those calls involving president obama, the french president, israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu, and palestinian leader abbas. frankly from the west, most of the pressure being applied on hamas right now to cease the rocket attacks and the u.s. in particular, staying away from any criticism of israeli military action. ben rhodes, the deputy national security advisor, said in a conference call with reporters today, quote, ultimately it is up to the israeli government to make determinations about how they're going to carry out their military objective. the middle east peace envoy, tony blair, also put the ball firmly in hamas' court. listen. >> all of it is deescalated back down. that means the rockets stop. because if the rockets carry on, the israeli air strikes will carry on and what happens as we've seen is that in that, there will be innocent israeli civilians killed, innocent palestinian civilians killed.