Bishop Tutu is the International Patron of Sabeel.

South Africa's Tutu blasts Israeli 'atrocity' in Gaza

Agence France Presse
9 November 2006

JOHANNESBURG, Nov 9 2006-- South African Nobel laureate Desmond Tutu condemned an Israeli attack on the Gaza Strip which killed 18 people as an atrocity Thursday, saying "security does not come from the barrel of a gun."

"It is an outrage that cries out to heaven and we must condemn it unequivocally as we do the atrocities committed by suicide bombers against Israeli civilians," Tutu, former archbishop of Cape Town, said in a statement.

"We learnt in South Africa that true security does not come from the barrel of a gun," he said, joining the worldwide chorus of outrage and condemnation.

"Therefore we cannot, we dare not, keep quiet in the face of the latest atrocity in Gaza City when about 20 civilians including about seven children were killed whilst sleeping by Israeli artillery."

Israeli artillery shells slammed into five apartment blocks in Beit Hanun at dawn Wednesday, killing eight children, five women and five men and wounding 58 people, according to the Palestinian health ministry.

Tutu, who was awarded the Nobel peace prize in 1984 for his opposition to the whites-only government, also urged both sides to "stop the violence."

"Israelis and Palestinians can survive only together as citizens of free and sovereign states, can ultimately prosper only together as citizens of such free and sovereign states."

South Africa, which has reached out to Hamas following its shocking victory in January's Palestinian parliamentary elections, on Wednesday condemned the attack.

"This conflict has been taken to another level of inhumanity," junior foreign minister Aziz Pahad said, adding that Pretoria was disappointed that the UN Security Council had failed to act decisively and in a timely fashion.