UNIMAGINABLE PRICE 
 
 More than 140,000 Palestinians have fled 17 days of fighting between Israel and Gaza militants, many of them seeking shelter in buildings run by the U.N. The airport is a mere 50 miles from Gaza, the scene of intense fighting between Hamas fighters and the Israeli military, who are determined to halt the firing of rockets into Israel. He was standing beside UK Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond, who said the cycle of violence had been triggered by Hamas "firing hundreds of rockets at Israeli towns and cities indiscriminately". Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal said on Wednesday his fighters had made gains against Israel and voiced support for a humanitarian truce, but only if Israel eased restrictions on Gaza's 1.8 million people. Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday he regretted each Palestinian civilian death, but said they were "the responsibility of Hamas". Palestinian rockets and mortar bombs have also killed three civilians in Israel. Meanwhile, the US Federal Aviation Authority lifted a ban on US airlines flying into Tel Aviv, which came into force on Tuesday after a rocket landed about a mile (1.6km) away from Ben Gurion airport 
 
 However, several European airlines have continued to avoid landing in Tel Aviv. An ensuing wave of cancellations by foreign airlines sharply reduced traffic at Israel's usually bustling international gateway at the height of the summer tourist season. Before making this decision, the FAA worked with its U.S. government counterparts to assess the security situation in Israel and carefully reviewed both significant new information and measures the Government of Israel is taking to mitigate potential risks to civil aviation.” 
 
 Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lobbied Secretary of State John Kerry Tuesday evening to rescind the ban, as Israeli officials argued the American government was giving Hamas a victory. Kerry, who arrived at the airfield Wednesday aboard a U.S. military plane, was apparently not troubled by the security situation. U.N. COUNCIL INQUIRY 
 
 U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay said on Wednesday that there was "a strong possibility" that Israel was committing war crimes in Gaza, where medical officials say most of those killed were civilians. Ban, who has also been on a truce-seeking mission, lashed out earlier at Gaza militants, expressing "outrage and regret" that rockets had been found inside a U.N. school for refugees for the second time during the conflict. He said storing rockets there "turned schools into potentially military targets, endangering the lives of innocent children", along with U.N. employees and the tens of thousands of sheltering Palestinians. Gaza has been rocked by regular bouts of violence since Israel unilaterally pulled out of the territory in 2005.
– Amid heavy lobbying from Israel, the FAA lifted its ban on flights to Tel Aviv's airport just before midnight, saying it had reviewed "significant new information and measures the government of Israel is taking to mitigate potential risks to civil aviation." Israeli officials had urged the US to lift the ban, calling it a victory for Hamas, but American officials say politics didn't play a role in the decision. "We didn't use the FAA to do anything," Deputy National Security Adviser Anthony Blinken tells CNN. "The FAA makes independent judgments for safety and security of our airline passengers and for our airlines. They made a judgment, and we're not in the business of second-guessing the FAA or overturning what they do." More: Ted Cruz threatened to block administration nominees in the Senate until his questions about FAA policy were answered, Time reports. He accused Obama of bringing in the flight ban to pressure Israel into accepting a cease-fire. "The facts suggest that President Obama has just used a federal regulatory agency to launch an economic boycott on Israel, in order to try to force our ally to comply with his foreign-policy demands," he said. After 16 days of fighting that has claimed more than 700 lives, the situation in Gaza is "terrible" and 44% of the territory is now a no-go zone, United Nations humanitarian chief Valerie Amos warns. She says people are running out of food and water and a cease-fire is "vital," the BBC reports. Despite the deteriorating situation in Gaza, a truce by the weekend appears unlikely, reports Reuters. Hamas leaders say they won't accept a deal that doesn't ease the economic blockade of Gaza, while Israel, which has now lost at least 32 soldiers, appears to want more time to destroy networks of tunnels under the territory. "I will oppose any cease-fire until it is clear both that the tunnels will be destroyed and what will happen in the post-cease-fire period—how we will guarantee that quiet for the residents of Israel will really be preserved in the long term," a security cabinet minister told Israel Radio. As strikes on Gaza continued, German astronaut Alexander Gerst tweeted a photo of the region from space, in which explosions and smoke were clearly visible. "My saddest photo yet," he said.