The Israeli attacks, in response to stepped up rocket salvos by militants in Gaza, drew dire warnings of retaliation from Hamas and threatened to ignite outrage on the streets of Arab nations whose governments were accused by critics of doing little to help the Palestinians in Gaza.
Protests erupted in Ramallah, the seat of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, and in the Jordanian capital Amman, where demonstrators urged Hamas fighters to "destroy Tel Aviv." Protests were also reported in Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon.
The Israeli attacks were called a "massacre" and "Holocaust" by Hamas spokesmen in Gaza, their voices broadcast over images of piled bodies in a morgue and wounded youths being tended on the floors of Shifa Hospital, which was overwhelmed with casualties. In one lingering image, a man kissed the head of a dead child carried out of the hospital.
Sheikh Yussuf al-Qaradawi, an influential Muslim cleric, decried what he called the "silence" of the Arab world and urged "the entire Islamic nation to stand against this criminal and savage aggression," in comments broadcast on the popular satellite channel Al-Jazeera.
Egypt, which on Thursday hosted Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni in an effort to renew an expired truce, found itself in an awkward position, accused by a Hamas spokesman of collusion with the Israelis. Livni had warned in Cairo that "enough was enough," signaling that Israel would respond to continuing rocket fire by Palestinian militants in Gaza, as Egypt's foreign minister urged restraint.
Scrambling to show support after Saturday's strikes, Egyptian officials said they would open the Rafah border crossing with the Gaza Strip to allow the passage of ambulances to take wounded Palestinians for treatment in Egypt.
Photo: Palestinian women and children in Chatila refugee camp in Beirut , Lebanon shout slogans during a protest against Israel's attack on the Gaza strip which killed over 195 people December 27, 2008
Tags: Arabs, Egypt, Gaza, Hamas, Israel, Lebanon, Palestinians, source: Chicago Tribune
