Tony Blair, the international community's Middle East envoy, yesterday issued his strongest call yet for an easing of the "counterproductive" blockade of Gaza as Israeli ministers met to consider relaxing the three-year-old embargo.

In his first newspaper interview since the Israeli navy halted a pro-Palestinian activist flotilla on Monday, Mr Blair called for a strategy for Gaza which "isolates the extremists and helps the people and not one that operates the other way round".

The Israeli government and its supporters are trying to turn negative attention onto the groups behind the pro-Palestinian aid convoy that was caught in a deadly raid earlier this week.

The Free Gaza Movement has been trying to sail cargo-laden ships into Gaza since 2007, but it was not until they teamed up with a Turkish charitable organisation that the mission reached critical mass, both in terms of support and attention.

Israel says the Humanitarian Relief Fund (IHH) is a radical Islamic and anti-American group that has been linked to Al Qaeda.

from Crikey .....

Clive takes on the RSPT -- and most of his mates in the process

Canberra correspondent Bernard Keane writes:

Israel's response to the Gaza flotilla is another unfortunate example of Israel clothing its conduct in the language of international law while flouting it in practice. If you believe Israeli government spokesmen, Israel is metabolically incapable of violating international law, placing it alongside Saddam Hussein's Information Minister in self-awareness.

Israel claims that paragraph 67(a) of the San Remo Manual on Armed Conflicts at Sea justified the Israeli operation against the flotilla. (The San Remo Manual is an authoritative statement of international law applicable to armed conflicts at sea.)

From the BBC

Nick Bryant

Kangaroos skipping playfully through the bush, a barbie on the beach, a brace of surfers waiting for the first big wave of the day, a local pub "where everyone's your mate," a sea plane skimming over the Great Barrier Reef, an Aborginal elder stood in front of Uluru, a ferry carving through Sydney harbour, with the Opera House and bridge in the background, and, of course, the mandatory koala. All to the bouncy refrain of a catchy new song, "There's Nothing Like Australia".

At least nine pro-Palestinian activists died when Israeli commandos raided the six-ship convoy early on Monday.

Israel says its troops acted in self-defence, but campaigners deny this.

The incident has sparked widespread concern and led to calls for Israel to lift its blockade of the Gaza Strip.

Israel has maintained control of Gaza's airspace and territorial waters, as well as most of its land borders, since withdrawing troops and settlers from the territory in 2005.

According to the UN, Gaza receives about one-quarter of the supplies it used to receive in the years before the blockade was tightened in 2007.

The nation's biggest miners are descending on Canberra today armed with new ammunition in their fight against the mining profits tax.

The Minerals Council is holding a two-day conference in Canberra, which coincides with the release of a new study on the profits tax.

The council's spokesman, Mitch Hooke, says the report by accounting firm KPMG shows gold and copper mines will not be viable under the new tax, while the net present value of new coal mines will be more than halved.

"They will either be deferred, shelved, or just simply cut," he said.

At a press briefing this morning following the massacre by Israel Defense Forces (IDF) commandos of passengers on board the Mavi Marmara, one of the boats pertaining to the Freedom Flotilla attempting to break the siege of Gaza, IDF spokeswoman Avital Liebovitch claimed that the passengers had engaged in "severe violence against our soldiers."

Multiple answers question: one of them isn't:

a) wise

b) a monkey, but is a liar

C) listening

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from David Marr

''PHO-NEY!'' yelled the government benches in perfect harmony as Tony Abbott came to the despatch box. The daily brawl was under way. To a wall of howls, groans and snatches of song, the Prime Minister battled to say nothing new about pink batts.

Two Liberals were thrown out. "On yer boat," yelled Labor's Sid Sidebottom as the opposition spokesman for punishing refugees, Scott Morrison, headed for the sin bin.

“When was the last time you had sex?” all candidates for the seminary are asked. (The preferred answer: not for three years or more.)

“What kind of sexual experiences have you had?” is another common question. “Do you like pornography?”

Depending on the replies, and the results of standardized psychological tests, the interview may proceed into deeper waters: “Do you like children?” and “Do you like children more than you like people your own age?”

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The chance that some oil will continue to leak for months was underscored by the managing director of BP, Robert Dudley, who described plans to put in place a second version of a containment dome, a strategy that failed earlier this month. Mr. Dudley, speaking on ABC’s “This Week” program, said that attempt had given the company’s engineers valuable lessons that would be applied to the new dome. But he added that even if it worked, some oil would seep out until the relief wells provided an “end point” by cutting off the flow beneath the seabed.

Britain's new coalition government has suffered a blow as high-profile finance minister David Laws resigned, following revelations over his expenses claims.

Mr Laws stepped down as chief treasury secretary after the Daily Telegraph newspaper reported he had channelled more than 40,000 pounds ($68,000) of taxpayers' money in rent to his long-term male partner.

"I do not see how I can carry out my crucial work on the budget and spending review while I have to deal with the private and public implications of recent revelations," Mr Laws said at a brief press conference.

Government by haircut. Who'd have thought it? In the four years since Kristina Keneally felt impelled to assure Parliament she had "never worn a pair of stilettos" she has achieved a far far greater thing, to which many strive but few finally attain: ascension by hair.

I realised this recently after yet another Kristina-tract landed on our stoop. You know the format. Me with awestruck old people, me with people in wheelchairs, me with grinning black kids, me cycling, me hugging the homeless. And I'm having a one-more-shot-of-Keneally's-blowdried-coif-and-I-throw-up moment when it strikes me who she's channelling.