Battle Cry - Iraqi lawmaker accuses “Jews” of financing sectarian violence
Coupled with Israel's assault on Gaza and Lebanon, the stage is set for Armageddon to launch from the Middle East.The speaker of parliament Thursday accused "Jews" of financing acts of violence in Iraq in order to discredit Islamists who control the parliament and government so they can install their "agents" in power.Am I alone, or is this an unusual and fairly significant public announcement coming from the Speaker of a government just installed by a staunchly pro-Zionist US?
Speaker Mahmoud al-Mashhadani hinted that the Americans and Israelis did not want to see officials of Sunni and Shiite parties running Iraq because "this is not their agenda."
"They will say that we brought you in a democratic way to the government but you are sectarian people. One of you is killing the other and you don't deserve to become leaders because you are war lords," al-Mashhadani told reporters after a parliament meeting.
Al-Mashhadani is a member of the Sunni Muslim Iraqi Accordance Front while Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is a member of the Shiite Dawa party.
"Some people say, 'We saw you beheading, kidnappings and killing. In the end we even started kidnapping women who are our honor,'" al-Mashhadani said. "These acts are not the work of Iraqis. I am sure that he who does this is a Jew and the son of a Jew."
"I can tell you about these Jewish, Israelis and Zionists who are using Iraqi money and oil to frustrate the Islamic movement in Iraq and come with the agent and cheap project."The battle line has been drawn - the worst is yet to come.
"No one deserves to rule Iraq other than Islamists," he said.
By "agents," he appeared to be referring to secular politicians who do not identify themselves with religious or ethnic communities.
posted by qrswave @ Friday, July 14, 2006
10 Comments:
Qrswave, thank you for your kind comment in a previous blog comment section.
You may or may not have read this interesting albeit long article "Behind the Scenes of Iraq War".
It concerns the Zionists' ambition to covet the Middle East outside its 'headquarter' homeland.
Of course, take the article with the grain of salt because Pravda used to be a communist propaganda newspaper. But they do occasionally put out lucidly written articles, like "Godfather USA".
Pravda is Russian for "the truth".
Israel’s rich history of military aggression against Lebanon
7/13/2006 7:30:00 PM GMT
(AFP Photo) Israeli soldiers at the border with Lebanon close to the Israeli village of Shtula
Israel’s recent raids into Lebanon came to revive memories of its old and continuous acts of terror and aggression targeting the Arab state.
At least 48 civilians, including ten children, lost their lives in the recent series of Israeli terror raids across south Lebanon, which followed the capture of two Israeli soldiers by the Lebanese resistance movement Hezbollah on Wednesday.
Israel carried on with its offensive on Thursday, blasting Beirut's airport and two army air bases near the Syrian border, as well as imposing a naval blockade.
Although Hezbollah had repeatedly threatened to capture Israeli soldiers, it had limited its attacks to shelling across the border. Wednesday's raid, in which it captured the two Israelis, marked the organisation’s biggest operation since 2000, when it forced Israel end its military occupation of southern Lebanon.
Hassan Nasrallah, the head of the Lebanese movement, said that the two Israeli soldiers would only be freed through a prisoner swap.
The seizure of the soldiers "was also meant to draw international attention... and highlight the ordeal of thousands of Lebanese, Palestinian and Arab detainees (in Israel) as well as their families."
"This is an ordeal of 10,000 detainees and 10,000 families," he said.
Nasrallah added that his group was observing "self-restraint ... as we do not want an escalation and we do not want to take Lebanon and the region to war."
"The Israelis always first say they do not wish to negotiate, but eventually they accept," Hezbollah leader was quoted as saying.
But whether Israel will resort to negotiations or not remains in question.
Here is a chronology of Israel’s terror raids and military aggression against Lebanon since 1968 when its forces raided Beirut airport, destroying 13 civilian planes.
In December 1968, Israeli commandos attacked 13 passenger planes at Beirut airport, claiming it was in retaliation for an attack by Lebanese-trained Palestinians, targeting Israeli airliner in Athens.
In April 1973, former Prime Minister Ehud Barak, disguised as a woman, led a raid on a Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) bases in Lebanon, killing three PLO members.
In March 1978, Israel launched a major military incursion, called the Litani River Operation, into south Lebanon and set up occupation zone. Most of the Israeli troops withdrew within weeks, leaving the zone in the hands of Israel's Lebanese Christian allies, the South Lebanon Army (SLA).
In January 1979, a car bomb attack organised by Israeli agents in west Beirut killed Ali Hassan Salameh, the security chief of PLO's Fatah group, known as Abu Hassan, and four bodyguards.
In June 1982, the Israeli Occupation forces invaded Lebanon, drove to Beirut, and encircled the PLO and Syrian forces in W. Beirut.
In September 1982, Israel captured Beirut after pro-Israeli Christian leader Bashir Gemayel, who was elected president days earlier, got assassinated.
Also September 1982 witnessed the horrific crime of Sabra and Shatila massacre, carried out by Lebanese Maronite Christian militias in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps, which were surrounded by Israeli soldiers throughout the incident.
The Kahan Commission, an Israeli inquiry into the massacre confirmed at that time that Israel was (indirectly) responsible for the massacre, and named then Israeli Defence Minister (and future Prime Minister) Ariel Sharon, among several Israeli figures, as bearing “personal responsibility” for the incident.
In June 1985, Israel withdrew most of its forces from Lebanon, leaving a small military unit and an Israeli-supported militia (the so-called "South Lebanon Army") in southern Lebanon.
In February 1992, Israeli forces killed Hezbollah leader Sheikh Abbas Musawi, his wife and six-year-old son.
In 1993, Israel launched a massive attack against Lebanon dubbed "Operation Accountability".
In April 1996, Israel launched another 17-day operation against south Lebanon and Hezbollah, dubbed "Operation Grapes of Wrath".
In May 2000, Israel was defeated by Hezbollah and forced to end 22 years of occupation in south Lebanon.
qrswave,
This isn't in response to the post but I didn't know how else to contact you. I came across this article yesterday and I thought it might be a point of intrest. With the terrible acts of terrorism that are being carried out around the world and those that perpatrate such acts trying to blame a third party, perhaps it is time to examine the REST of the clues that are being ignored or covered up. Mumbai seemed like an unlikely target but in light of this artcle it would seem that perhaps it was perfect for the 'attacker'. Hope you and your readers make use of the information.
http://us.rediff.com/news/2003/sep/08spec.htm
RAW and the Mossad
ksdrover
Treason in high places: Pentagon zionists, AIPAC and Israel
James Petras
Rebelión
The FBI investigation into Israeli espionage agents in the Pentagon is part of a major struggle between prominent Zionists in the Pentagon and the US security apparatus. Ever since the Bush regime came to power there has been a fierce political and organizational war between the Pentagon Zionists and their militarist collaborators, on the one hand, and the professional military and intelligence apparatus, on the other. This conflict has manifested itself in a series of major issues including the war in the Middle East, the rational for war, the relationship between Israel and the US, the strategy for empire, as well as tactical issues like the size of military force needed for colonial wars and the nature of colonial occupation. From 9/11/2001 to the invasion of Iraq, the Pentagon Zionists and the civilian militarists had the upper hand: they marginalized the CIA and established their own intelligence services to “cook the data”, they pushed through the doctrine of sequential wars, beginning with Afghanistan and Iraq and projecting wars with Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and other Muslim countries. The Pentagon Zionists increased Israel’s power in the Middle East and promoted its expansionist colonization of Palestine, at the expense of US soldiers, budget busting expenditures and CIA objections.
The US military and security apparatus has retaliated. First by debunking Zionist lies about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction, then by exposing the role of Zionist client Ahmed Chalabi as a double agent for Iran, followed by a two-year investigation of Pentagon Zionists passing documents to Israeli military intelligence and the secret police, the Mossad.
More is at stake than a turf war between the ‘Israel First’ Pentagon crowd and their opponents in the US military, diplomatic corp and intelligence agencies. The fundamental issue is the freedom of the US people to decide or at least influence their political leaders and their appointees without being subject to the manipulation and control by a foreign government (Israel) and their highly placed agents in positions of power.
Israel has for decades subverted US foreign policy to serve its interests through the organized power of major Jewish organizations in the US. What is new in the current Pentagon spy case is that rather than pressuring from the outside to secure favorable policies for Israel, the Israel loyalists are in top positions within the government making strategic decisions about US global policy and providing their Israeli handlers with secret documents pertaining to top level discussions in the White House on questions of war and peace. Today the politics of Pentagon and AIPAC espionage is especially dangerous – because what is at stake is a new US and/or Israeli war on Iran which will ignite the entire Middle East.
The move to high-level spying by top Zionist policy-makers like Douglas Feith, Elliott Abrams, Paul Wolfowitz and others in the Bush Administration is the culmination of a long series of strategic policies promoted by AIPAC designed to enhance Israeli expansionist goals in the Middle East.
Wolfowitz, Feith, Abrams, Perle, Rubin et al were the most zealous promoters of the war against Iraq. They worked closely with other Zionist ideologues like Bush speechwriter David Frum to promote the notion of “axes of evil”, to engage in a sequence of wars against Muslim regimes hostile to Israeli colonial policy in Palestine and beyond. Wolfowitz, Feith set up the parallel ‘intelligence’ agency (the Office of Special Planning) run by fellow Zionist Abram Shulsky using Chalabi to provide phony data on Iraq to precipitate that war. An army of ‘Israel First’ academic and journalist ideologues wrote, spoke and acted to justify the US attack on Iraq as the first part of a regional war to destroy any and all regimes critical of Israeli expansionism. Cohen, Rubin, Kristol, Foxman, Ledeen and many others provided “expert” propaganda on why US soldiers should kill and be killed for Greater Israel. Almost daily meetings and consultations took place between the top Zionists officials and the Israeli military and intelligence leaders in the offices of Feith and other Zionists. The Pentagon offices of Feith and Wolfowitz appeared to be an upscale bordello for high ranking Israeli officials. Judging from the subsequent policies it is clear that Pentagon Zionists took their cues from their Israeli counterparts – Israel was given greater funding, unlimited access to US policy makers and information pertaining to US policy in the Middle East. Meantime US intelligence and military officials were marginalized, their objections to Israeli positions blown away, their very presence seen as obstacles to realizing Sharon’s vision of a Greater Israeli – sharing (?) domination over the Middle East.
Given the high level of structural collaboration and integration of US Pentagon Zionists and US Jewish organizations with the Israeli state, the boundaries of what is United States policies and interests and what are Israeli prerogatives and interests are blurred. From the perspective of the Pentagon Zionists and their organized Jewish supporters, it is “natural” that the US spends billions to finance Israeli military power and territorial expansion. It is “natural” to transfer strategic documents from the Pentagon to the Israeli State. As Haaritz states, “Why would Israel have to steal documents when they can find out whatever they want through official meetings?” The routinization of espionage via official consultations between Israeli and US Zionist officials became public knowledge throughout the executive branch. Only it wasn’t called espionage, it was referred to as ‘exchanging intelligence’, only the Israelis sent ‘disinformation’ to the Pentagon Zionists to serve their interests while the latter passed on the real policies, positions and strategies of the US government.
The history of the key Zionists in the Pentagon reveals a pattern of disloyalty to the US and covert assistance to Israel. Harold Rhode and William Luti, both fanatical Pentagon Zionists under Feith , Wolfowitz and I. Lewis Libby have been under investigation by the FBI for passing documents to Israel. Rhode had his security clearance suspended recently. CIA operatives in Baghdad reported he was constantly on his cell phone to Israel reporting on US plans, military deployments, political projects, Iraqi assets and a host of other confidential information. Michael Ledeen, another influential Zionist policy maker who worked in the Pentagon lost his security clearance after he was accused of passing classified material to a ‘foreign country (Israel). In 2001 Feith hired Ledeen to work for the Office of Special Plans which handled top secret documents. Feith himself was fired in March 1983 from the National Security Council for providing Israel with classified data. The FBI investigated Wolfowitz for having provided documents to Israel on a proposed sale of US weapons to an Arab country.
It is clear that Israeli agents, not simply Zionists ideologues, infest the top echelon of the Pentagon. The question is not merely a question of taking this or that policy position in favor of Israel but of working systematically on a whole range of issues to further Israeli power over and against US imperial interests.
What is surprising is not the current investigation over Israeli spies in the Pentagon but why they have not been arrested, indicted and sentenced a decade or two earlier.
The problem of American Jewish organizational collaboration with Pentagon espionage - namely the role of the AIPEC as an accomplice in the current spy case - is not exceptional. In their books, former Mossad agent, Victor Ostrovsky ( The Other Side of Deception, 1994), and Gordon Thomas and Martin Dillon (Robert Maxwell: Israel’s Superspy, 2002) describe how the Israeli security forces have recruited overseas Zionist Jews, who are called sayanim, to serve as back-up supporters and collaborators in Israeli overseas operations. AIPAC is not merely a pro-Israel ‘lobby’ but a long-standing listening post and gatherer of public and confidential government information for Israel. At a more ‘philosophical’ level there is an insidious belief widely held among the leaders of major Jewish organizations like AIPAC that the basic question for all Jews is whether the “policy is good for the Jews” - narrowly defined to mean the interest of the State of Israel and its current rulers. In pursuit of “Defending Israel at all costs” it is very likely that some of these officials go over the line into wartime espionage.
President Bush has declared that he is a “wartime President” – the US is officially involved in a colonial war of aggression against the Iraqi people. In these circumstances, espionage in time of war is a capital offense… even if the spymasters are Israelis. It is no wonder that the Zionist and Israeli propaganda machine is working overtime to undermine the espionage investigation.
After the first announcement by CBS television, the rest of the mass media gave prominent space to Israeli and AIPEC denials. More seriously the CBS broadcast deliberately harmed the FBI spy investigation into the links between the Pentagon and AIPEC. The FBI blames CBS’s revelations concerning Franklin when, the latter had already confessed and was working with the FEDS to implicate AIPAC and Israeli agents. Zionist ideologues in the US mass media and the Israeli press try to downplay the incident – first through vehement denials and subsequently to reducing the case of treason to a question of a routine exchange of information by a single “lower level”, bumbling but fanatically pro-Israel Gentile functionary. They forget to mention he was hired and directed by Douglas Feith and Paul Wolfowitz to be their expert on Iran deeply involved in handling top secret documents and formulating policy on Iran.
The Israeli officials claim that Mossad and military intelligence solemnly pledged to stop spying on the US after the Jonathan Pollard case. “We have never spied on the US since…”, they claim. In fact over 800 Israeli spies posing as ‘art’ students and tourists were expelled after 9/11 and several Mossad agents posing as movers in New Jersey and Tennessee were expelled.
The arrogance of Israeli power in then US, which Sharon publically boasted about, is largely based on the simple principle embraced by all Zionist zealots whether they are Ivy league academics or neo-fascist felons (like Elliot Abrams) is “What’s good for Israel is good for the US”. “Good for Israel” today means bloody US wars against Israel’s adversaries, unconditional support for Israeli expansion and pillage of Palestine and now spying on the US for the good of Israel. Guided by this slogan it is easy to see how everything in the US that might be of use to Israeli intelligence whether it be documents, directives or strategic debates about big wartime issues taking place in the White House are fair game for transmission to Israeli intelligence.
Rather than face the evidence, the Zionist ideologues have taken to ad hominum attacks on their espionage agent as merely a middle level official who didn’t influence policy. They overlook the fact that he was the ‘delivery boy’ for his Zionist bosses who actually do make policy and work with top echelons of the Israeli state in ‘coordinating’ US policy to fit Israel’s needs. The power of the Israeli-US Zionist propaganda machine is so overwhelming that the FBI had to investigate for 2 years, make endless wiretaps, videos and photos, interview dozens of government and not-government officials before they could prepare to make the charges. Despite being taped and photographed in the act of taking top secret documents, AIPEC officials deny everything and then hire a string of high-powered defense lawyers. Already the pro-Zionists mass media suggest that Zionist-AIPEC spying is really a case of ‘mishandling sensitive documents’ – a case of putting top secret documents in the wrong mailbox. Really!
In less than two days the pro-Israel mass media buried the story, and a series of ‘news reports’ were published featuring AIPEC denials, Israeli ridiculing their Pentagon mole as a fanatical idiot (Haaretz) and launching a counter attack questioning the motives of the investigation and the FBI counter-espionage service. The media published stories from anonymous “insiders” who purportedly spoke of the FBI dropping espionage charges in favor of charges of “mishandling a classified document” or even simply dropping the case altogether. They claim that the spy handing over a classified document to Israeli interests didn’t know it was a crime, a case of an innocent, well-intentioned error of judgment. This piece of propaganda has been thoroughly discredited when it was revealed that the Israeli agent (Franklin) confessed and has been cooperating with the FBI for the past months.
Nothing captures the power and pervasive and corrosive influence of the US-Zionist apparatus on US politics as much as the absolute silence of both major candidates faced with a high-level security lapse and potentially damaging spy investigation. John Kerry, the Democratic candidate trailing Bush in the polls refuses to expose the Zionist Pentagon’s ‘security failures’ despite national security being at the center of his campaign. The reason is very clear: Kerry is tied to the AIPEC-Israel-US Zionist political machine and he is willing to sacrifice US security for the Zionist vote even when faced with the issue of Israeli espionage in a time of war.
The Republicans went one step further – sending their top politicos to an AIPEC political extravaganza organized in New York two days after AIPEC was cited by the FBI as the Israeli intermediary in the passing of secret documents. At no time in recent modern history has any governing or opposition party engaged in public festivities with an organization engaged in foreign espionage. The explanation is the unprecedented and unique political situation that exists in the US today – the extraordinary power that a small, economically dependent state exercises over a global imperial state via its wealthy organized political-religious agents.
If Israel can get anything it wants from its Zionist patriots in high places in the US government, then why engage in espionage? There are several explanations.
The hand delivery of documents by Franklin can be seen as a time saving and security-wise move. If discovered, Franklin’s mentors can simply deny involvement – he was acting on his own, an argument put forth in the Israeli press. The idea of Franklin as some kind of ‘loose cannon’ does not explain why he was hired, retained and given delicate assignments and praised by the senior Zionists (Feith, Wolfowitz, Ledeen and Abrams) up to the time of his exposure. Secondly the document transferred provided Israel with very timely information on a major top-level debate: US policy toward Iran, more particularly who was for or against a military assault on Teheran. This allows Israel to plan its own military strategy knowing in advance Washington’s possible response and directing its higher up Pentagon collaborators how to prepare the ground for acceptance of Israeli aggression. Fundamentally Israel wanted to be in the
White House decision making loop at every stage of Middle East policymaking via Wolfowitz, Feith et al and via confidential documentary accounts which the Mossad could analyze directly. There was a ‘need’ for espionage, because the Mossad does not merely rely on one source of information, nor does it operate only on one track. It has direct formal and ‘informal’ relations (spying) with ‘friendly’ government policy-makers. It operates on many levels, legal and illegal, through Zionist collaborators as well as overseas agents, through agents with false passports and though local Zionist sleepers, who can be activated for specific tasks…
Conclusion
Investigations and evidence are usually enough to proceed with indictments, interrogations and the pursuit of the leaders and foreign handlers in a major espionage case, especially in wartime. Thousands of innocent South Asians, Arabs and Muslims have been picked up and jailed on the most flimsy excuses (“suspicions”). But in the case of Israeli-AIPEC-Pentagon espionage the normal legal processes are inoperative.
The question of espionage prosecution depends on political power - a struggle between the Israeli State backed by the major Presidential candidates and parties, the Zionist-American political machines and their mass media acolytes on the one hand and, on the other hand the FBI, professional intelligence apparatus (CIA, DIA), state prosecutor and his investigatory staff and few stray political voices. The so-called progressive movements and policy critics are strangely silent: Even as they speak out against war, they fail to denounce an espionage case which is intimately related to the next Middle Eastern war – an Israeli attack on Iran. Why don’t progressive Jews denounce AIPAC espionage to further a new war in Iran? A signed statement “Not in our name” would clearly separate them from these agents of foreign wars. Three days after the initial expose, the mass media have buried the story. The FBI is delaying any announcements. The prosecuting attorney is under tremendous one-sided political pressure. Lacking any mass media outlets the US republic is a helpless giant, tied in knots by malicious dwarfs, unable to defend itself, unable to define its own policy interests. The latest report from the FBI tells us that self-confessed Israeli agent was preparing to lead the authorities to his contacts in the Israeli government when CBS blew open the case. Was CBS aware of the danger to the Israeli secret services and was it trying to undermine the investigation? No doubt some sort of official statement will be made, perhaps even an indictment will be made of the middle level functionary on secondary charges and the FBI may even dare to interview Wolfowitz and Feith on their knowledge of the espionage network with predictable consequences. However if there is anything beyond an interview, the Zionist media will charge “anti-Semitism”, a “Second Dreyfuss” case, which will probably end the current investigation.
The ‘underground’ struggle between the Pentagon Zionists and the US security apparatus will continue. If Bush is re-elected, Wolfowitz will most likely become Secretary of Defense. If Kerry is elected, the closet Zionist, Richard Holbrooke, will take charge of the Pentagon.
American citizens will have to face a serious question: If the security services are incapable of defending our country from foreign espionage in high places – What is to be done?
In either case we face an imminent Zionist designed and promoted military attack on Iran, which is likely to lead to a general conflagration which can only benefit the neo-fascists who run the state of Israel. And you are afraid of being called an anti-Semite for opposing the Israel’s espionage and regional wars.
August 31, 2004
Blair refuses to criticise Israel
Tony Blair
Amid mounting international concern, Tony Blair has refused to condemn Israeli actions in the Middle East.
Speaking at a press conference with his Canadian counterpart Stephen Harper on Friday, the prime minister said the military strikes against Palestinian and Lebanese targets were "an inevitable consequence" of the failure of diplomacy.
Downing Street also said it was not going to get into a "finger pointing game" after the EU issued a statement saying the strikes were a "disproportionate" response to attacks on Israel.
Blair said the most important thing was to return to the negotiating table.
"The truth of the matter is - and this is what is most frustrating about the whole situation between Israel and Palestine - there is actual total international unanimity on the basic solution to this, which is a two-state solution," he said.
"And the only way you are going to get a two-state solution is you negotiate the outstanding issues which are all well know. And both sides of the negotiations accept the right to exist of the other.
"That Israel accepts the right of the Palestinians to their own independent viable state and the Palestinians accept the right of Israel to exist and be confident of its own security.
"Now actually there is total international unanimity on that. People can argue about the rights and wrongs of the current situation.
"And I would point out... that this began with the kidnap of Israeli soldiers, that there are actions continuing against the northern part of Israel even at the moment and of course everyone wants at the other side proportionality and restraint and so on.
"But this situation isn't going to be resolved by, frankly, whatever we say as international leaders.
"It will only be resolved by what we do. And what we do has got to be to mobilise the international community to grip this situation and to make sure that we can get into a place where negotiated two-state solution, which is after all what the international community unanimously thinks should happen, is brought about.
"Anything else, this is why I say this every time I'm asked about this and people ask you to condemn Israel or condemn the Palestinian side, we can condemn as much as we like, we are not actually in that situation, we are not having to take decisions in that situation.
"The fact is there is immense pressure both on the Israeli prime minister and the Palestinians and now of course on the Lebanese government...
"All of this is an inevitable consequence of a political situation in which we don't have a political, diplomatic, negotiated track running to its proper destination.
"And that is the only way we are going to get this situation resolved and frankly whatever nuances there are between different international leaders on this issue is in my view less important than that."
Lebanon suffers as Israel braces
Bombardment of Lebanon continues as Israelis told to stock up on supplies
Conal Urquhart in Tel Aviv and agencies
Friday July 14, 2006
The Guardian
The aftermath of an Israeli air strike on Beirut airport. Photograph: Nasser Nasser/AP
The aftermath of an Israeli air strike on Beirut airport. Photograph: Nasser Nasser/AP
Israeli jets continued to bomb Lebanon today, hitting Beirut airport and 18 other targets as Jerusalem threatened to escalate its attack on the besieged country even further. Three people were killed. Hizbullah fired 13 more rockets at northern Israel, but caused little damage.
Hundreds of thousands of Israelis were advised this morning to stock up on essential supplies before returning to their bomb shelters by noon. The residents of northern Israel had emerged from their shelters after a relatively quiet night. Yesterday more than 150 Hizbullah rockets had been fired, killing two people.
Israeli officials and politicians said there would be no end to the campaign to destroy Hizbullah and free two Israeli soldiers. They expected Hizbullah to continue to fire some of its estimated 12,000 missiles over the weekend.
The soldiers, Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, were captured by Hizbullah guerrillas in a cross-border raid on Wednesday to be used to barter for the release of Lebanese prisoners. Eight Israeli soldiers and a Hizbullah fighter were killed in the raid.
The calm in the north of Israel was bought at the expense of the residents of southern Lebanon and Beirut, who were bombarded by the Israeli air force throughout last night.
Israeli aircraft hit offices, fuel depots, roads, bridges and junctions, killing three people and injuring 50, according to news agencies. About 50 people, including four Brazilians, have been killed since Israel started attacking Lebanon.
A spokeswoman for the Israeli army said aircraft had targeted 18 sites, including the airport, the offices of Hizbullah in Beirut and bridges and sections of road on the Beirut-Damascus highway. The conflict has affected both the Lebanese and Israeli economies. Tourists in both countries have fled and stocks and currency values have plummeted.
Yet Israeli officials vowed to escalate the conflict and assassinate Hassan Nasrallah, the Hizbullah leader.
Diplomatic pressure around the conflict was stepped up when Israel's UN ambassador named Syria and Iran as the backers of Hizbullah and Hamas.
It is widely known that Damascus and Tehran support the militant groups, but the remarks - in the midst of a security council debate about censuring Israel's actions in Gaza and Lebanon - ratcheted up fears that the countries may be dragged directly into the conflict.
"What we are seeing are the actions of Hamas and Hizbullah, but they are merely the fingers of the bloodstained hands and the executioners of the twisted minds of the leaders of the world's most ominous axis of terror, Syria and Iran," said Israel's ambassador, Dan Gillerman.
Earlier today, the Finnish foreign minister, Erkki Tuomioja, warned that the violence risked dragging in Syria, which ruled Lebanon as a puppet state until it withdrew troops last year and still has the support of the Lebanese president, Emile Lahoud.
Israeli commentators wrote that Israel would profit from the crisis by pushing Hizbullah away from the Israeli border.
Amnon Dankner, the editor of the newspaper Ma'ariv, said it was ironic that Amir Peretz, the defence minister, and Ehud Olmert, the prime minister, who had never been senior military men, had the task of repairing the damage done by Israel's previous prime ministers, Ariel Sharon and Ehud Barak, who were both decorated generals. This damage included allowing Hizbullah to deploy thousands of missiles close to the border and exchanging hundreds of prisoners for the bodies of Israelis and a single hostage, he said.
Other commentators compared Israel's situation to Britain's during the time of the blitz and said "everything is permissible" in the campaign against Lebanon.
The crisis in the north has completely overshadowed the situation in Gaza, where the Israeli corporal Gilad Shalit remains a captive of Hamas and the already desperate living conditions of Gazans continue to deteriorate.
Piles of rubbish are mounting in the streets as there is no fuel for garbage trucks. The shortage of electricity, caused by airstrikes on a power station, means there is not enough power to pump sewage or water. Untreated sewage is running directly into the sea and crowds gather round water tanks to fill jerry cans and plastic bottles.
Virtually no wages have been paid to employees of the Palestinian Authority and the rest of the economy is at a standstill. Israel allows enough fuel and food to enter but Gazans cannot leave or enter the strip. Thousands have been stuck on the Egyptian border waiting to return home. The Red Cross reported that four people had died because of the lack of shelter and services.
Israel pulled its forces out of central Gaza overnight, although they remain in the south near Rafah. The air force continued to bomb parts of Gaza, hitting buildings, roads and bridges, and the army shelled northern Gaza, where a man was killed when a tank fired at his car.
Since the offensive began, Israeli forces have killed 86 Palestinians and one Israeli soldier in a friendly fire incident. Many of the dead were gunmen, but about a fifth were civilians. The latest victim was a 10-year-old boy who died in a hospital on Friday, four days after being wounded in Beit Lahiya in the north.
Today, the Israeli army said that three Qassam rockets had landed in the city of Sderot in northern Israel without causing any damage.
Stop cutting and pasting articles, if you have original ideas let's hear them. I know how to look up articles if I want to read them, or link it. Don't mean to be insulting...unles you're really the zionist troll that has been assigned to heckle qrs.
ksdrover
Anonymous said...
Stop cutting and pasting articles, if you have original ideas let's hear them. I know how to look up articles if I want to read them, or link it. Don't mean to be insulting...unles you're really the zionist troll that has been assigned to heckle qrs.
ksdrover
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> All the articles are relevant. Not only that, but qrswave hasn't objected. So it brings to question, why DON'T YOU want people to know about these RECENT news???
To answer your question, not many people know where to look, nor do they find (or have time to) research and look. It's a time-consuming process. When something relevant from INTERNATIONAL news sources arives, it is a good thing to share it ---- but better than everything coming from the BIASED-Zionist controlled media, like News Corp, CNBC, CNN, Fox, etc.
It's tough to get at news source in America, when >92% are controlled by "jews" (Ashenazis/Talmudists). Many of my American comrades, DO NOT KNOW where to look. And for some it is quite some effort to look, not every spends hours a day researching ---- so the few of us that DO, we can point them to the right direction.
dsdrover, it seems you don't want us to do that?!!! mmmmmmmm???? In that case, crawl back to your cave you Zionist Troll (TM).
hey guys, settle down. You both have valid reasons for your respective positions.
ksd would like a more streamlined comments section that enables readers to get the most salient facts at a glance, and research only if necessary. That makes good sense.
On the other hand, anon wants to document important news stories which might be lost if left to mainstream media sources to archive.
That also makes good sense. I've linked to a number of articles in the past which for various reasons - some routine, some nefarious - are no longer available.
Anyway, my point is, we can't let little differences come between us, we have to stick together.
No need to apologize.
You made a very valid point. Time is of the essence too.
btw, I appreciate all your efforts.
Peace
:)
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