"Crisis" In Israel/Palestine/Lebanon/Syria

[Laura]

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/060731/481/9c236797940e4e048d396e8bd7e01930

Israeli newspapers front pages display articles and photographs from the Lebanese village of Qana, Monday, July 31, 2006. Israel called the 48-hour halt under U.S. pressure amid worldwide outrage over a strike Sunday morning that leveled a house in Qana, killing at least 56 people _ mostly women and children _ who had taken refuge there. It was the deadliest single strike in the Israeli onslaught against Lebanon, aimed at reining in the Hezbollah guerrillas who sparked the conflict July 12 by snatching two Israeli soldiers. (AP Photo/Muhammed Muheisen)

 

[blindpsychic]

Despite the pause, warplanes struck near the village of Taibeh to cover troops forces still battling Hezbollah guerrillas in the Israeli military's newest ground incursion there, launched over the weekend.

Fighting was heavy in the northeast corner of south Lebanon around Taibeh and other border villages. Constant Israeli artillery blasts - not covered under the air halt - shook the hills. Hezbollah guerrillas in the area fired a volley of rockets at the nearby Israeli town of Kiryat Shmona, their first since Israel's suspension began.

Re: Fox News of all places.

But Israel left open the option of striking targets to stop imminent attacks or if the military completed its inquiry. After Hezbollah guerrillas hit an Israeli tank near the village of Taibeh with an anti-tank missile, Israel said, the army carried out the airstrikes to protect ground troops.

In a second airstrike around the port city of Tyre, Israel accidentally killed a Lebanese soldier when it hit a car it believed was carrying a senior Hezbollah official. Instead, the car carried a Lebanese army officer and soldiers. "They were, of course, not the targets and we regret the incident," the Israeli army said.



Another airstrike hit the main Lebanese-Syrian border crossing for the third time in as many days, the army and witnesses said. Israel said the strike targeted a truck importing weapons from Syria. It said the strike was in Lebanese territory.

http://today.reuters.com/tv/videoCh...5f162cabbf2c3b&src=073106_0903_FEATURES_video
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/L/LEBANON_ISRAEL?SITE=CAVIC&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
And as I figured, artillery strikes don't count as part of the bombing halt, so they're still terrorizing Lebannon, albeit a little more inaccurately.

 

[Danny]

I think it's like Ark said..just enough time to reload...probably for their new campaign "Operation Shock and Yaweh".And this whole passing of the detainee bill here in the US fits right in with their military plans in the very near future.They have an idea that what they are about to do is going to cause an uproar(wishful thinking maybe)or at the very least it is going to be like no other offensive before.Even the sleeping sheeple will gasp for a second.

 

[paulnotbilly]

Since Israel has told UN to all but get lost, UN looks for someone to 'bully'

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/31072006/325/un-demands-iran-stop-nuclear-work.html

UN demands Iran stop nuclear work
Reuters Monday July 31, 06:54 PM

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The U.N. Security Council on Monday demanded that Iran suspend its nuclear activities in a month or face the threat of sanctions, but Tehran denounced the move as illegal and vowed to press on.

The council vote was 14 to 1, with Qatar, the only Arab member, voting against.

The resolution, which followed weeks of negotiations, demanded that Iran "suspend all enrichment-related and reprocessing activities, including research and development."

If Tehran does not comply by August 31, the council would consider adopting "appropriate measures" under Article 41 of Chapter 7 of the U.N. Charter, which refers to economic sanctions.

The resolution was the first on Iran to include legally binding demands and a sanctions threat. The United States and its allies suspect Iran is developing a nuclear bomb and accuse it of hiding its research for the past 18 years.

"It's a strong resolution," U.S. President George W. Bush told reporters during a trip to Miami.

"The Iranians must hear loud and clear with this resolution the world's intent, upon working together, to make sure that they do not end up with a nuclear weapon," Bush said.

Iranian U.N. Ambassador Javad Zarif, in a lengthy statement complaining about a long history of Tehran's mistreatment by the West, repeated his government's position that its nuclear program was for peaceful purposes only.

"The people and government of the Islamic Republic of Iran are determined to exercise their inalienable right to nuclear technology for peaceful purposes," Zarif told the council.

"Iran's peaceful nuclear program poses no threat to international peace and security and therefore dealing with this issue in the Security Council is unwarranted and void of any legal basis or practical utility," he said.

"STRONG RESPONSE"

While U.S. Ambassador John Bolton characterised Zarif's address as a rejection, Russia's U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin said he preferred to view Iran's response in a positive light because Zarif did not specifically use the word "rejection."

Bolton said Iran had been out of compliance with demands of the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency, the International Atomic Energy Agency, for three years.

"Sadly, Iran has consistently and brazenly defied the international community by continuing its pursuit of nuclear weapons, and the continued intransigence and defiance of the Iranian leadership demands a strong response from this council," Bolton said.

Russia and China are reluctant to impose sanctions and Churkin has said the sanctions provision meant the council would have "a discussion" only on punitive measures.

Germany and the council's five permanent members with veto power -- the United States, Russia, China, France and Britain -- negotiated the text. The six in June offered a package of energy, commercial and technological incentives if Iran suspended it uranium enrichment work. Iran has said it will respond on August 22.

British Foreign Minister Margaret Beckett and London's U.N. Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry both urged Iran to accept the incentive package and thereby avoid sanctions.

Chapter 7 of the U.N. Charter makes a resolution mandatory and provides options for enforcement. The document excludes any military action.

Qatar's U.N. ambassador, Abdulaziz Al-Nasser, said he voted "no" because of the conflict between Israel and Hizbollah militants. "We do not agree with the resolution at a time when our region is in flames," he said.

(added reporting by Irwin Arieff)

 

[Keit]

Here take a look at this article and at writer's cruel ugly face. I can sware that I see a drop of blood falling from his lower lip.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3284163,00.html
And ohh, now I understand why English version of Ynet doesn't have other much more balanced or anti war articles translated. He is a news editor, so they use it as an opportunity to maintain a proper level of propaganda.

Sorry, world

World slams 'barbarian Jews' but forgets 7-year-old Israeli killed by Hizbullah rockets
Guy Benyovits

The British tie-wearing commentator set at the studio, wearing an expression of well made-up revulsion, while displaying the screaming newspaper headlines. All of Europe is united today, so it seems, in the opinion that all of us - all Israelis - are guilty over what is characterized as "the second Qana massacre."

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and IDF Chief of Staff Dan Halutz have apologized. So did the defense minister, and this even before an investigation was carried out, before the whole truth came to light. Because that's the way we are.

It is not my place to stand by their side at this time, but with your permission I would like to add a few apologies of my own, the day after the bombing.

Sorry, world. Sorry for again being bad, and barbaric, and pulverizing. Sorry for again realizing your wild anti-Semitic fantasy, to view us as a real thorn in the flesh of the Middle East, not to mention the entire world.

And all this so that next time there's a bloody terror attack in Spain, Britain, or anywhere else, you can self-righteously sigh and "understand" the motives, because after all the Israelis are at fault for everything.

"It's not us," you'll utter with glee, "it's them." They were the ones who actually also sent the Americans to Iraq, no? They have some group there of the Elders of Zion, which rules the world. We read it somewhere.

Gibson said what everyone thinks

Sorry, Mel Gibson . Sorry for getting upset at you because yesterday you told a police officer in Los Angeles that those damn Jews "are responsible for all the wars in the world," and then angrily asked whether the policeman was also Jewish.

After all, Mel, you only expressed in your drunk, Australian-accented voice what most of the Western world thinks at this time. Those cursed Jews, lousy Jews, damn zhids. In one second, the distance between a leading Hollywood actor and Iran's President Ahmadinejad was cut to zero.

Fortunately, Gibson's countryman, Prime Minister John Howard, salvaged the country's dignity after daring to say that Hizbullah is "not some kind of inspirational liberation organization, it's a terrorist organization" - before being attacked by protesters. There are some rays of light here and there, despite all. And we'll remember them all.

Sorry (late Israeli writer) Ephraim Kishon. Sorry for the years you were boycotted as a "crazy rightist" by those who saw themselves as the literary-cultural establishment in the country, for writing gems that only today do we start to realize were correct - such as the piece describing how the world really loves Israel in the role of the "Jew," the beaten and humiliated one, Tevya-the-Milkman-style.

The world really loves to see us like this, belittled and disparaged. The world really doesn't like the new Jew, the one with the tank. That's a dangerous Jew. It has power and it does what it wishes. In the old Jewish shtetls of eastern Europe there were no tanks. There, under the Polish landowner, we knew our place. You were so right, Ephraim. Sorry.

We don't whine

And sorry, Omer Pesachov . Sorry precious child, you will forever remain seven-years-old. The small body left in the arms of grandma Yehudit at the community of Meron, which nobody in the world remembers. In fact, nobody really reported it.

Sorry, Omer, sorry we did not drag all news agencies crews and foreign correspondents and al-Jazeera to the site and turned to the United Nations Security Council and organized around-the-clock protest rallies and screamed, the second that cursed rocket fell on your home and killed you and grandma.

We didn't do all this, because we're proud of ourselves and our strength. We don't rush to whine to the UN and to the media. We bite our lips and continue, because there's no choice.

So sorry, Omer, because we only need to apologize to you. And only then to the children of Qana.

Guy Benyovits is Ynet's News Editor

 

[Tenten]

Source: http://tinyurl.com/o75gp
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/objects/pages/PrintArticleEn.jhtml?itemNo=744061

Last update - 10:38 30/07/2006

Days of darkness By Gideon Levy

In war as in war: Israel is sinking into a strident, nationalistic atmosphere and darkness is beginning to cover everything. The brakes we still had are eroding, the insensitivity and blindness that characterized Israeli society in recent years is intensifying. The home front is cut in half: the north suffers and the center is serene. But both have been taken over by tones of jingoism, ruthlessness and vengeance, and the voices of extremism that previously characterized the camp's margins are now expressing its heart. The left has once again lost its way, wrapped in silence or "admitting mistakes." Israel is exposing a unified, nationalistic face.

The devastation we are sowing in Lebanon doesn't touch anyone here and most of it is not even shown to Israelis. Those who want to know what Tyre looks like now have to turn to foreign channels - the BBC reporter brings chilling images from there, the likes of which won't be seen here. How can one not be shocked by the suffering of the other, at our hands, even when our north suffers? The death we are sowing at the same time, right now in Gaza, with close to 120 dead since the kidnapping of Gilad Shalit, 27 last Wednesday alone, touches us even less. The hospitals in Gaza are full of burned children, but who cares? The darkness of the war in the north covers them, too.

Since we've grown accustomed to thinking collective punishment a legitimate weapon, it is no wonder no debate has sparked here over the cruel punishment of Lebanon for Hezbollah's actions. If it was okay in Nablus, why not Beirut? The only criticism being heard about this war is over tactics. Everyone is a general now and they are mostly pushing the IDF to deepen its activities. Commentators, ex-generals and politicians compete at raising the stakes with extreme proposals.

Haim Ramon "doesn't understand" why there is still electricity in Baalbek; Eli Yishai proposes turning south Lebanon into a "sandbox"; Yoav Limor, a Channel 1 military correspondent, proposes an exhibition of Hezbollah corpses and the next day to conduct a parade of prisoners in their underwear, "to strengthen the home front's morale."

It's not difficult to guess what we would think about an Arab TV station whose commentators would say something like that, but another few casualties or failures by the IDF, and Limor's proposal will be implemented. Is there any better sign of how we have lost our senses and our humanity?

Chauvinism and an appetite for vengeance are raising their heads. If two weeks ago only lunatics such as Safed Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu spoke about "wiping out every village where a Katyusha is fired," now a senior officer in the IDF speaks that way in Yedioth Aharonoth's main headlines. Lebanese villages may not have been wiped out yet, but we have long since wiped out our own red lines.

A bereaved father, Haim Avraham, whose son was kidnapped and killed by Hezbollah in October 2000, fires an artillery shell into Lebanon for the reporters. It's vengeance for his son. His image, embracing the decorated artillery shell is one of the most disgraceful images of this war. And it's only the first. A group of young girls also have their picture taken decorating IDF shells with slogans.

Maariv, which has turned into the Fox News of Israel, fills its pages with chauvinist slogans reminiscent of particularly inferior propaganda machines, such as "Israel is strong" - which is indicative of weakness, actually - while a TV commentator calls for the bombing of a TV station.

Lebanon, which has never fought Israel and has 40 daily newspapers, 42 colleges and universities and hundreds of different banks, is being destroyed by our planes and cannon and nobody is taking into account the amount of hatred we are sowing. In international public opinion, Israel has been turned into a monster, and that still hasn't been calculated into the debit column of this war. Israel is badly stained, a moral stain that can't be easily and quickly removed. And only we don't want to see it.

The people want victory, and nobody knows what that is and what its price will be.

The Zionist left has also been made irrelevant. As in every difficult test in the past - the two intifadas for example - this time too the left has failed just when its voice was so necessary as a counterweight to the stridency of the beating tom-toms of war. Why have a left if at every real test it joins the national chorus?

Peace Now stands silently, so does Meretz, except for brave Zehava Gal-On. A few days of a war of choice and already Yehoshua Sobol is admitting he was wrong all along. Peace Now is suddenly an "infantile slogan" for him. His colleagues are silent and their silence is no less resounding. Only the extreme left makes its voice heard, but it is a voice nobody listens to.

Long before this war is decided, it can already be stated that its spiraling cost will include the moral blackout that is surrounding and covering us all, threatening our existence and image no less than Hezbollah's Katyushas.

 

[Mike]

Raise readiness, Assad tells Syrian Army
Mon Jul 31, 2006 5:27pm ET
http://today.reuters.com/news/newsarticle.aspx?type=topNews&storyid=2006-07-31T212727Z_01_L31883392_RTRUKOC_0_US-MIDEAST-ASSAD.xml&src=rss&rpc=22

DAMASCUS (Reuters) - Syrian President Bashar al-Assad told the Syrian military on Monday to raise its readiness, pledging not to abandon support for Lebanese resistance against Israel.

"We are facing international circumstances and regional challenges that require caution, alert, readiness and preparedness," Assad said.

"The barbaric war of annihilation the Israeli aggression is waging on our people in Lebanon and Palestine is increasing in ferocity," Assad said in a written address on the occasion of the 61st anniversary of the foundation of the Syria Arab Army.

Diplomats in Damascus say the Syrian army has been on alert since the Israeli onslaught on Lebanon began on July 12 after Hizbollah fighters captured two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border operation.

 

[Keit]

In war as in war: Israel is sinking into a strident, nationalistic atmosphere and darkness is beginning to cover everything. The brakes we still had are eroding, the insensitivity and blindness that characterized Israeli society in recent years is intensifying. The home front is cut in half: the north suffers and the center is serene. But both have been taken over by tones of jingoism, ruthlessness and vengeance, and the voices of extremism that previously characterized the camp's margins are now expressing its heart. The left has once again lost its way, wrapped in silence or "admitting mistakes." Israel is exposing a unified, nationalistic face.

I have to agree with every single word in this article. Israelis transformed into vicious critters with a black hearts. But of course not all of them. The majority (especially those who live in the center) do not express their thirst for blood, but rather cold logical conclusion "This is what has to be done. And who we are to know better. We do not know all the facts. Let's leave it into the hands of our leaders".
But in my opinion, this cold attitude is even more chilling then words of those loyal, though unconscious Yahweh servants/slaves.

Yesterday I've decided to express my opinion as a small reply to one of the articles on Ynet. You should see the reaction. I was immediately condemned as in the case of all posters who express anti-war opinion. One woman urged me to meet with her in real life, so she could kill such despicable coward like me. Well, I asked her if she would be willing to do the same to Lebanon children if Israel army would decide to create national units with patriots like herself and send them into a war zone. Of course I never saw my post published.

Another example: yesterday I saw two of my colleges sitting in front of the same computer and looking for something. They asked me for something and I came closer to their desk and saw that they were on Haaretz site. During those day people here are very addicted to the news, asking lot of times if anything have changed or happened in the North of the country or our forces in Lebanon. So when I saw that they are looking at this site with great attention, I've asked them "What happened? Something happened?" And they both replied with a normal voice: "No, nothing. Everything is ok". And then I saw that in the middle of the Haaretz site, with bold black and red letters there is an article about more then 50 people dead in Lebanon when 25 of them are children. And I said (rather quietly, but I am sure they've heard it.) Oh, I get it. If it's happened there and not here, it means that nothing really happened. There was no answer or reaction from their side.

And you know, I find it extremely puzzling. Lot of them are not bad people, they just stuck with an opinion of the majority. They are cowards. Even I consider myself a coward, because I know perfectly what will happen if I'll express my opinion freely. It's just mind boggling to see intelligent people believing in everything they are told.

 

[Windmill knight]

And you know, I find it extremely puzzling. Lot of them are not bad people, they just stuck with an opinion of the majority. They are cowards. Even I consider myself a coward, because I know perfectly what will happen if I'll express my opinion freely. It's just mind boggling to see intelligent people believing in everything they are told.

Oh, Keit! What you describe is shocking and terrible! Sure, most of them are not bad people, but they seem to have 'ingested pathological material' from their pathocratic leaders, as Lobaczewski would put it. They now think that 'nothing happened' if the death children are on Lebanon's side of the border and not yours. What really scares me is how much this sounds like a certain European country around 1939...

I don't think you're a coward for not speaking out freely. How many would listen anyway and at what cost for you? Actually, I think you should be careful. Speak only to those who are capable of understanding. Or write anonymously, like from a blog, so that those others out there that can SEE will see. Or keep on leaving comments on Haaretz or other websites for the same purpose. You never know who will be reading and understanding. So yes, speak, but with strategy and care. That is my opinion.

Have you read the whole of the 'Political Ponerology' book? If you haven't, maybe this is the time to make it a priority.

My best wishes for you and your friends and family.

 

[Mr. Premise]

And you know, I find it extremely puzzling. Lot of them are not bad people, they just stuck with an opinion of the majority. They are cowards. Even I consider myself a coward, because I know perfectly what will happen if I'll express my opinion freely. It's just mind boggling to see intelligent people believing in everything they are told.

Hi Keit,

What you wrote reminds me of being at work on 9/11/01 and seeing my coworkers transformed before my eyes. It was like watching people be hypnotized. They started talking about kicking out all foreigners and bombing the entire middle east and stuff like that-- and that was on the morning of 9/11!

After I advised people to wait before drawing conclusions and then, some days later, telling people that I thought it was an inside job, I stopped getting invited to informal after work gatherings.

They were and still are mostly "nice people."

This will be something you will never forget. A good lesson, when all is said and done.

Don

 

[Danny]

So true Don and Keit about how people can change with a blink of an eye.All that is need is a catch phrase and(with alot of repetiotion) humans will do a complete 180.Perfect example is what is being used for the "phrase of the minute" is "Israel has a right to defend itself"and Voila the zombies of the American populace chant it right back.

 

[Cyre2067]

Ya i've heard alot of this, "It's the only way they can defend themselves..." bit and it makes no sense to me.

 

[Renaissance]

Here's a video showing the the horror and truth of Israel's brutality through their use of vacuum bombs. This is the fruit of Israel.

 

[a.saccus]

Rare Event: CNN Interviewer Actually Asking Israelis Hard Questions on the Bombing!

Here's the 4 minute video of an interview of Miri Eisen, Israeli spokesperson, by Rosemary of CNN. (I saw this on AOL but could not find it on the CNN website to get more details, so I have emailed CNN to get Rosemary's full name and when she comes on.)

http://journals.aol.com/thefeedblog...video-tensions-overflow-during-interview/1972

Here's some of the questions Rosemary asked:

[...] What proof do you have that that is the case, because other observers have suggested that that isn't the case?

Are you suggesting that these rockets were fired from this four story building housing these women and children?
[...]
Why was this building targeted? You have guided missiles, yet this building was not targeted?
[...]
But what impact are you having? There's no evidence that you're having any impact on Hezbollah in any way. They keep firing their weaponry, which is nowhere of the same calibre as that of the Israeli army.

How do you explain that all of these women and children, all of these civilians killed, and yet very little impact, it seems on Hezbollah at all?
[...]
But they're crude rockets aren't they? And after, all their impact has been minimal compared to the impact of Israeli strikes on Lebanon.

I have not included the Israeli answers--standard avoidance or reiteration of rehearsed speech. You can see/hear them for yourself.

1. I'm not saying these were the greatest questions in the world, and I'm not expecting the 99.44% merde we normally get to stop any time soon, but Rosemary looked and sounded like she was really trying to burst the Zionist bull-oney bubble without concern for whether she might be called an anti-semite. That is, she exhibited a desire for the truth. A nice thing to have in a reporter. She'll probably get sacked....

2.Psychopath watchers might enjoy taking a gander at the Israeli spokesperson, Miri Eisen, because she's really, really good, and seems really, really sincere-so long as you don't know that what she's saying is almost completely untrue or very badly skewed, and you don't notice that there is that odd lack of emotional depth. Smooth voice, yes. Articulate, yes. Well-rehearsed, most likely. And nice touch, that black (mourning) sweater, and being taped in an empty hallway so you get that resonant, authoritative and vibrant echo.

CraigS

 

[paulnotbilly]

I have not included the Israeli answers--standard avoidance or reiteration of rehearsed speech. You can see/hear them for yourself.

it always helps to present both sides of the story otherwise you appear to be biased or guilty of censorship. Usually where the answers may be false, something can be gleaned from them. Unfortunately it's mostly a well written script denying everything but occasionally, things are known to slip through.