(Updates throughout after council sets meeting) By Irwin Arieff UNITED NATIONS, Nov 8 (Reuters) - The U.N. Security Council agreed on Wednesday to let Arab and Muslim nations air their concerns about soaring Israeli-Palestinian violence after an Israeli artillery barrage that killed 18 civilians in Gaza. The 15-nation council invited U.N. members to address a public meeting on Gaza on Thursday after snubbing an earlier request for an emergency session. The Palestinian Authority wants the council to adopt a resolution calling for a mutual cease-fire in Gaza and for U.N. observers to be sent into the area to enforce the cease-fire, as was done in southern Lebanon after the 34-day war between Israel and Lebanon's Hezbollah that ended in August. But the United States, Israel's closest ally and one of five permanent council members with veto power, typically opposes council intervention in the Middle East conflict as ineffective in ending the cycle of violence between Palestinians and Israelis. Council members on Tuesday had sat in silence after Qatar, the U.N. body's sole Arab member, presented a plea for an urgent meeting on the fighting in Gaza, diplomats said. "There was no support for it," U.S. Ambassador John Bolton said on Wednesday when asked about the initial response by the council, which under the U.N. Charter is responsible for dealing with threats to international peace and security. The Palestinian Authority had been joined by the 57-nation Organization of the Islamic Conference and the 22-member Arab League in its call for an emergency session. The initial request came on Monday, near the end of a weeklong Israeli military operation in the Gaza town of Beit Hanoun that killed at least 52 Palestinians, more than half of them militants. The operation was aimed at curbing rocket attacks on Israeli civilian targets launched by Palestinian militants from Gaza, and Israeli forces pulled out of Beit Hanoun on Tuesday. But Wednesday's attack, the deadliest in four years, prompted a wave of criticism in Europe and the Middle East of the Jewish state's tactics in a territory it quit last year. Israeli leaders voiced remorse for the killings, which army officers said were probably caused by shells that overshot targeted areas used by Palestinian militants to fire rockets.
