Arab states want UN to press Israel to end attacks

UNITED NATIONS, Apr 11 (Reuters) Arab nations today called on the UN Security Council to put pressure on the Israeli military to end a wave of military strikes on Palestinian targets.

Several members of the 15-nation council said a draft statement, which was put forward by Bahrain's UN ambassador, on behalf of the Arab group at the United Nations, was biased against Israel and needed rewriting.

The next step was for council diplomats to meet informally to negotiate revisions in the text, they said.

''At the moment, what is on the table I don't think is the basis for agreement,'' British Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry told reporters.

''I think it is very partial in the comments it makes.'' To win US backing a council statement would have to be ''something that contributes to positive movement in the dispute, not something that creates more heat than light,'' US Ambassador John Bolton said.

Palestinian UN Observer Riyad Mansour said the Palestinians wanted the council ''to ask Israel to stop this aggression against the Palestinian people and to cease these military activities and attacks and killing of civilians immediately.'' Mansour had written the council yesterday to accuse Israeli forces of killing at least 18 Palestinians, including a 6-year-old boy, since last Friday.

Among the recent attacks were three targeted assassinations in Gaza, in which Palestinians were killed by missiles or rockets fired from military aircraft.

Hamas, which is now governing the Palestinian territories after winning an election in January, is sworn to destroy Israel although it has largely abided by a year-old cease-fire that other militant groups have ignored.

Israel says it reserves the right to conduct extrajudicial killings of Palestinian militants bent on carrying out attacks targeting the Jewish state. It says it has been shelling Gaza to combat militants' rocket attacks on Israeli territory.

Israel suspended formal security ties to the new Hamas-led Palestinian government on Monday in what Hamas said amounted to ''a declaration of war.'' REUTERS DH BD0142