Tel Aviv - Israeli ground

Tel Aviv/Gaza City  - Israeli ground troops began moving into the north and east of the Gaza Strip on Saturday evening, Palestinian witnesses said.

Tel Aviv  - Protests continued around the world against the ongoing Israeli military offensive in the Gaza Strip on Saturday, including in Israel where tens of thousands of Israeli Arabs demonstrated in the northern town of Sakhnin.

In what media reports said was the largest demonstration of Arabs in Israel in years, the Sakhnin protest started with a minute of silence for the victims of the attacks which have continued for an eighth day.

Among the demonstrators were numerous Arab members of the Israeli Knesset (parliament).

Amman - Jordan's King Abdullah II on Saturday issued a fresh appeal for a prompt action by the world community to force Israel to stop its offensive on the Gaza Strip, where he said the humanitarian situation had deteriorated drastically.

The monarch made the remarks during a telephone conversation with the envoy of the so-called Middle East Quartet Tony Blair, according to a royal court statement.

"The humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip has deteriorated to the point where the world community should drop its silence and move promptly to ensure a cessation of the Israeli aggression," King Abdullah told Blair.

Tel Aviv/Gaza  - Israeli-Palestinian violence in and from the Gaza Strip showed no sign of letting up Saturday, as the Israel Air Force (IAF) attacked 40 targets in the salient, and artillery also opened fire, and militants in the enclave continued launching rockets at the Jewish state.

For the first time since the offensive began one week ago, Israeli guns positioned along the border opened up in the late afternoon in what could be an indication that the long-expected ground invasion is close.

The artillery barrage continued for several hours. It was unclear whether it was an artillery shell or an airstrike which hit a mosque in the north of the Strip in the late afternoon, killing 11 Palestinians and wounding 50 others, 24 of them seriously.

Tel Aviv  - Tens of thousands of Israeli Arabs in the northern Israeli town of Sakhnin demonstrated against the ongoing military offensive in the Gaza Strip, Israeli media reported Saturday.