News Service from House Harris

MID: Arab states cancel New Year festivities in solidarity with Gaza

CAIRO, Dec 31 AFP - Several Arab states have cancelled planned New Year celebrations in solidarity with Palestinians in the Islamist-run Gaza Strip who suffered a fifth straight day of Israeli bombardment on Wednesday.

Egypt, Jordan, Dubai and Syria have all cancelled festivities including concerts by renowned Arab singers.

As the Arab League met in the Egyptian capital to decide a political response to one of Israel's deadliest-ever offensives on Gaza that has so far killed at least 390 Palestinians, the cultural message was clear.

Egypt's state-owned Al-Ahram daily reported that official events planned for New Year's Eve had been shelved.

"In solidarity with the painful events in the Palestinian territories and the massacres which Gazans are faced with... the ministries of culture and information have decided to cancel New Year's festivities," it said.

Cancelled events include a special concert by famed Egyptian singer Mohammed Munir set for Cairo's Opera House, and a variety performance due to be broadcast on state television.

The planned New Year's Day launch by state television of a new channel called Nile Comedy has also been postponed.

In the Gulf tourism hub of Dubai, the emirate's ruler Sheikh Mohammad bin Rashed al-Maktoum decreed that several planned concerts should not go ahead.

He gave the order "as a sign of solidarity with the brotherly Palestinian people and because of the death and destruction perpetrated on the Gaza Strip by the Israeli war machine," his office said.

International Arab stars including Mohammed Abdu of Saudi Arabia, Iraq's Kazem al-Saher, Nancy Ajram from Lebanon and Tunisian chanteuse Latifa had all been due to perform in Dubai over the New Year.

A concert by Colombian star Shakira in the neighbouring emirate of Abu Dhabi is still scheduled to go ahead.

The Syrian artists' union said in a statement festivities would not take place, including a New Year's Eve concert by famed singer Sabah Fakhri in a top Damascus hotel.

Hotels in Beirut, capital of neighbouring Lebanon, told AFP their events would proceed as planned.

In Jordan several five-star hotels and restaurants in the capital Amman and other cities including the ancient Nabataean city of Petra and the Red Sea port of Aqaba, cancelled New Year celebrations.

"The decision to cancel the celebrations has been taken in solidarity with our people in Gaza," Michel Nazzal, head of the Jordanian Hotel Association, said in a statement.

Newspapers urged Jordanians to join a candlelight vigil in central Amman at midnight instead to express their support for Gaza.

"While the world is celebrating the new year, the people of Gaza are going to welcome it with bombs, fire and blood. Let us affirm our solidarity with them," read an advertisement in Wednesday's papers.

Emergency services inside the battered Palestinian Gaza enclave say that since Israel unleashed its wave of air strikes on Saturday at least 390 Palestinians, including 42 children, have been killed and 1,900 wounded.

During the same period, four people in Israel have been killed by rockets fired by militants in Gaza.