REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, BANGKOK - President Barack Obama said on Sunday it would be "preferable" to avoid an Israeli ground invasion of Gaza but put the onus on Egypt and Turkey to get Hamas to halt cross-border rocket fire, saying Israel had a right to defend itself from attack. This is the first comment on crisis from Obama.
Obama, weighing in with his first comments on the crisis, made clear he was firmly on the side of U.S. ally Israel against the Palestinian militant group, but he also seemed to appeal to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to allow more time for Middle East leaders to rein in Hamas.
And he warned those in the region who support Palestinian aspirations for statehood that any peace deal would be pushed off "way into the future" if the Gaza conflict escalated.
"There's no country on earth that would tolerate missiles raining down on its citizens from outside its borders," Obama told a news conference during a visit to Thailand. "So we are fully supportive of Israel's right to defend itself."
Israel bombed Palestinian militant targets in the Gaza Strip from air and sea for a fifth straight day on Sunday, preparing for a possible ground offensive while also spelling out its conditions for a truce.
Palestinians launched dozens of rockets into Israel and targeted its commercial capital, Tel Aviv, for a fourth day.
"We're actively working with all parties in the region to see if we can end those missiles being fired without further escalation of violence in the region," Obama said during his first trip abroad since winning re-election on Nov. 6.
Obama noted that he had spoken regularly during the crisis with Netanyahu, with whom he has had a testy relationship. But Obama was more pointed in talking about his conversations with Egypt's new Islamist president, Mohamed Mursi, and with Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, who have been strongly critical of Israel's air assault on Gaza.
"What I said to President Mursi and Prime Minister Erdogan is those who champion the cause of the Palestinians should recognize that if we see a further escalation of the situation in Gaza then the likelihood of us getting back on any kind of peace track that leads to a two-state solution is going to be pushed off way into the future," he said.
With Netanyahu warning that Israel was ready to widen its offensive, Obama said his message to all leaders in the region was that Israel "has every right to expect that it does not have missiles fired into its territory".
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