In an evening session Monday, the People's Assembly demanded the deportation of the Israeli ambassador, Yaakov Amitai, and the withdrawal of the Egyptian ambassador from Tel Aviv. The assembly voted unanimously on a statement prepared by the Committee on Arab Affairs, which also called for stopping gas exports to Israel in protest against the brutal attacks committed by Israel against the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip, considering it a flagrant violation of human rights. Assembly speaker Saad al-Katatny asked a special parliamentary committee to follow up the implementation of the demands with the government. The statement said, “Egypt after the revolution will never be a friend of the Zionist entity, the first enemy of Egypt and the Arab nation,” and demanded that the Egyptian government review all its relations and agreements with that “enemy.” It also called for activating the Arab boycott of the “Zionist entity” and the international companies that deal with it, considering such boycott strong support of the “choice of resistance,” the strategic option for the liberation of the occupied territories. Israel has launched several air strikes on the Gaza Strip, while militants in Gaza continued to fire rockets into southern Israel on Monday, the fourth day of violence that has taken the lives of 23 Palestinians. Egyptian efforts to mediate a cease-fire were met with a demand by the Islamic Jihad Movement that Israel agree first not to target the movement's leaders in future air strikes. Egyptian Foreign Minister Mohamed Kamel Amr had condemned the Israeli raids on the Gaza Stripon Saturday, and called for an immediate end to bloodshed, but Israel refused as long as rockets are still launched from the strip.
