Israel: New 'axis of terror' sowing seeds of world war

Israel warned today that a new “axis of terror” – Iran, Syria and the Hamas-run Palestinian government – was sowing the seeds of the first world war of the 21st century.

The warning came as Israeli and Palestinian envoys traded charges at an open United Nations Security Council meeting in response to the recent upsurge in Israeli attacks in Gaza.

But the Palestinians accused Israel of an escalating military campaign using indiscriminate force to kill civilians and entrench its occupation.

The war of words took place a day after a Palestinian suicide bomber struck a packed fast-food restaurant in Tel Aviv, killing nine people and wounding dozens in the deadliest bombing in more than a year.

UN secretary-general Kofi Annan called the escalating violence “very worrying” and urged both sides to avoid putting civilians at risk. He also announced that the Quartet of Middle East peacemakers – the United Nations, the US, the European Union and Russia – would meet in New York on May 9 to discuss how to move the stalled roadmap to peace forward.

Israel’s UN ambassador Dan Gillerman told the security council that yesterday’s “horrific act of terrorism as well as the ones that preceded it were the direct result of the new axis of terror” comprising Iran and Syria and the “terrorist organisations they have been harbouring, nurturing, financing and supporting, namely Hamas and Hezbollah”.

Recent statements by Hamas leaders refusing to recognise Israel, and by Iran’s president who said on Saturday that Israel was a “rotten, dried tree” “on the road to being eliminated”, represented “the stated goal of this axis of terror” – which was again executed in yesterday’s deadly suicide bombing, he said.

“Each day extreme fundamentalist leaders are inciting more acts of terrorism,” Gillerman warned. “A dark cloud is looming above our region, and it is metastasising as a result of the statements and actions by leaders of Iran, Syria, and the newly-elected government of the Palestinian Authority.”

“These recent statements … are clear declarations of war, and I urge each and every one of you to listen carefully and take them at face value,” he said.

The Palestinian UN observer, Riyad Mansour, condemned yesterday’s suicide bombing and the loss of innocent civilians on both sides but attacked Israel for trying to portray its latest military escalation – which killed 21 Palestinians between April 7 and 9 – as a response to violence from the Palestinian territories.

“Israel, the occupying power has been relentless in its grave breaches of international law, including the wilful killing and injury of civilians and the practice of extrajudicial executions,” he said.

“What the Israeli government is doing and what it has been doing throughout its nearly 39-year-old military occupation is clearly intended to serve its clear political objectives of inflicting maximum pain, suffering and loss on the Palestinian people while it entrenches its occupation.”

Mansour urged the security council and the international community to condemn the Israeli attacks and take measures to halt the latest escalation.

Gillerman urged the international community and the security council “to take swift actions to try and prevent the next murder which is already on its way”.

Since January, he said, 11 major suicide terrorist attacks had been prevented and 90 potential suicide bombers arrested.

Gillerman said while Israel regretted any loss of life, it would not sit idly by and allow “human bombs” or rockets to penetrate the country and kill Israelis – and asked whether every country would not do the same to eliminate a similar danger.

“The danger I must add, not just to Israel but also to the whole free world, and to civilisation as we know it, as this axis of evil and terror sows the seeds of the first world war of the 21st century,” he said.