Posted on 12/28/2004 3:28:39 AM PST by white trash redneck
A 150-member Israeli aid delegation canceled its mission to Sri Lanka on Tuesday, after the country - one of the hardest hit in the Asian tsunami disaster - refused to accept the Israeli team, Israel Defense Forces officials said.
However, Israel is sending supplies at Sri Lanka's request, including 10,000 blankets contributed by the IDF, tents, nylon sheeting and water containers. The IDF Home Front Command is organizing aid preparations.
The Israeli humanitarian organization Latet ("To give") is sending a separate aid package Tuesday. It is filling a jumbo jet with 18 tons of supplies worth $50,000, at Sri Lanka's request. The group is considering sending additional aid shortly.
Sri Lanka said on Tuesday the death toll from the tsunami had risen to about 15,000 people, including at least 200 foreign tourists. Sri Lankan military spokesman Daya Ratnayake said more than 1.5 million people had been displaced from their homes - around 7.5 percent of Sri Lanka's population.
About 26,000 people were confirmed dead Tuesday in the wake of the tsunami that slammed into coasts from India to Indonesia two days before, with some estimates nearly doubling that toll.
The aid delegation that had been set to depart for Sri Lanka on Tuesday included medical teams and representatives of the IDF and Defense Ministry, who were planning to provide humanitarian assistance and participate in search-and-rescue operations.
The delegation was planning to assemble a medical facility comprised of specialist doctors, and set up emergency, internal medicine and pediatric departments, as well as laboratory and X-ray facilities in the southern part of Sri Lanka.
A far smaller team landed in Sri Lanka on Monday night, headed by four doctors from Hadassah University Hospital, Ein Karem in Jerusalem. The team was carrying medicine and baby food.
The doctors - who specialize in rescue operations, trauma and pediatrics - were also checking the viability of setting up a field hospital in the area, and advised Israel to send a larger team, such as the one Sri Lanka rejected.
"We will advise Israel and the Foreign Ministry... to send something more massive," said Dr. Avi Rivkind, director of Hadassah's trauma unit. "We will try to use our... broad experience in dealing with terror attacks and rescuing masses to help in this disaster as well."
Israel is weighing the option of sending similar delegations to Thailand, where more than 1,000 people have died, and India, where more than 4,000 people have died, but has yet to make a final decision on the matter.
Health Min. team leaves for Thailand A Health Ministry contingent left for Thailand on Monday night to aid in the rescue efforts there after around 1,000 people, including tourists, were killed on the islands of Phuket and Phi Phi. The contingent includes doctors, nurses and four members of the IDF, Israel Radio reported.
Israel has also offered its assistance to India. Mofaz passed on the offer to Indian authorities through Israel's military attache Colonel Moshe Krawitz.
Mofaz offered aid of two kinds - a search-and-rescue team from the Home Front Command, as well as consignments of food and medicine.
A ZAKA rescue-and-recovery team left for the disaster areas Monday night armed with its equipment, including materials and tools for identifying bodies, as well as body bags.
"We are waiting for any instruction," Yehuda Meshi Zahav, the director of the organization, said Monday.
Not much they have their money tied up on building homicide bombs and planning the overthrow of Isreal...
Ahhhh....
So the curtian is finally pulled back, and reveal a sheet, and a pro-Islamazi bent.
Thanks for clarifying your anti-Israeli slant.
BTW, if the Israeli were "wrong" to sell arms...what does it say about those who BUY them? Or would the same arms purchase from an Islamazi or Communist source be OK?
I now know to ignore you in the future.
Oh, and in answer to your "impassioned" pleas about the wounded...I don't CARE anymore. If you ain't with us, you are AGAINST us...so no aid to those in the "Gray Area" or on the other side anymore!
Logistics may be difficult---but they did nothing.
Sitting on their hands (and their asses) certainly added to the death toll.
The idea is that they should have done what they could have--and they chose to do nothing.
Actually, on one boat I rode, we cut it with a saw.
;-)
"I won't ask how you take it, I bet I know: black with a pinch of salt. (Right?)"
But, of course!
I definitely dont miss the coffee.
On some of the older boats, they had an isolation valve for the coffee pot you had to shut before you blew the sanitary tanks. Failure to do so made you extremely unpopular for the rest of your tour.
Thankfully, I never did it...LOL
"On some of the older boats, they had an isolation valve for the coffee pot you had to shut before you blew the sanitary tanks. Failure to do so made you extremely unpopular for the rest of your tour. "
LOL, something else for the messcranks to do---damned non-quals!
I remember a non-qual who used the head when we were blowing sanitaries----he got to clean the head later, too......
Course, this was the nimrod I sent to the EOOW to give him an emergency (ahem)
*GRIN*
***********
LOL!!
Well, it's not a vanity. More than one post. Capitalization and paragraphs. So I'll be with holding judgement.
I saw the story on injesus.com earlier. I thought the headline was a tad misleading. I'm sure you're just as shocked about that as I was.
:^)
Agreed 100%.
The new, updated story is here: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1309615/posts
Israel did send aid but very few people. Israel also sent aid and relief workers to Thailand.
Standing by.
For a newly arrived forum masher, not even particularly creative.
Well, if the Sri Lankans are blessed with an overabundance of highly skilled and experienced humans and dogs for finding bodies in rubble, then great.
Color me skeptical, but I doubt it.
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