Posted on 03/01/2009 8:29:47 PM PST by Tailgunner Joe
Britain's former prime minister Tony Blair paid a brief visit to a UN school in the Gaza Strip on Sunday on his first trip to the Hamas-run enclave since being appointed Middle East Quartet envoy.
"I wanted to come to hear for myself first-hand from people in Gaza, whose lives have been so badly impacted by the recent conflict," Blair said at the school in the northern town of Beit Hanun.
"These are the people who need to be the focus of all our efforts for peace and progress from now on," he said, adding that he would relay what he saw to an international conference on Gaza reconstruction in Egypt on Monday.
The Middle East Quartet -- the European Union, Russia, the United Nations and the United States -- is due to meet on the sidelines of the conference in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.
Blair's visit coincided with a trip by British International Development Secretary Douglas Alexander, the first to Gaza by a British minister since the Islamists violently seized power in the enclave in June 2007.
Alexander pledged 30 million pounds (43 million dollars, 34 million euros) toward rebuilding and called on Israel to open the borders of the territory where he said he was "horrified by the scale of human suffering."
"Today I am making an allocation of 30 million pounds as a new statement of our commitment to do what we can as a British government to alleviate the suffering," Alexander said at a press conference.
"We want to see full and unfettered access both for aid and for aid workers here in Gaza."
Blair met Gaza businesspeople, members of civil society and representatives of the water authority, as well as dropping in on an English class, British consulate officials said.
But unlike recent high-profile visitors to Gaza -- including UN chief Ban Ki-moon and US Senator John Kerry -- Blair did not visit the areas most devastated by the three-week Israeli war on the territory.
John Ging, the Gaza director of the UN refugee agency, said he hoped the visits had convinced decision-makers to change their "failed policies" and lift the Israeli and international blockade.
"We rest our case now, there is nothing more to say. They have seen it and now it's up to them to live up to their responsibility to actually change it," he said after accompanying Blair on the school visit.
"Focus on the people, not the politics, and get the crossings open. It's as simple as that."
Israel and Egypt have sealed Gaza off from all but limited humanitarian aid since Hamas, a group pledged to Israel's destruction, seized power in June 2007 after weeks of deadly street battles with secular Fatah rivals.
Most of Gaza's 1.4 million population relies on aid from the outside world.
Israel's 22-day onslaught in December and January caused damaged estimated at 1.95 billion dollars, the Palestinian Economic Council for Development and Reconstruction says.
Blair was appointed Quartet representative in June 2007 after he stepped down following 10 years as prime minister.
He had planned to make his maiden visit to Gaza in July 2008, but it was cancelled because of security concerns.
Since his appointment, Blair has been spearheading several projects aimed at revitalising the Palestinian economy, including three planned industrial zones in the occupied West Bank.
He has also pushed development projects in Gaza, including the repair of the water treatment plant, where a reservoir burst its banks in March 2007, flooding a village with raw sewage and drowning five Palestinians.
The Quartet has refused to have dealings with Hamas, which swept Palestinian elections in January 2006, saying the group first has to renounce violence, recognise Israel and agree to abide by past peace deals.
Blair said he hopes the Western-backed Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and Hamas can together develop a "unified Palestinian response in a way that the international community can engage with the Palestinian people."
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