Livni: No Humanitarian Crisis in Gaza!!??

‘Israeli' Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, on a visit to Paris on Thursday, reiterated her government's rejection of a French-proposed cease-fire in the Gaza Strip to allow in humanitarian aid, her office said.

"There is no humanitarian crisis in the Strip, and therefore there is no need for a humanitarian truce," the Foreign Ministry quoted Livni as saying in a statement. "'Israel' has been supplying comprehensive humanitarian aid to the Strip ... and has even been stepping this up by the day," she even claimed.

President Nicolas Sarkozy was to welcome Livni at the Elysee presidential palace ahead of his trip to the Zionist entity and the West Bank on Monday, part of a Mideast tour that will include stops in Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon.

"Here there is an impression that ‘Israel' does not want a ceasefire. That is not the issue," Livni said in an interview to French television i-tele ahead of the Elysee meeting. "Our ability to enter into a ceasefire is linked to a halt by Hamas of rocket attacks on our ‘Israeli' citizens," she claimed.

After touching down in Paris, Livni headed directly into talks with Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner whose call for a 48-hour truce was rejected by ‘Israel' on Wednesday. Kouchner this week hosted a meeting of European Union foreign ministers who called for a ceasefire while the Middle East Quartet made up of the EU, Russia, the United Nations and the United States also appealed for peace.

In a New Year's message, Sarkozy said it was France's duty to "seek a path towards peace" in the Middle East. The French leader has made clear he intends to continue playing an active role in European diplomacy even as the Czech Republic takes the helm of the EU.

Sarkozy will travel to Cairo on Monday for a working lunch with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, whose government is seeking to renew an ‘Israel'-Hamas ceasefire brokered in 2008 and which expired in late December. He then travels to Ramallah to meet with Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, who has appealed for a ceasefire. A ministerial delegation from the European Union will also be present at the meeting. Sarkozy ends his visit to ‘Israel' with a working dinner with ‘Israeli' Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in occupied Jerusalem on Monday evening.