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UN "Caught Off
Guard" by Bombing of Gaza, Aware of Sewage Dangers, Council's Basement
Theater
Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of
Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis
UNITED NATIONS,
January 5, updated -- With
the Gaza Strip
cut in two, and U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad meeting with Arab
League
ministers in New York, the UN's John Ging told the Press on Monday, "We
were all caught off guard by this operation." Ging was in fact on
leave,
the UN word for vacation, when the Israeli air strikes began. He
finally
returned to Gaza City on January 5, after being held up at the crossing
along
with a group of Red Cross surgeons.
Inner City
Press asked Ging, what did the
UN anticipate or plan for when Hamas called of
its unilateral ceasefire? We believed that this would not happen, Ging
said. Video here,
from Minute 36:35.
Ging added
that it is the conventional wisdom of senior political figures that
there will be no solution of the Israeli - Palestinian conflict by
military
means. That's not the same thing as not planning for for the
eventuality of
military action. One wonders what the UN's or UNRWA's contingency plans
were,
and where those plans and planners are now.
Inner City
Press asked UN humanitarian coordinator John Holmes about the danger of
the
sewage lake by Beit Lahiya getting hit or targeted by Israeli bombs.
Video here,
from Minute 32:33. Holmes
rushed to point out that "it is not so much that it would be targeted
but
if hit by accident" the wall would send a flood of sewage onto the
population. And would the UN then say, "we were caught off guard"?
In UN briefing room, talking heads by video, foreknowledge not shown
On Sunday
evening, Ban Ki-moon's spokesperson's office sent out three Press
releases: the
first on elections in Ghana, the second about Gaza, with the Ghana in
the
headline. One recipient mused, had Israel invaded Ghana? Then came the
correction.
In the
basement of the UN, the Arab League ministers' meeting was postponed
from 10 am
to 11 am, then to 12:30. As the clock passed 5:30, a procession of
Permanent
Five Ambassadors went in to Conference Room 5: France's Jean-Maurice
Ripert,
who told the Press he didn't want to comment while his President
Nicolas
Sarkozy is in the region, US Ambassador Khalilzad, a delegation of
Russians and
then John Sawers of the UK. Egypt's
Ambassador criticized Sawers on Saturday for his allegation of arms
smuggling
from Egypt into Gaza. It was a question to be asked.
Update of 6:10 pm
-- UK Amb. Sawers came out, made a brief statement at the stakeout
microphone, then turned away. He stopped to churn out a few more pearls
of wisdom, then headed up the stairs. His spokesman promised to return
with an answer to the question, did Egypt complain? And lo and behold,
he did, reporting that as of Monday morning, no letter or "demarche"
had been received by the UK mission, but that the two Ambassadors have
been repeatedly in touch, and are -- in Inner City Press' phrase --
still on speaking terms. And there you have it.
Update of 7:53 pm
-- while the Arab League ministers continue to meet in Conference Room
5, with non-permanent Security Council members, the UN has decided to
terminate UN Television coverage, taking down not only the camera and
speakers, but also the lights and UN logo background screen. Only after
the U.S. and Japan speakers had finished did the cost savings begin. At
the UN it's pay to play, even in the basement theater.
Update of 8:10 pm
-- in a final lull, Inner City Press asked how owns the blue UN
backdrop. UN TV, the answer came. But UNTV staffers are "affiliates,"
not UN employees. So is the backdrop with the UN logo owned by an
outside contractor? No, it was reiterates, UN TV is part of the UN,
only its employees aren't. But where did the backdrop go?
Update of 8:20 pm
-- When the meeting broke up, what interviews there were, in the
half-light, were entirely in Arabic. Inner City Press ran after the
Egyptian Ambassador to ask if he had spoken with the UK counterpart,
and what was said. Yes, he answered, we spoke, and the UK withdrew its
accusation, and said there is smuggling from everywhere. And then he
was gone. The Arab Group moves in world parallel to others, often by
their choice, but this time at least in part by UN (TV's) choice.
Click here for Inner City Press'
review-of-2008 UN Top Ten debate
Click here for Inner
City Press' December 24 debate on UN budget, Niger
Click here from Inner City Press'
December 12 debate on UN double standards
Click here for Inner
City Press' November 25 debate on Somalia, politics
Click here for Inner City
Press Nov. 7 debate on the war in Congo
Watch this site, and this Oct. 2 debate, on
UN, bailout, MDGs
and this October 17 debate, on
Security Council and Obama and the UN.
* * *
These
reports are
usually also available through Google
News and on Lexis-Nexis.
Click
here
for a Reuters
AlertNet piece by this correspondent
about Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army. Click
here
for an earlier Reuters AlertNet piece about the Somali
National
Reconciliation Congress, and the UN's $200,000 contribution from an
undefined trust fund. Video
Analysis here
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