip which killed seven Palestinians, at least four of them senior militants from the Popular Resistance Committees, the group Israel says was behind Thursday’s bloodshed.

The group immediately vowed to exact a bitter price for the killing of its leader and other senior cadres.

A housing protest movement in Israel began in mid-July and has since mushroomed into a full-blown social uprising. - AFP (File Photo)

JERUSALEM: Israel’s growing protest movement is hoping to draw a “critical mass” of demonstrators across the Jewish state on Saturday night, as they push the government for reforms to ease living costs.

The demonstrations will test the appeal and staying power of a movement that began in mid-July over housing costs and has since mushroomed into a full-blown social uprising calling for across-the-board reforms to ease the cost of living and reduce Israel’s income disparity.

“We’re hoping to reach a critical mass of more than 200,000 protesters to force the government to radically change social policy,” Hadas Kushlevitch, a representative of the protest movement, told AFP.

Kushlevitch, a student, accuses Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of failing to take demonstrators’ demands seriously and rejects his promise of a committee to look into their calls for reform.

The premier appears to have been caught off-guard by the protests, which drew 100,000 people into the streets in cities across Israel last Saturday.

He cancelled a foreign trip to address the rallies, setting a ministerial committee to look into their demands and expressing his sympathy with some of the concerns raised by protesters.

But his government has so far shied away from the sort of sweeping reforms that protesters are calling for, with Netanyahu explicitly warning against costly measures that he says could plunge Israel into a financial crisis.

Uri Metuki, another protest leader, makes no secret of the fact that he expects “the battle will be long.” We are trying to change nothing more and nothing less than a whole system that privileges the interests of the individual to the detriment of the collective interest,” he said.

But he does not see the movement running out of steam anytime soon.

“The movement has the support of a very large part of the population, which is not ready to renounce its demands,” he says, accusing Netanyahu of acting “cynically … in the hope that the movement will lose support.”

The burgeoning movement sparked off over housing prices, when a handful of young activists set up a tent city in one of Tel Aviv’s trendiest neighbourhoods to publicise their inability to afford homes.

It has tapped into deep frustration over what Israelis say is a growing gap between rich and poor and a general decline in social services that the state once provided.

Largely absent so far from the protesters’ discourse has been the issue of Israel’s settlements in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, with many reluctant to raise the controversial issue for fear of losing public support.

But individually, some protesters say they see a link between the outsized financial support that goes to support settlement construction and the dwindling government assistance for housing inside Israel.

In recent days, protesters have seen a new infusion of support from the Histadrut labour union, with several thousand members of the organisation joining demonstrators in Tel Aviv on Thursday.

Brandishing placards reading “the workers are with the protests,” the union members listened as their secretary general Ofer Eini addressed the crowd and promised to support the demonstrations.

The Israeli media has also largely thrown its support behind the movement, with commentators flaying Netanyahu for his decision to submit protesters’ claims to a committee and push through controversial housing legislation.

The laws, passed this week before the Knesset broke for a summer recess, streamlines the building process for contractors, which Netanyahu said would flood the market with housing and bring down prices.

But social and environmental activists say it will simply allow the construction of more luxury housing and could be abused by contractors who want to build without meeting environmental regulations.

The top-selling Yediot Aharanot newspaper on Friday questioned why Netanyahu had taken so long to act.

“If the protests are justified as Netanyahu says … then why did he not come to this realisation before they were triggered?” it asked.

Israeli soldiers and paramedics walk near the scene of a rocket launched from the Gaza Strip. - AFP (File Photo)

JERUSALEM: Israel’s air force carried out three raids on the Gaza Strip on Thursday without causing any casualties, witnesses said.

Two attacks early in the day targeted bases of the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades, the military branch of Hamas that controls the tiny Palestinian coastal enclave, to the east and west of Gaza City.

They followed two Palestinian rocket attacks Wednesday on southern Israel that caused no damage or injuries, according to the army.

On Thursday night, another rocket was fired at the southern town of Kiryat Gat without causing any harm, the army said.

In response, an Israeli warplane attacked a group suspected of firing the rocket, a military spokeswoman said.

The attack, in Gaza City, was confirmed by witnesses, who said there were no casualties.

On Monday, a woman was lightly wounded by shrapnel when a rocket fired from the Palestinian territory exploded near a cemetery.

The past month has seen an increase in rockets and other projectiles fired at Israel from Gaza after several months of calm following a flare-up in April when an anti-tank missile hit an Israeli school bus, killing a teenager.

Israel responded to that attack with a series of air strikes that killed at least 19 Palestinians in the deadliest violence since Israel’s devastating 22-day assault on Gaza in December 2008-January 2009.

The violence raised fears of another offensive, but the Islamist movement Hamas which rules the Palestinian territory announced on April 10 a return to the truce that ended Israel’s Operation Cast Lead.