Gus Dur calls on people not to be provoked over Israeli issue

Jakarta, NU Online
Ex-general chairman of the Indonesia's biggest Muslim organization Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) KH Abdurrahman Wahid (Gus Dur) called on people not to easily be provoked over the Israeli attack on Gaza.

Gus Dur said there would be such possibilities of other parties taking advantage of the Israeli attack against Gaza solely for their own interest.<>

"I hope people not to easily provoked by those taking advantage of the Palestinian issue and whose intention to pursue their own interest," Gus Dur told reporters here on Sunday.

According to Gus Dur, the purposeful effort to help Palestinian people is by sending such deliveries of assistance as medicine, medical equipment, health care and and so on.

The former president of Indonesia also called on Muslims to pray for Palestinian people.

While, as reported by The Associated Press, Israeli ground troops and tanks cut swaths through the Gaza Strip early Sunday, bisecting the coastal territory and surrounding its biggest city as the new phase of a devastating offensive against Hamas gained momentum.

Thousands of soldiers in three brigade-size formations pushed into Gaza after nightfall Saturday, beginning a long-awaited ground offensive after a week of intense aerial bombardment. Black smoke billowed over Gaza City at first light and bursts of machine gun fire rang out.

TV footage showed Israeli troops with night-vision goggles and camouflage face paint marching in single file. Artillery barrages preceded their advance, and they moved through fields and orchards following bomb-sniffing dogs ensuring their routes had not been booby-trapped.

The military said troops killed or wounded dozens of militant fighters, but Palestinian medical teams in Gaza, unable to move because of the fighting, could not provide casualty figures. Hamas said only three of its fighters had been killed, and Gaza health officials said eight civilians also died, including a 12-year-old girl in the northern Gaza town of Beit Lahiya and four family members killed in an airstrike in southern Gaza.

Army ambulances were seen bringing Israeli wounded to a hospital in the southern Israeli city of Beersheba. The military reported 30 Israeli troops were wounded, two seriously, in the opening hours of the offensive.

In his first public comments since the ground operation was launched, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Sunday that the invasion was unavoidable and that his government exhausted all other options before approving the operation. (dar)