a devastating earthquake, which some officials said killed up to 40,000 people, twice the previous estimate.
Saying it had "no conflict" with Iranians but with the Islamic regime, the Israeli Government urged the world to help the devastated nation, after Tehran called for international relief aid from any country "except Israel."
"The Government and people of Israel are moved by the human tragedy experienced by the Iranian people," in south-eastern Iran, said the Israeli Foreign Ministry in a statement released by the French News Agency AFP.
"Despite all differences a mobilization of the whole international community is needed to come to the help of families of the victims and wounded," the ministry added.
ISRAELI CONDOLENCES
"The Deputy Premier and Foreign Minister, Sylvan Shalom, addresses in the name of the Israeli Government and the people of Israel condolences to the Iranian people after the catastrophe."
World-wide relief, including from churches, was on its way to the mainly Muslim country, which also has a persecuted Christian minority and where Western missionary workers have been expelled in the past, BosNewsLife established.
Friday’s pre-dawn earthquake razed much of the ancient Silk Road city of Bam in Iran, about 630 miles (1000 kilometers) from Tehran. The earthquake, which struck at 5:28 a.m. local time Friday, was reportedly measured at magnitude 6.3 by Iranian authorities and 6.5 by the U.S. Geological Survey in Colorado.
Historical structures such as the 2,000-year old citadel were destroyed with eyewitnesses saying that the tallest section of the ancient mud fortress crumbled like a sand castle.
AMERICAN KILLED
One American was killed and another injured as they visited the citadel when the quake struck, the Associated Press (AP) quoted United States State Department Spokesman Lou Fintor as saying, without releasing their names.
An AP reporter noted scenes of grief throughout Bam with one man, Mohammed Karimi saying "this is the Apocalypse, there is nothing but devastation and debris," as he brought the bodies of his wife and 4-year-old daughter to a cemetery.
"Before she went to sleep she made me a drawing and kissed me four times," a tearful Karimi said of his daughter, AP reported. "When I asked, "’Why four kisses?" she said, "Maybe I won’t see you again, Papa."
HOSPITALS DESTROYED
With hospitals in the area destroyed, military transport planes had to evacuate many wounded to the provincial capital, Kerman, or Tehran, news reports said.
Washington began sending 150,000 pounds of medical supplies in a military airlift to the region as well as 200 teams with search and rescue, disaster relief coordination and surgical experts.
The effort is being coordinated by the White House, State Department and the Pentagon, which is supplying at least a half-dozen cargo planes, AP reported.
COUNTRIES PREPARE
In much smaller countries relief preparations were also continuing, including in former Communist Hungary where the Baptist Charity Service and the Hungarian Special Rescue Team offered their services.
Yet for nearly one in five people in the Bam area, home to about 200,000 residents, help came to late, officials warned.
"As more bodies are pulled out, we fear that the death toll may reach as high as 40,000. An unbelievable human disaster has occurred," AP quoted Akbar Alavi, the mayor of the provincial capital Kerman, as saying. Relief workers reportedly endorsed the figure of 40,000, and the Interior Ministry said at least 30,000 people were injured.
New aftershocks were reported Saturday, December 27, creating havoc and panic across the city. Iran has a history of earthquakes that kill thousands of people, including one of magnitude 7.3 in northwest Iran in 1990 which killed an estimated 50,000 people.
