Tutu Shocked by Gaza Conditions (plus video)

Tutu shocked by Gaza conditions

Forty people were also wounded in the 2006 Israeli shelling [GALLO/GETTY] Desmond Tutu, the South African Nobel Peace prize winner, has said he is shocked by conditions in the Gaza Strip after months of Israeli sanctions. Tutu, who has been on a UN fact-finding mission to investigate the deaths of 19 Palestinian civilians killed in November 2006, said on Thursday the coastal strip had become "desolate and scary". He said Israel should ease the blockade, which has resulted in shortages of fuel and other basic goods. Israel imposed sanctions last year after Hamas seized control of Gaza. It has tightened the blockade in recent months in response to repeated rocket attacks by Palestinian militants. Rights violation Tutu told reporters in Gaza the blockade had to be lifted because "it is a gross violation of human rights". In video Beit Hanoun residents bear scars of Israeli attack On Wednesday, Tutu said he had asked Ismail Haniya, prime minister of Gaza's Hamas government: "Can you stop the firing of rockets into Israel?" Haniya was dismissed by Mahmud Abbas, the Palestinian president, last June when Hamas took control of Gaza from forces loyal to Abbas. "The incident we are meant to investigate was a violation of human rights in the fact that civilians were targeted," Tutu said. "We have said to the prime minister [Haniya] that equally, what happens with rockets fired at Sderot is a violation." Tutu, who was a prominent anti-apartheid activist when South Africa was still under white minority rule, said it was crucial that the two sides negotiate. Eight children were among the dead in the November 2006 attack [File: GALLO/GETTY] "That was our experience in South Africa. Peace came when former enemies sat down to talk," he said. The team visited Beit Hanoun on Wednesday, where the 2006 killings occurred, to interview witnesses and survivors of the attack. They will prepare a report to present to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. The Israeli attack on Beit Hanoun was widely condemned by the international community for killing 19 civilians, including five women and eight children in their homes. Source Video: Beit Hanoun Tutu visit (Al-Jazeera)