Open borders with Gaza, UN humanitarian chief urges Israel

United Nations humanitarian chief John Holmes is urging Israel to fully open its borders with Gaza to help the devastated Palestinian territory recover.

Holmes toured Gaza Thursday as part of his five-day visit to the region following the 22-day conflict between Israel and Hamas. Israel suspended its military campaign on Sunday, but hasn't fully reopened its border crossings although it partially opens some daily to allow humanitarian aid supplies into Gaza.

Border crossings between Gaza and Egypt also remain closed.

"What Israel needs to do is to open the crossing points in a full and sustained way so that humanitarian aid and workers can get into Gaza much more freely than they can now," said Holmes.

More than 2,000 supply trucks carrying humanitarian aid have entered Gaza since the beginning of the operation, according to the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

However, Holmes said Gaza still needs basic supplies such as food and shelter as well as construction materials like cement, pipes and electrical parts.

"What we would like to see is the crossing points open for commercial goods in a much fuller way, and for export, so that the economy of Gaza can revive."

Without any jobs, people living in Gaza turn to jobs aligned with Hamas, he said.

"All these things are needed if we're going to have some semblance of a return to normal life for the long-suffering people of Gaza."

His comments came the same day as a similar call from U.S. President Barack Obama.

"Now we must extend a hand of opportunity to those who seek peace as part of a lasting ceasefire, Gaza's border crossings should be open to allow the flow of aid and commerce," Obama said during an address to the State Department in Washington, D.C.

Prisoner swap?

Israel launched air strikes on Gaza on Dec. 27 in response to Hamas rocket attacks on southern Israel. The militant Palestinian group controls Gaza while its rival, Fatah, governs the West Bank. The Israeli air campaign later expanded to include a ground invasion.

Roughly 1,300 Palestinians and 13 Israelis were killed in the violence.

Holmes called the Palestinian casualty toll "extremely shocking" and suggested the UN might ask Israel to compensate it for wartime damage to UN compounds in Gaza. Hundreds of tonnes of humanitarian aid were destroyed by an Israeli shelling of the main UN compound, and several staff members were killed in the violence, he said.

Halting the flow of arms from Egypt into Gaza was one of the main objectives of the Israeli military operation.

Senior Israeli envoy Amos Gilad headed to Egypt on Thursday to discuss ways to prevent Gaza militants from replenishingtheirwar-battered arsenal, while Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni is in Brussels seeking European Union support for anti-smuggling measures.

As diplomatic efforts continued, Israeli media reported that a number of cabinet ministers are considering freeing some Palestinian prisoners in exchange for Israeli soldier Sgt. Gilad Schalit, captured by Hamas-affiliated militants in a June 2006 cross-border raid.

Any prisoner swap deal likely would be tied to an arrangement to end the Gaza blockade.

Gadhafi pitches 'Isratine'

Also Thursday, Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi offered his take on how to solve the crisis in the Middle East.

A New York Times opinion piece penned by Gadhafi said a two-state solution will not solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and that the only way to achieve peace is to create a joint state called "Isratine."

"As Gaza still smoulders, calls for a two-state solution or partition persist. But neither will work," he wrote.

"The two movements must remain in perpetual war or a compromise must be reached. The compromise is one state for all, an 'Isratine' that would allow the people in each party to feel that they live in all of the disputed land and they are not deprived of any one part of it."

The comments differ sharply from his calls earlier this month for Arab leaders to allow volunteers to join with Hamas militants to fight against Israel.

Gadhafi also repeatedly called for Israel's Jews to be driven into the sea in the 1970s and 1980s when he was a champion of Arab nationalist positions opposing U.S. and Israeli policies.

Relations with the West warmed in the late 1990s when Libya handed over two suspects wanted in connection with the 1988 bombing of a Pan Am plane.