Israel, Gaza fighting rages on as Egypt seeks truce

GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel bombed militant targets in Gaza for a fifth straight day on Sunday, launching aerial and naval attacks as its military prepared for a possible ground invasion, though Egypt saw "some indications" of a truce ahead.

Forty-seven Palestinians, about half of them civilians, including 12 children, have been killed in Israel's raids, Palestinian officials said. More than 500 rockets fired from Gaza have hit Israel, killing three people and injuring dozens.

Israel unleashed its massive air campaign on Wednesday, killing a leading militant of the Hamas Islamist group that controls Gaza and rejects Israel's existence, with the declared goal of deterring gunmen in the coastal enclave from launching rockets that have plagued its southern communities for years.

The Jewish state has since launched more than 950 air strikes on the coastal Palestinian territory, targeting weaponry and flattening militant homes and headquarters.

The raids continued past midnight on Sunday, with warships bombarding targets from the sea. And an air raid targeted a building in Gaza City housing the offices of local Arab media, wounding three journalists from al Quds television, a station Israel sees as pro-Hamas, witnesses said.

Two other predawn attacks on houses in the Jebalya refugee camp killed one child and wounded 12 other people, medical officials said.

These attacks followed a defiant statement by Hamas military spokesman Abu Ubaida, who told a televised news conference.

"This round of confrontation will not be the last against the Zionist enemy and it is only the beginning."

The masked gunman dressed in military fatigues insisted that despite Israel's blows Hamas "is still strong enough to destroy the enemy."

An Israeli attack on Saturday destroyed the house of a Hamas commander near the Egyptian border.

Casualties there were averted however, because Israel had fired non-exploding missiles at the building beforehand from a drone, which the militant's family understood as a warning to flee, and thus their lives were spared, witnesses said.

Israeli aircraft also bombed Hamas government buildings in Gaza on Saturday, including the offices of Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh and a police headquarters.

Among those killed in air strikes on Gaza on Saturday were at least four suspected militants riding motorcycles, and several civilians including a 30-year-old woman.

ISRAELI SCHOOLS SHUT

Israel said it would keep schools in its southern region shut on Sunday as a precaution to avoid casualties from rocket strikes reaching as far as Tel Aviv and Jerusalem in the past few days.

Israel's "Iron Dome" missile interceptor system destroyed in mid-air a rocket fired by Gaza militants at Tel Aviv on Saturday, where volleyball games on the beach front came to an abrupt halt as air-raid sirens sounded.

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

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

Israel's operation has drawn Western support for what U.S. and European leaders have called Israel's right to self-defense, but there was also a growing number of calls from world leaders to seek an end to the violence.

British Prime Minister David Cameron "expressed concern over the risk of the conflict escalating further and the danger of further civilian casualties on both sides," in a conversation with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a spokesperson for Cameron said.

The United Kingdom was "putting pressure on both sides to de-escalate," the spokesman said, adding that Cameron had urged Netanyahu "to do everything possible to bring the conflict to an end."

Ben Rhodes, a deputy national security adviser to President Barack Obama, said the United States would like to see the conflict resolved through "de-escalation" and diplomacy, but also believes Israel has a right to self-defense.

Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi said in Cairo as his security deputies sought to broker a truce with Hamas leaders, that "there are some indications that there is a possibility of a ceasefire soon, but we do not yet have firm guarantees."

Egypt has mediated previous ceasefire deals between Israel and Hamas, the latest of which unraveled with recent violence.

A Palestinian official told Reuters the truce discussions would continue in Cairo on Sunday, saying "there is hope," but it was too early to say whether the efforts would succeed.

In Jerusalem, an Israeli official declined to comment on the negotiations. Military commanders said Israel was prepared to fight on to achieve a goal of halting rocket fire from Gaza, which has plagued Israeli towns since late 2000, when failed peace talks led to the outbreak of a Palestinian uprising.

Diplomats at the United Nations said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is expected to visit Israel and Egypt in the coming week to push for an end to the fighting.

POSSIBLE GROUND OFFENSIVE

Israel, though, with tanks and artillery positioned along the frontier, signaled it was still weighing a possible ground offensive into Gaza.

Israeli cabinet ministers decided on Friday to more than double the current reserve troop quota set for the Gaza offensive to 75,000 and 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.

Another senior commander briefing reporters on condition of anonymity said Israel had scored "good achievements" in striking at nearly 1,000 targets, with the aim of ridding Hamas of firepower imported from Libya, Sudan and Iran.

A possible move into the densely populated Gaza Strip and the risk of major casualties it brings would be a significant gamble for 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 Israeli air blitz and ground invasion over the New Year's period of 2008-09, killed over 1,400 Palestinians, mostly civilians. Thirteen Israelis died in the conflict.

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.

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

(Writing by Allyn Fisher-Ilan; Editing by Todd Eastham)

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21st ASEAN Summit kicks off in Phnom Penh

PHNOM PENH: The 21st ASEAN Summit and its related meetings kicked off in the Cambodian capital Phnom Penh on Sunday with an opening ceremony officiated by the country's premier, Hun Sen.

ASEAN's leaders are expected to ensure that the ten-member grouping plays a collective role in riding out the current economic uncertainties facing the world.

One such initiative to boost the grouping's competitiveness is the launch of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP).

According to trade officials, the RCEP is a 16-party Free Trade Agreement between the 10 ASEAN members and its current FTA partners - Australia, China, India, Japan, Korea and New Zealand.

Negotiations for the RCEP are expected to start in 2013 and conclude by end-2015.

ASEAN's leaders believe that the RCEP would lead to greater economic integration and strengthen economic co-operation among the countries involved, especially when it has a potential to transform the region into an integrated market of more than three billion people (over 45 per cent of the world's population), with a combined GDP of about US$17.23 trillion, which is about a third of the world's current annual GDP.

Singapore's Trade and Industry Ministry said the Republic is taking part in the RCEP as it enhances access to a huge potential market that will bring benefits to both businesses and consumers in the participating countries.

A second major development at the Phnom Penh summit is the adoption by its leaders of the ASEAN Human Rights Declaration. The declaration is expected to cover rights in the areas of social, political, economic and cultural aspects and also the rights of women in ASEAN society.

The ASEAN Institute of Peace and Reconciliation (AIPR) was also launched on Sunday. Funds for the for the institute will be contributed by ASEAN member states.

The AIPR was initiated by Indonesia, which is aimed at reviewing ASEAN cooperation and contributing to the peace and reconciliation in the region.

-CNA/ac

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Bal Thackeray: In his Pawar games, he played friend and foe

Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray, veteran trade union leader George Fernandes and Maratha strongman Sharad Pawar were arch-rivals for several years. However, the 1982 textile workers' strike united them against trade union leader Datta Samant. The trio addressed a large public rally at the historic Shivaji Park, where they said a strike would have an adverse impact on the textile industry and ruin the metropolis's economy. The trio wanted to stop Samant from gaining followers. They did not succeed, as a record number of textile workers joined the strike. But the strike was unsuccessful.

In subsequent years, while Thackeray's and Pawar's personal relations peaked, they became the biggest rivals on the political front. Veteran journalist Vasant Deshpande said, "They never mixed personal relations and politics. As a result, even today Pawar has very cordial relations with the Thackeray family." For over four-anda-half decades, relations between Pawar and the Thackeray family, particularly Thackeray Sr, soured on several occasions due to political issues, but both these stalwarts ensured there was no strain on their personal relations. The Sena's mouthpiece, Saamna, wrote very critically about Pawar several times, but he never reacted too sharply to the stringent observations.

Another veteran journalist, Dinkar Raikar, agreed that Pawar and Thackeray had a soft corner for each other. "In 1972, Pawar was the minister of state for home and the Shiv Sena had just begun to spread its tentacles in the metropolis. There were moments of tension, but Pawar always dealt with the situation diplomatically. They were political rivals, but their personal equations were like family members," Raikar said.

Maharashtra witnessed a public spat between Pawar and Thackeray on at least three occasions. First, when Chhagan Bhujbal, as a Sena legislator , launched a frontal attack on Pawar over an alleged plot scam. Second, when Bhujbal engineered a split in the Shiv Sena. Thirdly, when Bhujbal, as home minister in the Congress-NCP government, got Thackeray arrested in a decade-old case.

In 1989, when Pawar was the Congress chief minister, Bhujbal, the lone Sena legislator in the assembly, single-handedly launched a campaign against Pawar over an alleged plot scam in the metropolis. "We were expecting that the senior Thackeray would step in and halt the campaign against Pawar, but Thackeray did not come to the rescue of Pawar. As a result, Pawar's image was massively damaged," said a senior Shiv Sena leader.

Shockingly, a year later, Bhujbal led the biggest-ever split in the Sena, when a record 14 legislators quit to join the Congress. "It was one of the biggestever setbacks for Thackeray, who expected that Pawar would halt the split. But this time there was no response from Pawar," the Sena leader said.

Later in 2000, when Bhujbal was state home minister and deputy chief minister, he dug out a decade-old case under Section 153 of the Indian Penal Code — creating communal enmity — and ensured that Thackeray was arrested . The Sena made an all-out effort to thwart Bhujbal's attempt, but Pawar did not step in. As a result, the senior Thackeray had to face an embarrassing arrest. A month ago, Bhujbal told a public meeting that he had not sought the permission of Pawar or then chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh to arrest Thackeray.

Thackeray drafted an ambitious plan to dislodge the Congress government in 1990, but did not succeed. However, prior to the 1995 assembly polls, Thackeray, accompanied by BJP leader Gopinath Munde and Sena leader Manohar Joshi, launched a statewide campaign against Pawar, saying it was high time that the people of Maharashtra dislodged the Pawar-led Congress government. "It was a setback for Pawar when the saffron combine assumed power. Till then it was assumed that Pawar was the undisputed leader of Maharashtra . A question mark then came over Pawar's leadership," a senior Congress minister said.

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EU drug regulator OKs Novartis' meningitis B shot

LONDON (AP) — Europe's top drug regulator has recommended approval for the first vaccine against meningitis B, made by Novartis AG.

There are five types of bacterial meningitis. While vaccines exist to protect against the other four, none has previously been licensed for type B meningitis. In Europe, type B is the most common, causing 3,000 to 5,000 cases every year.

Meningitis mainly affects infants and children. It kills about 8 percent of patients and leaves others with lifelong consequences such as brain damage.

In a statement on Friday, Andrin Oswald of Novartis said he is "proud of the major advance" the company has made in developing its vaccine Bexsero. It is aimed at children over two months of age, and Novartis is hoping countries will include the shot among the routine ones for childhood diseases such as measles.

Novartis said the immunization has had side effects such as fever and redness at the injection site.

Recommendations from the European Medicines Agency are usually adopted by the European Commission. Novartis also is seeking to test the vaccine in the U.S.

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Israel's Iron Dome Proves Effective Defense

Israel said that it will install a fifth "Iron Dome" battery before the end of the year, adding another installation to the country's missile defense system, which has proven itself this week, intercepting more than 150 rockets fired from the Gaza Strip.

The missile defense system, which can identify enemy rockets, determine if they pose a threat to populated areas, and destroy them within a matter of seconds, has been praised by Israel's leaders for saving hundreds of lives.

The system, however, comes with a steep price. Each interceptor missile, which includes a radar guidance system, costs $40,000. Israel has not disclosed how many missiles are required to take down an enemy rocket or how many interceptors it has fired, but experts estimate the country has fired $8 million worth of missiles in the past three days.

The Israelis are only trying to shoot down about a third of the rockets fired by militants, those on a trajectory towards populated areas, said Ben Goodlad, a senior aerospace and defense analyst at IHS Jane's. But of the rockets Iron Dome has targeted, the system is between 87 and 90 percent successful in destroying.

"That is an incredibly high success rate for the system," he said. "What isn't clear is how many interceptor missiles are fired. There may be two, three, or four fired at a one time to take down a rocket."

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Palestinian militants working out of the Gaza Strip, a ribbon of coastline controlled by Hamas, have for years been stockpiling short- and medium-range rockets, built at a fraction of the cost of the Iron Dome missiles and then stored in highly populated areas near hospitals and schools.

Hamas is considered by the U.S. and Europe Union as a terrorist organization.

Militants this week fired rockets further into Israel than ever before, targeting the country's two largest cities, Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, but there were no casualties in those cities. Three Israelis were killed by rockets elsewhere in Israel.

"We are very pleased with the interception rates," aerial defense commander Brig. Gen. Shachar Shochet told reporters on Thursday. "We have intercepted dozens of Grad and Qassam rockets fired by Hamas and other groups, and prevented serious harm to our civilians."

Defense Minister Ehud Barak said the country the system had saved lives.

"No other country in the world has technology like the Iron Dome," Barak said. "Had the system not existed, many civilians would be in harm's way. However, the system is not a 100 percent foolproof defense, and does not absolve citizens of their duty to closely follow instructions given by Homefront Command."

The system is not perfect, and can be breeched by a large volley of rockets fired at once, a problem of "saturation," said former White House counterterrorism adviser and ABC News consultant Dick Clark.

Israel, therefore, plans to target the rocket stockpiles rather than continue to shoot down individual missiles. Israel has called up more than 60,000 reserve soldiers and appears to be planning a ground strike in Gaza soon.

Currently four mobile batteries equipped with sophisticated radar technology and missiles and on-board radar, are combined to create a shield over the country.

In 2006, 4,000 rockets were fired at Israel during a war with Lebanon that left 44 civilians dead. In response, the Israeli Defense Forces and Israeli defense manufacturer Rafael Advanced Defense Systems began developing Iron Dome.

In 2010, after tests proved effective, the United States began funding the program in part. Earlier this year, Congress authorized $600 million for the program, with instructions that the U.S. would eventually begin co-production of the system.

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Israel authorizes more reservists after rockets target cities

GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israeli aircraft pounded Hamas government buildings in Gaza on Saturday, including the building housing the prime minister's office, after Israel's Cabinet authorized the mobilization of up to 75,000 reservists, preparing the ground for a possible invasion into Gaza.

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

An Israeli military spokeswoman confirmed the strike on Haniyeh's office.

On Friday, Palestinians fired a rocket toward Jerusalem for the first time in decades.

Tel Aviv, Israel's commercial centre, also came under rocket attack for the second straight day, in defiance of an Israeli air offensive that began on Wednesday with the declared aim of deterring Hamas from launching cross-border attacks that have plagued southern Israel for years.

Hamas claimed responsibility for firing at Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. Israel said the rocket launched toward Jerusalem landed in the occupied West Bank, and the one fired at Tel Aviv did not hit the city. There were no reports of casualties.

The siren that sounded in Jerusalem stunned many Israelis. The city, holy to Jews, Muslims and Christians, was last struck by a Palestinian rocket in 1970, and it was not a target when Saddam Hussein's Iraq fired missiles at Israel in the 1991 Gulf War.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held a four-hour strategy session late on Friday with a clutch of senior ministers in Tel Aviv on widening the military campaign, while other Cabinet members were polled by telephone on raising the mobilization level.

Political sources said they decided to more than double the current reserve troop quota set for the Gaza offensive to 75,000. The move did not necessarily mean all would be called into service.

Hours earlier, Egypt's prime minister, denouncing what he described as Israeli aggression, visited Gaza and said Cairo was prepared to mediate a truce.

U.S. President Barack Obama spoke with Netanyahu and Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi on Friday, the White House said.

Officials in Gaza said 30 Palestinians - 14 militants and 16 civilians, among them eight children and a pregnant woman - had been killed in the enclave since Israel began its air strikes. Three Israeli civilians were killed by a rocket on Thursday.

The Israeli military said 133 rockets fired from Gaza had hit Israel since Friday and 82 more were intercepted by its Iron Dome anti-missile system. Dozens of Israeli bombing raids rocked the enclave.

In a further sign Netanyahu might be clearing the way for a ground operation, Israel's armed forces announced that a highway leading to the territory and two roads bordering the enclave of 1.7 million Palestinians would be off-limits to civilian traffic.

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.

Netanyahu is favored to win a January national election, but further rocket strikes against Tel Aviv, a free-wheeling city Israelis equate with New York, and Jerusalem, which Israel regards as its capital, could be political poison for the conservative leader.

"The Israel Defense 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."

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.

Obama commended Egypt's efforts to help calm the Gaza violence in a call to Mursi on Friday, the White House said, and underscored his hope of restoring stability.

In a call with Netanyahu, Obama discussed options for "de-escalating" the situation, the White House said.

Obama "reiterated U.S. support for Israel's right to defend itself, and expressed regret over the loss of Israeli and Palestinian civilian lives," a statement on the call said.

Israel Radio's military affairs correspondent said the army's Homefront Command had told municipal officials to make civil defense 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 Mursi, a veteran Islamist politician from the Muslim Brotherhood who was elected this year after protests ousted military autocrat Hosni Mubarak in 2011.

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.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton spoke by telephone on Friday to the Egyptian and Israeli foreign ministers as well as Jordan's King Abdullah and planned to speak on Saturday with Qatar's prime minister, said a senior State Department official traveling with her in Singapore.

"We believe that Egypt has an important leadership role to play on this. It has the relationships in Gaza. The PM traveled there yesterday ... so we believe that they have the stature, the credibility and the relationships to be able to persuade Hamas and its allies to stop," the State Department official said. "So our message to them has been: 'Use it, use those things.'"

A Palestinian official close to Egypt's mediators told Reuters that 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.

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

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' 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, Crispian Balmer in Jerusalem, David Brunnstrom in Singapore, and Louis Charbonneau at the United Nations; Writing by Jeffrey Heller; Editing by Giles Elgood, Will Waterman and Peter Cooney)

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Tougher measures being rolled out to curb littering

SINGAPORE: Measures are being rolled out to curb littering in Singapore. From March 2013, fines for first-time litter offenders will go up from S$300 to S$500.

Plans are also under way to make the Corrective Work Order (CWO) even more visible. This includes having recalcitrant litterbugs perform CWO in areas such as town centres instead of parks.

Minister for the Environment and Water Resources Vivian Balakrishnan revealed this on Saturday at a community event in Bukit Panjang.

He said the government is also studying the possibility of launching a whistleblowing system, where feedback and complaints by members of the public can be used to prosecute offenders.

-CNA/ac

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Will not be rushed by pressures: Irish PM on abortion rights

LODON: With an Indian dentist's tragic death igniting protests over right to abortion in Ireland, Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny has said he is awaiting a report by an expert group on the issue but will not be rushed into an immediate decision.

Kenny said his government would go through the report and indicated it will take its own time in arriving at a decision.

Savita Halappanavar, 31, died in an Irish hospital last month after doctors refused to terminate her pregnancy despite telling her that she was miscarrying.

Savita died of blood poisoning after spending three days in pain and agony.

The case has prompted protests in Ireland and calls for right to choice, and the Prime Minister himself asked to see the report into the investigation in the case.

India summoned the Irish ambassador in New Delhi yesterday to convey its "concern and angst" over the tragic death of Savita and hoped the inquiry instituted into the case would be "independent".

Kenny was quoted as saying by state broadcaster RTE News that the report of an expert group will be before the Cabinet on November 27, and can be discussed by "everyone else" after it is published.

He said he will not be rushed on the issue of abortion by pressures from any side, according to RTE.

Earlier, minister for health James Reilly also suggested the government will take its own time in arriving at any decision as rushing the issue or coming to wrong conclusions, which could have "disastrous" consequences into the future.

He admitted that right to abortion had long divided opinion in the Catholic country, but said his government was determined to deal with it as a sensitive issue.

Amnesty International has written to Reilly over the issue expressing its concern and asking the country to address the gap in law over the issue.

"Successive Irish governments have failed in their duty to provide the necessary clarity on how this right is protected and vindicated, leaving women in Ireland in a very vulnerable position. Government must offer this clarity without further delay," said Colm O'Gorman, executive director of Amnesty International in Ireland.

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EU drug regulator OKs Novartis' meningitis B shot

LONDON (AP) — Europe's top drug regulator has recommended approval for the first vaccine against meningitis B, made by Novartis AG.

There are five types of bacterial meningitis. While vaccines exist to protect against the other four, none has previously been licensed for type B meningitis. In Europe, type B is the most common, causing 3,000 to 5,000 cases every year.

Meningitis mainly affects infants and children. It kills about 8 percent of patients and leaves others with lifelong consequences such as brain damage.

In a statement on Friday, Andrin Oswald of Novartis said he is "proud of the major advance" the company has made in developing its vaccine Bexsero. It is aimed at children over two months of age, and Novartis is hoping countries will include the shot among the routine ones for childhood diseases such as measles.

Novartis said the immunization has had side effects such as fever and redness at the injection site.

Recommendations from the European Medicines Agency are usually adopted by the European Commission. Novartis also is seeking to test the vaccine in the U.S.

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Pelosi: No Deal Without Tax Hike for Wealthy

Nov 16, 2012 6:28pm

ABC

In an interview that will air in its entirety on Sunday’s “This Week,” House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi gave ABC’s Martha Raddatz a firm “no” when asked if a deal to avert the so-called “fiscal cliff” could exclude tax rate hikes on the wealthy. Pelosi, D-Calif., said that simply closing loopholes and capping tax deductions for the wealthy would not suffice.

“Well, no… just to close loopholes is far too little money,” Pelosi said. “If it’s going to bring in revenue, the president has been very clear that the higher income people have to pay their fair share.”

Pelosi’s position puts her directly at odds with GOP House Speaker John Boehner, who said tax rate hikes would be ”unacceptable” during an interview with ”World News” anchor Diane Sawyer earlier this month. Boehner has said he is open to rewriting the tax code and closing loopholes, which would result in additional revenue for the federal government, but has ruled out rate hikes for the wealthy.

Still, Pelosi seemed optimistic a deal could be cut after today’s first fiscal cliff summit between President Obama and top congressional leaders at the White House.

“The spirit at the table was one of everybody wants to make the best effort to get this done. Hopefully that is possible; hopefully it is possible by the middle of December so the confidence of the markets and most importantly the confidence of the consumers returns to infuse our economy with demand, which creates jobs,” Pelosi said.

The “fiscal cliff” refers to a series of tax hikes and spending cuts that are scheduled to go into effect in January.

WATCH “This Week” on Sunday to see the entire interview.

SHOWS: This Week

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