United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told a Paris gathering of nations committed to financially supporting the Palestinian cause on Monday that without an increase in international humanitarian aid, the impoverished Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip is headed for a crash.
Ban suggested that a further worsening of conditions in Gaza would result in even more Palestinian terrorism. As in previous statements by other international figures, the UN chief appeared to be blaming Israel's blockade of the coastal territory for security reasons for the dire situation.
But during her flight to join other world leaders at the donors conference in the French capital, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told reporters traveling with her that Hamas alone is to blame for Gaza's appalling circumstances.
Hamas' anti-Israel policies and support for and practice of terrorism are the direct cause of the situation in Gaza, said Rice.
Israeli child wounded by Gaza rocket fire
A three-year-old Israeli child was lightly wounded on Sunday afternoon when a rocket fired by Palestinian terrorists operating out of the nearby Gaza Strip slammed into the side of his home in a southern Israel kibbutz.
The child's mother, who was sitting just several feet from her son at the time of the attacks, was treated for shock.
Another rocket hit a nearby community several hours later.
Residents of the area used the incident to again demand the government of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert authorize the kind of broad ground invasion of Gaza that military experts say is the only way to curb the terrorist rocket fire.
A report released by the Israeli army on Sunday revealed that with recent improvements in Palestinian rocket technology, some 190,000 Israeli civilians now live under direct threat of artillery attacks from Gaza.
In other Gaza news, Israel's left-leaning Ha'aretz newspaper reported that the United States is weighing several options to help Egypt prevent the smuggling of weapons into Gaza via the Sinai Peninsula. Among the options being considered are the equipping of Egyptian border patrols with sophisticated tunnel detecting equipment and the digging of a deep canal along the border.
Washington began looking into the matter following years of complaints by Israel that Egypt was doing little to stop the flow of arms into Gaza, even after Hamas seized control of the coastal territory last June.
Israeli officials have pointed out that their forces exercised much greater control over the short Gaza-Sinai border prior to the 2005 Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, and insist Egypt could easily do the same if it desired.
A three-year-old Israeli child was lightly wounded on Sunday afternoon when a rocket fired by Palestinian terrorists operating out of the nearby Gaza Strip slammed into the side of his home in a southern Israel kibbutz.
The child's mother, who was sitting just several feet from her son at the time of the attacks, was treated for shock.
Another rocket hit a nearby community several hours later.
Residents of the area used the incident to again demand the government of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert authorize the kind of broad ground invasion of Gaza that military experts say is the only way to curb the terrorist rocket fire.
A report released by the Israeli army on Sunday revealed that with recent improvements in Palestinian rocket technology, some 190,000 Israeli civilians now live under direct threat of artillery attacks from Gaza.
In other Gaza news, Israel's left-leaning Ha'aretz newspaper reported that the United States is weighing several options to help Egypt prevent the smuggling of weapons into Gaza via the Sinai Peninsula. Among the options being considered are the equipping of Egyptian border patrols with sophisticated tunnel detecting equipment and the digging of a deep canal along the border.
Washington began looking into the matter following years of complaints by Israel that Egypt was doing little to stop the flow of arms into Gaza, even after Hamas seized control of the coastal territory last June.
Israeli officials have pointed out that their forces exercised much greater control over the short Gaza-Sinai border prior to the 2005 Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, and insist Egypt could easily do the same if it desired.
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