Vatican City  - Israel's airstrikes on the Gaza Strip are likely to trigger more hatred in the region, the Vatican's chief spokesman said Saturday.

Father Federico Lombardi, speaking on Vatican Radio, said an Israeli reaction to the launching of rockets by Palestinian militants following Hamas' decision not to renew a ceasefire agreement, was "expected".

However, the scale of the raids and the number of victims has left a a strong "impression," Lombardi said.

Paris  - The European Union on Saturday called for an immediate end to hostilities in the Gaza Strip, following Israeli airstrikes on the territory which have left at least
155 people dead.

The EU also criticized what it called Israel's disproportionate use of force, in a statement from the current presidency of the union in Paris.

The French foreign ministry on behalf of the EU renewed its call for a permanent ceasefire between Hamas and Israel, and said that there could be no military solution to the conflict in the Gaza Strip.

Beirut  - Followers of the Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah and others from Hamas gathered Saturday in Beirut's southern suburbs, a hotbed of Hezbollah, to show support for the people of Gaza after Israel launched a massive attack on the strip.

"The people of Gaza are not alone... the coming days will show you this," said Hezbollah politburo member Sheikh Hashem Safieddine.

He criticized Arab leaders and called on them to take urgent steps against Israel's attack on Gaza. He also urged Arab people to pressure their leaders.

Tel

Tel Aviv/Cairo - Israel is not prepared to accept continuous rocket fire on its citizens, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said Thursday, as the Israeli military readied itself for action against Palestinian militants, after receiving the green light to act.

Livni's comments were echoed by Defence Minister Ehud Barak, who warned that the Islamist Hamas movement, which controls the Gaza Strip and which Israel sees as responsible for the rockets fire, would pay a "heavy price" if the rocket fire continued.

Bethlehem, West Bank - Scores of people lined up outside Bethlehem's Church of the Nativity late Wednesday evening in cold and windy weather to attend the Midnight Mass in the birthplace of Jesus.

The mass will be lead by the head of the Roman Catholic Church in the Holy Land, Latin Patriarch Fouad Twal, and attended also by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who arrived in Bethlehem earlier in the day from the central West Bank city of Ramallah.