EU Admits Failures As International Pressure Grows for Ceasefire

International demands for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip multiplied yesterday but a flurry of diplomatic activity failed to keep pace with the intensifying Israeli ground offensive against Hamas.

Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, is due in Jerusalem today, along with a high-ranking European Union delegation. But Javier Solana, the EU's foreign policy chief, and one of the three-strong team, admitted there had been a "failure of diplomacy" in response to the Gaza crisis so far.

In London, Gordon Brown repeated his call for an immediate ceasefire, warning: "This is a very dangerous moment. This is a moment where all the hopes of the peace process are falling apart in the action that's being taken."

The EU delegation, led by the Czech Republic, the union's president, is due to meet the Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas, in the West Bank. Tony Blair, representing the Quartet - the US, EU, UN and Russia - was seeing Israel's defence minister, Ehud Barak, the architect of Operation Cast Lead.

Russia said it was extremely concerned at the fighting and sent its special representative for the Middle East, the deputy foreign minister Alexander Saltanov, to the region.

But no outside mediator is in contact with Hamas, which is shunned as a terrorist organization by the EU, the US and Israel. The Islamist movement is in regular touch only with its allies, Iran and Syria.

Israeli officials expressed satisfaction at the failure of the UN security council to agree a statement on the crisis after the US rejected a Libyan proposal late on Saturday to call for an immediate ceasefire.

The US said a ceasefire should take place as soon as possible but insisted it must guarantee an end to Hamas rocket fire. The US deputy ambassador, Alejandro Wolff, said Washington believed it was important that the region "not return to the status quo".

"The efforts we are making internationally are designed to establish a sustainable, durable ceasefire that's respected by all," Wolff said. "And that means no more rocket attacks. It means no more smuggling of arms."

The Hamas spokesman, Fawzi Barhoum, dismissed the UN discussion as a "farce."

In the Arab world there was anger from Egypt and Jordan, which both have peace treaties with Israel. Egypt is also facing furious demands from Hamas and supporters that it open the border crossing points into the Gaza Strip.

The Egyptian foreign minister, Ahmed Abul Gheit, criticized Israel's incursion as in "brazen defiance" of international calls to end the offensive and blamed the UN for failing to act. "The security council's silence and its failure to take a decision to stop Israel's aggression since it began was interpreted by Israel as a green light," said Abul Gheit.

Jordan's King Abdullah, who rules over a large Palestinian population, said the humanitarian situation in Gaza had deteriorated to the point where "silence is unacceptable".

Al-Jazeera TV last night quoted the Jordanian prime minister, Nader Dahabi, as warning that his country would re-examine its relations with Israel.

Brown said in his BBC interview that Palestinians needed humanitarian aid but insisted that Israel must have assurances. "So first we need an immediate ceasefire, and that includes a stopping of the rockets into Israel. Secondly, we need some resolution of the problem over arms trafficking into Gaza, and thirdly we need the borders and the crossings open, and that will need some international solution."