Rebels in Congo reach door of Goma

GOMA, Congo (AP) — A Rwandan-backed rebel group advanced to within 3 kilometers (1.8 miles) of Goma, a crucial provincial capital in eastern Congo, marking the first time that rebels have come this close since 2008.

Congolese army spokesman Col. Olivier Hamuli said the fighting has been going on since 6 a.m. Sunday and the front line has moved to just a few kilometers (miles) outside the city. After more than nine hours of violent clashes the two sides took a break, with M23 rebels establishing a checkpoint just 100 meters (yards) away from one held by the military in the village of Munigi, exactly 3 kilometers (1.8 miles) outside the Goma city line.

Contacted by telephone on the front line, M23 rebel spokesman Col. Vianney Kazarama said the group will spend the night in Goma.

“We are about to take the town. We will spend the night in Goma tonight,” said Kazarama. “We are confident that we can take Goma and then our next step will be to take Bukavu,” he said mentioning the capital of the next province to the south.

The M23 rebel group is made up of soldiers from a now-defunct rebel army, the National Congress for the Defense of the People, or CNDP, a group made-up primarily of fighters from the Tutsi ethnic group, the ethnicity that was targeted in Rwanda‘s 1994 genocide. In 2008, the CNDP led by Rwandan commando Gen. Laurent Nkunda marched his soldiers to the doorstep of Goma, abruptly stopping just before taking the city.

In the negotiations that followed and which culminated in a March 23, 2009 peace deal, the CNDP agreed to disband and their fighters joined the national army of Congo. They did not pick up their arms again until this spring, when hundreds of ex-CNDP fighters defected from the army in April, claiming that the Congolese government had failed to uphold their end of the 2009 agreement.

Reports, including one by the United Nations Group of Experts, have shown that M23 is actively being backed by Rwanda and the new rebellion is likely linked to the fight to control Congo’s rich mineral wealth.

The latest fighting broke out Thursday and led to the deaths of 151 rebels and two soldiers. On Saturday U.N. attack helicopters targeted M23 positions in eastern Congo.

Also on Saturday, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon had called Rwandan President Paul Kagame “to request that he use his influence on the M23 to help calm the situation and restrain M23 from continuing their attack,” according to peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous who spoke at the U.N. headquarters in New York on Saturday.

North Kivu governor Julien Paluku said Saturday that the Congolese army had earlier retreated from Kibumba, which is 30 kilometers (19 miles) north of Goma, after thousands of Rwandans, who he says were backing the rebels, attacked early Saturday.

“Rwandan forces bombarded our positions in Kibumba since early this morning and an estimated 3,500 crossed the border to attack us,” he said Saturday.

In downtown Goma, panicked residents had come out to try to get more information on what was happening. A 45-year-old mother of five said that she has nowhere to go.

“I don’t really know what is happening, I’ve seen soldiers and tanks in the streets and that scares me,” said Imaculee Kahindo. Asked if she planned to leave the city, she said: “What can we do? I will probably hide in my house with my children.”

Hamuli, the spokesman for the Congolese army, denied reports that soldiers were fleeing.

In 2008 as Nkunda’s CNDP rebels amassed at the gates of Goma, reporters inside the city were able to see Congolese soldiers running in the opposite direction, after having abandoned their posts. The Congolese army is notoriously dysfunctional with soldiers paid only small amounts, making it difficult to secure their loyalties during heavy fighting.

“We are fighting 3 kilometers from Goma, just past the airport. And our troops are strong enough to resist the rebels,” said Hamuli. “We won’t let the M23 march into our town,” he said. Asked if his troops were fleeing, he added: “These are false rumors. We are not going anywhere.”

U.N. peacekeeping chief Ladsous said that the rebels were very well-equipped, including with night vision equipment allowing them to fight at night.

Reports by United Nations experts have accused Rwanda, as well as Uganda, of supporting the rebels. Both countries strongly deny any involvement and Uganda said if the charges continue it will pull its peacekeeping troops out of Somalia, where they are playing an important role in pushing out the Islamist extremist rebels.

The U.N. Security Council called for an immediate stop to the violence following a two-hour, closed-door emergency meeting. The council said it would add sanctions against M23 rebels and demanded that rebels immediately stop their advance toward the provincial capital of Goma.

“We must stop the M23″ because Goma’s fall “would, inevitably, turn into a humanitarian crisis,” said France‘s U.N. Ambassador, Gerard Araud. He added that U.N. officials would decide in the coming days which M23 leaders to target for additional sanctions.

___

Associated Press writer Maria Sanminiatelli at the United Nations and Rukmini Callimachi in Dakar, Senegal, contributed to this report.

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Man demoted for Facebook comments wins case

LONDON (AP) — Britain‘s High Court ruled Friday that a Christian was unfairly demoted for posting his opposition to gay marriage on Facebook.

Adrian Smith was stripped of his management position with the Trafford Housing Trust in northwest England and had his salary cut by 40 percent after posting that gay weddings in churches were “an equality too far.”

The trust said Smith broke its code of conduct by expressing religious or political views that might upset co-workers.

But High Court judge Michael Briggs ruled Friday that Smith had been “taken to task for doing nothing wrong” and found his employer guilty of breach of contract.

Smith said he was glad the court had backed the principle that “Britain is a free country where people have freedom of speech.”

And he received support from veteran gay rights and civil liberties campaigner Peter Tatchell, who said Smith’s employer had overreacted.

“In a democratic society, Adrian has a right to express his point of view, even if it is misguided and wrong,” Tatchell said.

Trafford Housing Trust chief executive Matthew Gardiner, said he “fully accepted” the court’s decision and had apologized to Smith, though it was not clear whether he would be reinstated.

In Britain, same-sex couples can currently form civil partnerships, which carry the same legal rights as marriage. The government wants to change the law to include gay marriage, a move opposed by many religious groups.

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Jon Stewart tells Bill O’Reilly to stop worrying about loss of “traditional America”

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – Jon Stewart has a message for Fox News host Bill O’Reilly — chill out about the loss of “traditional America.”

“The Daily Show” funnyman skewered the right-leaning network on Thursday for treating the re-election of President Barack Obama – a victory aided by minority voters – as a cataclysm for the white men who were once in the driver’s seat in America. Stewart implied that this longing on behalf of some of the network’s commentators for a Grover’s Corners past may not be rooted in reality.

“Yes Bill,” Stewart said. “Obama’s re-election marked the moment that traditional America ended. The moment when the family from the 1950s sitcom ‘Leave it to Beaver’ ceased to be real.”

Moreover, Stewart said that ethnic demographics are constantly shifting in the United States and that such changes can be a little troublesome for the folks who were in control.

“You don’t need to worry so much,” Stewart counseled. “What you are demonstrating is the health and vitality of America’s greatest tradition – a fevered, frightened ruling class lamenting the rise of a new ethnically and religiously diverse new class. One that will destroy all that is virtuous and good and bring the American experiment crashing to the ground.”

He added that those rising ethnic groups work so hard so that their children and grandchildren have the opportunity to be intolerant of new immigrant populations. Thus the circle of life continues.

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Gaza hospitals stretched, need supplies to treat wounded: WHO

GENEVA (Reuters) – Gaza hospitals are overwhelmed with casualties from Israel‘s bombings and face critical shortages of drugs and medical supplies, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Saturday.

The U.N. health agency appealed for $ 10 million from donors to meet the need for drugs and supplies over the next three months.

Officials in Gaza said 43 Palestinians, nearly half of them civilians including eight children, had been killed since Israel began its air strikes. Three Israeli civilians were killed by a rocket fired from the enclave on Thursday.

Israel unleashed its massive air campaign on Wednesday with the declared goal of deterring Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist group that runs the Gaza Strip, from launching rockets that have plagued its southern communities for years.

The WHO, quoting Health Ministry officials in Gaza, said 382 people have been injured – 245 adults and 137 children.

“Many of those injured have been admitted to hospitals with severe burns, injuries from collapsing buildings and head injuries,” the WHO said in a statement issued in Geneva.

Health authorities have declared an emergency situation in all hospitals to cope with patients, it said.

“Before the hostilities began, health facilities were severely over stretched mainly as a result of the siege of Gaza,” the WHO said. Israel maintains a tight blockade on the Gaza Strip with the help of neighboring Egypt.

The Gaza Ministry of Health‘s supplies of many life-saving drugs and disposable equipment were at “zero stock”, it said.

“The Ministry of Health has postponed all elective surgeries due to the emergency and shortages in anaesthesia drugs,” it said. Non-urgent cases are being transferred to hospitals run by aid groups and health personnel have been asked to report to the nearest health facility for extended shifts, it said.

“WHO appeals to the international and regional community for urgent financial support to provide essential medicines to cover pre-existing shortages, as well as emergency supplies for treating casualties and the chronically ill,” it said.

(Reporting by Stephanie Nebehay; Editing by Alison Williams)

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Diesel founder considering jewelery and Japan to beat slowdown

ROME (Reuters) – Diesel brand founder Renzo Rosso is considering expanding into jewelery and launching a new project in Japan to fuel growth at his fashion group despite the global economic turmoil.

Known as the “king of high-end casualwear”, the rockstar-looking businessman is one of the most dynamic figures in a fashion industry threatened by a slowdown in its core markets.

A painful recession in southern Europe and a slowdown in China are forcing European brands to come up with new ideas to lure consumers back into their stores.

Accessories, which, like leather belts and perfumes, are more affordable than evening dresses, are the fastest-growing category in a luxury industry expected to grow 5 percent this year from 13 percent in 2011 at constant exchange rates, according to consultancy Bain & Co.

Italian designer Giorgio Armani said in September he would boost sales of accessories.

Rosso, who also owns young-focused brands such Maison Martin Margiela and Viktor & Rolf, said he expected the recession to continue to hurt Italy well beyond 2013.

“There is a deep crisis and I believe it will remain serious for two other years,” Rosso said on the sidelines of the IHT summit on Friday afternoon.

“We need to take care of our licences for sunglasses, watches and perfumes. A world that fascinates me is jewelery. With my brands I want to enter this category too,” he said.

A visionary entrepreneur, Rosso was the first to turn stone-washed denim into a premium category in the 1980s.

His holding “Only The Brave” – which includes his brands as well as Staff International, a company that produces under licence for Just Cavalli, Vivienne Westwood Red Label, DSquared and Marc Jacobs Men – had revenues of around $ 2 billion in 2011.

DENIM KING

Rosso said he finds inspiration for new projects from travelling and working with his international team.

“I went to Japan with my daughters for three days and I came back with an incredible idea about a business that is totally different from what I do but related to clothing,” he said.

Rosso said nobody really understood him when he started to age his jeans by washing them with stones. His products are now sold worldwide, mostly in Japan.

“Japan is a country where fashion is extreme, more than elsewhere. I also love London,” curly haired Rosso said.

“Russia is going very well, like the Arab countries. Another growing market is Brazil, where people enjoy life,” he said.

Rosso, who works hands-on in Diesel but leaves designers at his other brands complete autonomy, has interests spanning from wine to eco-friendly technologies.

On Friday, Rosso announced a partnership with his friend rockstar Bono to sell in Diesel stores fashion products, sourced or entirely made in Africa under an Diesel+Edun label.

Through his Red Circle investment arm, Rosso is also the single-biggest shareholder with a stake of around 9 percent in growing Italian online fashion retailer Yoox .

Rosso has also invested in an Italian start-up incubator called H-Farm and in a maker of electric vehicles.

Rosso, whose thought-provoking slogans “Be Stupid” and “For Successful Living” have inspired books, did not rule out other investments in the future.

(Editing by Alison Williams)

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Israel hits Hamas buildings, shoots down Tel Aviv-bound rocket

GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israeli aircraft bombed Hamas government buildings in Gaza, and the “Iron Dome” defense system shot down a Tel Aviv-bound rocket on Saturday as Israel geared up for a possible ground invasion.

Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist group that runs the Gaza Strip, said Israeli missiles wrecked the office building of Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh – where he had met on Friday with the Egyptian prime minister – and struck a police headquarters.

Along the Tel Aviv beachfront, volleyball games came to an abrupt halt and people crouched as sirens sounded. Two interceptor rockets streaked into the sky. A flash and an explosion followed as Iron Dome, deployed only hours earlier near the city, destroyed the incoming projectile in mid-air.

With Israeli tanks and artillery positioned along the Gaza border and no end in sight to hostilities now in their fourth day, Tunisia’s foreign minister travelled to the enclave in a show of Arab solidarity.

In Cairo, a presidential source said Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi would hold four-way talks with the Qatari emir, the prime minister of Turkey and Hamas chief Khaled Meshaal in the Egyptian capital on Saturday to discuss the Gaza crisis.

Egypt has been working to reinstate calm between Israel and Hamas after an informal ceasefire brokered by Cairo unraveled over the past few weeks. Meshaal, who lives in exile, has already held a round of talks with Egyptian security officials.

Officials in Gaza said 43 Palestinians, nearly half of them civilians including eight children, had been killed since Israel began its air strikes. Three Israeli civilians were killed by a rocket on Thursday.

Israel unleashed its massive air campaign on Wednesday with the declared goal of deterring Hamas from launching rockets that have plagued its southern communities for years.

The Israeli army said it had zeroed in on a number of government buildings during the night, including Haniyeh’s office, the Hamas Interior Ministry and a police compound.

Taher al-Nono, a spokesman for the Hamas government, held a news conference near the rubble of the prime minister’s office and pledged: “We will declare victory from here.”

Hamas‘s armed wing claimed responsibility for Saturday’s rocket attack on Tel Aviv, the third against the city since Wednesday. It said it fired an Iranian-designed Fajr-5 at the coastal metropolis, some 70 km (43 miles) north of Gaza.

“Well that wasn’t such a big deal,” said one woman, who had watched the interception while clinging for protection to the trunk of a baby palm tree on a traffic island.

In the Israeli Mediterranean port of Ashdod, a rocket ripped into several balconies. Police said five people were hurt.

Among those killed in airstrikes on Gaza on Saturday were at least four suspected militants riding on motorcycles.

Israel’s operation has drawn Western support for what U.S. and European leaders have called Israel’s right to self-defense, along with appeals to avoid civilian casualties.

Hamas, shunned by the West over its refusal to recognize Israel, says its cross-border attacks have come in response to Israeli strikes against Palestinian fighters in Gaza.

RESERVIST CALL-UP

At a late night session on Friday, Israeli cabinet ministers decided to more than double the current reserve troop quota set for the Gaza offensive to 75,000, political sources said, in a signal Israel was edging closer to an invasion.

Around 16,000 reservists have already been called up.

Asked by reporters whether a ground operation was possible, Major-General Tal Russo, commander of the Israeli forces on the Gaza frontier, said: “Definitely.”

“We have a plan … it will take time. We need to have patience. It won’t be a day or two,” he added.

A possible move into the densely populated Gaza Strip and the risk of major casualties it brings would be a significant gamble for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, favorite to win a January national election.

Hamas fighters are no match for the Israeli military. The last Gaza war, involving a three-week long Israeli air blitz and ground invasion over the New Year period of 2008-09, killed over 1,400 Palestinians, mostly civilians. Thirteen Israelis died.

But the Gaza conflagration has stirred the pot of a Middle East already boiling from two years of Arab revolution and a civil war in Syria that threatens to spread beyond its borders.

“Israel should understand that many things have changed and that lots of water has run in the Arab river,” Tunisian Foreign Minister Rafik Abdesslem said as he surveyed the wreckage from a bomb-blast site in central Gaza.

One major change has been the election of an Islamist government in Cairo that is allied with Hamas, potentially narrowing Israel’s manoeuvering room in confronting the Palestinian group. Israel and Egypt made peace in 1979.

“DE-ESCALATION”

Netanyahu spoke late on Friday with U.S. President Barack Obama for the second time since the offensive began, the prime minister’s office said in a statement.

“(Netanyahu) expressed his deep appreciation for the U.S. position that Israel has a right to defend itself and thanked him for American aid in purchasing Iron Dome batteries,” the statement added.

The two leaders have had a testy relationship and have been at odds over how to curb Iran’s nuclear program.

A White House official said on Saturday Obama called Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan to discuss how the two countries could help bring an end to the Gaza conflict.

Ben Rhodes, White House deputy national security adviser, told reporters that Washington “wants the same thing as the Israelis want”, an end to rocket attacks from Gaza. He said the United States is emphasizing diplomacy and “de-escalation”.

In Berlin, a spokesman for German Chancellor Angela Merkel said she had spoken to Netanyahu and Egypt’s Mursi, stressing to the Israeli leader that Israel had a right to self-defense and that a ceasefire must be agreed as soon as possible to avoid more bloodshed.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is expected to visit Israel and Egypt next week to push for an end to the fighting in Gaza, U.N. diplomats said on Friday.

The Israeli military said 492 rockets fired from Gaza have hit Israel since the operation began. Iron Dome intercepted another 245.

In Jerusalem, targeted by a Palestinian rocket on Friday for the first time in 42 years, there was little outward sign on the Jewish Sabbath that the attack had any impact on the usually placid pace of life in the holy city.

Some families in Gaza have abandoned their homes – some of them damaged and others situated near potential Israeli targets – and packed into the houses of friends and relatives.

(Additional reporting by Dan Williams and Douglas Hamilton in Tel Aviv, Allyn Fisher-Ilan in Jerusalem, Jeff Mason aboard Air Force One, Writing by Jeffrey Heller; editing by Crispian Balmer)

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Google Considering Wireless Network [REPORT]

Google is looking to cut out the middleman for its Android mobile devices and begin offering wireless service itself, according to a report.

The search giant met with reps from Dish Network to partner on a wireless service “that would rival” wireless networks like AT&T and Verizon, according to The Wall Street Journal, which cited “people familiar with the discussions.” The talks, however, could amount to nothing, the article notes.

[More from Mashable: Google Updates Blogger Mobile Apps to Version 2.0]

Dish bought wireless spectrum in 2008 that it plans to build out into such a network. The company has met with other, unnamed companies aside from Google, according to the report. In an interview this week, Dish Chairman Charlie Ergen said potential partners include companies “who would like to be in the industry” and don’t offer wireless service. He did not name Google or any other of the companies. Despite the talk, there’s speculation that AT&T might partner with Dish on the spectrum offering.

Google bid on wireless spectrum in 2008, but lost to Verizon and AT&T. Google also took a $ 500 million stake in mobile broadband firm Clearwire, which it sold this year for $ 66.5 million.

[More from Mashable: Google Launches Mobile Game You Play in Real Life]

Despite being shut out of wireless for now, Google is offering wired broadband service in Kansas City. The company also diversified into the wireless handset business last year with its $ 12.5 billion purchase of Motorola.

Bonus Gallery: Hands-On: Verizon’s Droid DNA Wows With High-Def Display

Verizon’s Droid DNA

Click here to view this gallery.

This story originally published on Mashable here.

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Robert Pattinson looks for danger after “Twilight”

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Robert Pattinson has set young hearts aflutter as the teen vampire Edward Cullen in the “Twilight Saga” films, but as the sun sets on the franchise that launched his career, the actor is looking for more grown-up and “dangerous” roles.

“Breaking Dawn – Part 2,” released this week, is the fifth and final in the series, and Edward’s character shifts from brooding, tormented lover to a contented husband and father who must protect his family from an ancient vampire clan.

But Pattinson, 26, still has those rakish good looks that drew a screaming fan base and made him a tabloid fixture. While the avid fan excitement around the “Twilight” series overwhelms him, the British actor hopes his audience will follow him as he moves on.

“It’s all about control. Now, I don’t feel like I have any control whatsoever,” he told Reuters with a laugh.

“They’re a very ardent fan base, so to figure out a way to harness that vehement audience, it’s definitely an important thing.”

Pattinson became a pinup as the angst-ridden Edward, but said he wasn’t worried he might be typecast as the perpetual brooding hero. “I’m not particularly brooding in my real life,” he said.

The actor has already been laying the ground for a career beyond “Twilight.” He played a 19th century French gigolo in “Bel Ami” and a billionaire with an existential crisis in David Cronenberg‘s “Cosmopolis,” although both films fared poorly at the box office earlier this year.

Next up is a drama, “Map to the Stars,” again with Cronenberg, and “The Rover,” a Western-style action movie set in the Australian desert.

“Everything I’ve signed up for now is very physical, because I feel like I’ve done quite a few things where I’m quite still. I’m trying to find people that are doing things that feel dangerous,” Pattinson said.

ROMANCE ON AND OFF SCREEN

Away from the series with its apple motif, symbolizing forbidden love, Pattinson’s fame has also been fueled by his off-screen romance with “Twilight” co-star Kristen Stewart, 22, who plays Bella Swan.

Their relationship was thrust into the spotlight in the summer when Stewart publicly admitted she had an affair with her married “Snow White and the Huntsman” director, Rupert Sanders.

The actress apologized in a rare, heartfelt public statement but the affair shocked “Twilight” fans. Pattinson and Stewart have since reconciled, and the paparazzi have spotted them together, but they have stayed mum on their relationship.

“I just try and avoid it,” Pattinson said when asked about the scrutiny of his personal life.

“I don’t think it’s good in terms of a career as an actor. I think being in gossip magazines – I don’t like the whole industry, I think it’s a lazy industry, and it’s a weird media consumer culture,” the actor said.

“(Success) is so much based on luck as an actor. No one knew that the audience would connect to the ‘Twilight’ series the way that they did … it’s just luck, you’ve got to do the things that interest you.”

For now, Pattinson is coming to terms with saying goodbye to the franchise.

“It sounds cheesy, but it’s been such a life-changing experience where you share a bond with people, it’s weird. I remember hearing about ‘Lord of the Rings,’ they all got tattoos … that’d be so funny, maybe we could get a little apple, a ‘tramp stamp’ with an apple,” the actor mused, laughing.

(Reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy, Editing by Jill Serjeant, Gary Hill)

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TSX boosted by conciliatory U.S. budget comments

TORONTO (Reuters) – Canada‘s benchmark stock index jumped on Friday, led by financial and resource-related shares, as investors cheered conciliatory statements from U.S. politicians after they held talks on avoiding the “fiscal cliff” that threatens to drive the U.S. economy into recession.

The index had fallen in morning trade, weighed down by signs of global economic weakness, but swung higher after U.S. legislators vowed to find common ground to help the world’s largest economy avoid what could be debilitating tax hikes and spending cuts.

“We’ve definitely seen a swing up today on more promising talk from the Democrats,” said Youssef Zohny, portfolio manager at Stenner Investment Partners, a unit of Richardson GMP.

“We’ve seen a fairly sharp selloff in the last week or so and you’re definitely starting to see a few bargain hunters come in today. As well, oil’s up today so that’s helping lift some of the commodity sector,” Zohny said.

Oil rose as a fire on a Gulf of Mexico platform and the escalating conflict between Israel and Palestinians stoked supply concerns.

The Toronto Stock Exchange‘s S&P/TSX composite index <.GSPTSE> closed up 66.34 points, or 0.56 percent, at 11,877.72, with broad gains across nine of its 10 main sectors. It nevertheless notched a 2.6 percent drop for the week, its sharpest weekly fall since May.

“It shows you how low our expectations are right now that you can get that kind of a rally just by coming up to a microphone and saying ‘hey, we all understand each other’,” said Mike Newton, portfolio manager at Macquarie Private Wealth, referring to the comments from congressional Democrats and Republicans.

“What could be exciting about it is, imagine the rally that will occur when they come out with something very concrete,” he said.

STRONG RALLY POTENTIAL

Rick Hutcheon, president and chief operating officer at RKH Investments, said valuations have become so cheap that it would take little for the index to bounce higher in coming weeks.

“If there is any glimmer of good news the market has a very strong rally potential,” he said, speaking before the U.S. legislators made their comments.

Royal Bank of Canada led the index’s rise, adding 1 percent to C$ 55.62, while pipeline operator TransCanada Corp jumped 1.7 percent to C$ 45.05 as a bipartisan group of U.S. senators urged President Barack Obama to allow the company to proceed with the Keystone XL project.

Those companies played the biggest role of any two stocks in leading the market higher.

Miner Barrick Gold Corp gained 1.5 percent to C$ 33.77, while BCE Inc also moved 1.5 percent higher, to C$ 41.99 after confirmation that it is continuing to work with acquisition target Astral Media Inc to get a deal past regulators. Astral rose 5 percent to C$ 44.

Fertilizer company Potash Corp was the most heavily weighted decliner, dropping 0.8 percent to C$ 37.37, while Niko Resources Ltd skidded to a 52-week low, closing down 9.3 percent at C$ 8.44 after the oil company announced stock and convertible debt offerings.

(Editing by Jeffrey Hodgson; and Peter Galloway)

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Israel moves on reservists after rockets target cities

GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israeli ministers were on Friday asked to endorse the call-up of up to 75,000 reservists after Palestinian militants nearly hit Jerusalem with a rocket for the first time in decades and fired at Tel Aviv for a second day.

The rocket attacks were a challenge to Israel‘s Gaza offensive and came just hours after Egypt‘s prime minister, denouncing what he described as Israeli aggression, visited the enclave and said Cairo was prepared to mediate.

Israel’s armed forces announced that a highway leading to the Gaza Strip and two roads bordering the enclave would be off-limits to civilian traffic until further notice.

Tanks and self-propelled guns were seen near the border area on Friday, and the military said it had already called 16,000 reservists to active duty.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convened senior cabinet ministers in Tel Aviv after the rockets struck to decide on widening the Gaza campaign.

Political sources said ministers were asked to approve the mobilization of up to 75,000 reservists, in what could be preparation for a possible ground operation.

No decision was immediately announced and some commentators speculated in the Israeli media the move could be psychological warfare against Gaza’s Hamas rulers. A quota of 30,000 reservists had been set earlier.

Israel began bombing Gaza on Wednesday with an attack that killed the Hamas military chief. It says its campaign is in response to Hamas missiles fired on its territory. Hamas stepped up rocket attacks in response.

Israeli police said a rocket fired from Gaza landed in the Jerusalem area, outside the city, on Friday.

It was the first Palestinian rocket since 1970 to reach the vicinity of the holy city, which Israel claims as its capital, and was likely to spur an escalation in its three-day old air war against militants in Gaza.

Rockets nearly hit Tel Aviv on Thursday for the first time since Saddam Hussein’s Iraq fired them during the 1991 Gulf War. An air raid siren rang out on Friday when the commercial centre was targeted again. Motorists crouched next to cars, many with their hands protecting their heads, while pedestrians scurried for cover in building stairwells.

The Jerusalem and Tel Aviv strikes have so far caused no casualties or damage, but could be political poison for Netanyahu, a conservative favored to win re-election in January on the strength of his ability to guarantee security.

“The Israel Defence Forces will continue to hit Hamas hard and are prepared to broaden the action inside Gaza,” Netanyahu said before the rocket attacks on the two cities.

Asked about Israel massing forces for a possible Gaza invasion, Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said: “The Israelis should be aware of the grave results of such a raid and they should bring their body bags.”

Officials in Gaza said 28 Palestinians had been killed in the enclave since Israel began the air offensive with the declared aim of stemming surges of rocket strikes that have disrupted life in southern Israeli towns.

The Palestinian dead include 12 militants and 16 civilians, among them eight children and a pregnant woman. Three Israelis were killed by a rocket on Thursday. A Hamas source said the Israeli air force launched an attack on the house of Hamas’s commander for southern Gaza which resulted in the death of two civilians, one a child.

SOLIDARITY VISIT

A solidarity visit to Gaza by Egyptian Prime Minister Hisham Kandil, whose Islamist government is allied with Hamas but also party to a 1979 peace treaty with Israel, had appeared to open a tiny window to emergency peace diplomacy.

Kandil said: “Egypt will spare no effort … to stop the aggression and to achieve a truce.”

But a three-hour truce that Israel declared for the duration of Kandil’s visit never took hold. Israel said 66 rockets launched from the Gaza Strip hit its territory on Friday and a further 99 were intercepted by the Iron Dome anti-missile system.

Israel denied Palestinian assertions that its aircraft struck while Kandil was in the enclave.

Israel Radio’s military affairs correspondent said the army’s Homefront Command had told municipal officials to make civil defence preparations for the possibility that fighting could drag on for seven weeks. An Israeli military spokeswoman declined to comment on the report.

The Gaza conflagration has stoked the flames of a Middle East already ablaze with two years of Arab revolution and a civil war in Syria that threatens to leap across borders.

It is the biggest test yet for Egypt’s new President Mohamed Mursi, a veteran Islamist politician from the Muslim Brotherhood who was elected this year after last year’s protests ousted military autocrat Hosni Mubarak.

Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood are spiritual mentors of Hamas, yet Mursi has also pledged to respect Cairo’s 1979 peace treaty with Israel, seen in the West as the cornerstone of regional security. Egypt and Israel both receive billions of dollars in U.S. military aid to underwrite their treaty.

Mursi has vocally denounced the Israeli military action while promoting Egypt as a mediator, a mission that his prime minister’s visit was intended to further.

A Palestinian official close to Egypt’s mediators told Reuters Kandil’s visit “was the beginning of a process to explore the possibility of reaching a truce. It is early to speak of any details or of how things will evolve”.

Hamas fighters are no match for the Israeli military. The last Gaza war, involving a three-week long Israeli air blitz and ground invasion over the New Year period of 2008-2009, killed more than 1,400 Palestinians, mostly civilians. Thirteen Israelis died.

Tunisia’s foreign minister was due to visit Gaza on Saturday “to provide all political support for Gaza” the spokesman for the Tunisian president, Moncef Marzouki, said in a statement.

The United States asked countries that have contact with Hamas to urge the Islamist movement to stop its rocket attacks.

Hamas refuses to recognize Israel’s right to exist. By contrast, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who rules in the nearby West Bank, does recognize Israel, but peace talks between the two sides have been frozen since 2010.

Abbas’s supporters say they will push ahead with a plan to have Palestine declared an “observer state” rather than a mere “entity” at the United Nations later this month.

(Additional reporting by Maayan Lubell, Jeffrey Heller and Crispian Balmer in Jerusalem; Writing by Jeffrey Heller; Editing by Giles Elgood)

World News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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