GAZA CITY
Support by U.S. President Barack Obama to Israel and his description of its crimes as a kind of self-defense give it a blank cheque to keep killing Palestinian children in the Gaza Strip, the resistance movement Hamas said early on Thursday.
"Obama's support to Israel gives it encouragement to maintain its crimes," Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri added in a press statement.
Obama said on Wednesday that his administration backed an initiative for ceasefire in Gaza proposed on Monday by Egypt.
He added that Israel has the right to defend itself against rocket attacks from Gaza, expressing pride that the U.S.-supplied Iron Dome defense system had saved many Israeli lives.
Gaza has been pounded by Israel from land, air and sea for nine days now since Israel started its "Operation Protective Edge" offensive with the aim of debilitating the military capabilities of its resistance factions.
However, instead of incapacitating the resistance factions, Israeli planes, warships and tanks have left a tragic human toll behind in Gaza, producing an Arab outcry.
Around 226 Gazans have been killed by Israel so far, while 1673 others have been injured.
Gaza-based resistance factions have met the Israeli attacks with barrages of rocket attacks, some of them have struck at the heart of the Israeli capital Tel Aviv and some other northern cities, sending fear down the spines of almost everybody in the self-proclaimed Jewish state.
Late on Wednesday, Israel approved a proposal by the United Nations for imposing a five-hour calm in Gaza on Thursday to allow the delivery of humanitarian aid to the residents of the embattled enclave.
Abu Zuhri said earlier that Hamas had agreed to the humanitarian calm, saying it would start at 7:00 GMT on Thursday.
By Mustafa Haboosh
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