U.S. LIFTS ISRAEL FLIGHT BAN
WASHINGTON — The Federal Aviation Administration has lifted its ban on U.S. flights to Israel, which it had imposed out of concern over the risk of planes being hit by Hamas rockets.
The agency made its decision late Wednesday after working with other U.S. government entities to assess the security situation in Israel. Its decision was effective at 8:45 p.m. PDT.
The FAA instituted a 24-hour prohibition Tuesday on flights to Ben Gurion International Airport in response to a rocket strike that landed about a mile from the airport.
The directive, which was extended Wednesday, applied only to U.S. carriers. The FAA has no authority over foreign airlines operating in Israel.
The FAA’s flight ban was criticized by the Israeli government and by Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas.
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
two black-clad figures, presumably fighters, getting into an ambulance and issued maps of purported rocket-launching sites close to homes and a hospital.
Israel says militants had stored rockets near the Al Aqsa Hospital in central Gaza where four people were killed and about 30 wounded by Israeli tank fire earlier this week.
The army also portrayed the Al Wafa Hospital in the Shijaiyah neighborhood, hard-hit in several days of fighting, as a Hamas military compound. Several access shafts led from the hospital to the Hamas tunnel network, it said. The hospital was repeatedly hit by Israeli tank shells, and after initially refusing, the director agreed to evacuate 17 patients.
Israeli officials have also alleged that Hamas prevents Gaza civilians from fleeing their homes when they receive warnings to clear an area ahead of Israeli strikes. In the early days of the fighting, before Israel’s ground offensive, Hamas authorities issued statements urging residents to stay and dismissing Israeli warnings as “psychological warfare.”
However, displaced Gaza residents describing their ordeal have said consistently that they fled in haste, with few belongings, and made no mention of attempts by Hamas to keep them in their homes.
Nahed Sirsawi, 30, a displaced resident of Shijaiyah, said her husband had received a call from the Israeli army late last week, telling him the family had five minutes to leave the house before bombing would begin.
The call set in motion a terrifying odyssey, with the family of seven seeking refuge in a series of homes of relatives, only to be exposed to more tank shelling or told again by the army to evacuate.
Eventually, the Sirsawis found refuge in the St. Porphyrios Church in Gaza City along with dozens of others from their area. Yet even the church wasn’t safe, she said. This week, several missiles hit a nearby cemetery, sending debris flying into the church courtyard.
“I don’t feel safe anywhere,” she said, pointing to where shrapnel hit inside the church library where her family was sleeping.
Israel said that it can’t be held hostage by Hamas’ decision to fire from within densely populated areas and that it has an obligation to defend Israeli civilians. Government spokesman Mark Regev said Israel’s response is “both measured and proportionate.”
But even in Israel, some — still a fringe — are questioning this.
In a letter to Israel’s defense minister, a number of local aid organizations demanded that Israel ensure the humanitarian needs of the civilian population, especially water and electricity. A few celebrities have spoken out against the airstrikes, then faced a flood of criticism for doing so.
News shows are still dominated by calls to let the army “complete its job.” The attitude derives from a widespread sense in Israel that Hamas is evil incarnate and that the militants actually want civilians to be killed for the propaganda value.
Gideon Levy, a prominent leftist Israeli columnist, said a long-standing “dehumanization of the Palestinians” has resulted today in a “total lack of any kind of empathy” with them.