Sydney  - Over 100 prominent Australian Jews issued an open letter Tuesday describing Israel's Gaza siege as "grossly disproportionate" to the threat posed by Hamas' rocket attacks.

The group Independent Australian Jewish Voices accused Israel of breaking its truce with Palestinian militant groups in Gaza.

"There is a growing number of Jews around the world, tens of thousands if not more in the last week, if nothing else have spoken out forcefully against Israel," spokesman Antony Loewenstein said.

New York  - UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said Monday he plans to discuss with US President George W Bush the draft resolution hammered out by Arab governments calling for a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas conflict.

Ban is to have lunch with Bush at the White House, providing a unique opportunity to discuss the war in Gaza Strip, fresh from his discussions with Arab foreign ministers at UN headquarters.

Washington - President-elect Barack Obama said Monday he was receiving daily briefings on the situation in the Gaza Strip but did not signal whether he would alter the current US policy on the conflict.

Obama stuck to his position of not commenting on foreign policy before President George W Bush leaves office January 20.

"It is particularly important to adhere to the principle of one president at a time, because there are delicate negotiations taking place right now, and we can't have two voices coming out of the United States," Obama said attending a series of meetings with members of Congress.

Washington - The United States is pushing for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip that would require Hamas to halt rocket attacks into Israel but would also open crossings into the isolated enclave, US State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Monday.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice spoke to more than a dozen counterparts over the weekend seeking support for the initiative, which would also address tunnels used by Hamas to smuggle weapons from Egypt as part as the three-point approach, McCormack said.

Ramallah - French President Nicolas Sarkozy called Monday night for an urgent truce between Israel and militants in the Gaza Strip, and blamed Hamas for the violence which has seen 550 Palestinians killed and over 2600 wounded in 10 days of Israeli attacks.