War boosted extremists in Gaza, says U.N. official

By Stephanie Nebehay

GENEVA (Reuters) - Israel's invasion of Gaza has strengthened the hand of extremists and only a credible independent investigation into alleged wrongdoing can quieten growing Palestinian anger, a U.N. aid official said on Friday.

John Ging, head of the U.N. Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) in Gaza, called for new U.S. Middle East envoy George Mitchell to talk to ordinary people in Gaza as part of a "new track" in diplomacy.

U.S. President Barack Obama named Mitchell, a former U.S. Senator who helped settle the conflict in Northern Ireland, on Thursday to try to jump-start Arab-Israeli peace talks.

"My first request to the U.S. administration is talk to the ordinary people in Gaza. Come to Gaza and talk to the ordinary people -- the mothers, fathers, leaders of civil society, the people who are not involved in politics," Ging, speaking from Gaza, told reporters in Geneva.

"They are still quite shell-shocked but there is more and more anger growing."

It is urgent to establish accountability for death and the destruction of Palestinian infrastructure through a credible mechanism which would "channel this emotion to confidence in the rule of law," Ging said.

"The extremists here -- there are more now at the end of this conflict than there were at the start, that's the product of such conflict -- are very confident in their rhetoric that there should be no expectation that justice will be delivered through the rule of law. Now we must prove that wrong," he said.

The investigation had to examine "legitimate allegations" on both sides, as Israeli civilians had also suffered, he said.