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Ya Ven ... its 2006 .. get with the program ..

Capturing 3 soldiers is terrorism
Bombing civilians and associated infrastructure is self defense

ajb wrote:Thanks for that .... what I dont understand yet is how did the Israeli's get there? Are they actually people from the region or did they all just move in one day put up some borders and say welcome to Israel?

Mass exodus after WWII when Palestine was part of the Ottoman Empire. A Blafour declaration years before had promised the Jews a homeland in Palestine. And then a series of wars which lead to the state of Israel being created.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab-Israeli_conflict

and more specifically:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1948_Arab-Israeli_War

A few points:

MaaaD wrote:1. Israel has occupied a number of Arab territories since 1967, pursuing an illegal colonial project thereon comprising, but not limited to, expropriating land, building settlements, and transferring its civilian population. These lands include the Palestinian West Bank, the Syrian Golan Heights, and the Lebanese Shebaa Farms.

Don't mix the West Bank & Lebanon. Different places - different story

MaaaD wrote:2. Israel occupied Lebanon for 22 years (excluding the occupation of Shebaa Farms, which continues to this day). During this period, Israel massacred civilian populations, such as the 1996 bombardment of the United Nations compound in Qana; targetted Lebanon's infrastructure, including power plants and highways; and raised a proxy army, the South Lebanese Army, helping it administer the notorious Khiam prison where hundreds of Lebanese were tortured and imprisoned for years without charge.

Let's not forget that from 1976-2005 the country was occupied by Syria - who also ignored UN resolutions to leave.

MaaaD wrote:3. During its occupation of Lebanon, Israel detained hundreds of Lebanese, often times by crossing over the border and abducting them. To this day, Israel continues to detain a number of Lebanese.

Nothing justifies that, but it is still only a fraction of the number that is being held in Syrian prisions.

MaaaD wrote:5. Though Israel departed from southern Lebanon in 2000, they left over 130,000 land mines which have killed and injured countless children. Israel refuses to disclose the location of these mines.

According to the UN, there are 150,000 mines in Lebanon, as a result of the long civil war as well as the foreign occupations. Israel actually did supply UNIFIL maps, but the Lebanese govt. disputes the accuracy.

mraph33 wrote:Let's not forget that from 1976-2005 the country was occupied by Syria - who also ignored UN resolutions to leave.

It was not "occupied" the Syrian forces were there as part of Al Tayif agreement to bring stability to Lebanon after the civil war. Anyway i dont see how this is relevant to anything.

mraph33 wrote:Nothing justifies that, but it is still only a fraction of the number that is being held in Syrian prisions.

Again two wrongs dont make a right, and i dont see the relevance of bringing this up.

mraph33 wrote:According to the UN, there are 150,000 mines in Lebanon, as a result of the long civil war as well as the foreign occupations. Israel actually did supply UNIFIL maps, but the Lebanese govt. disputes the accuracy.

Actually they were forced to give in mine maps for exchange for the israeli buisnessman / spy that was captured by hizbollah a few years ago.

MaaaD wrote:It was not "occupied" the Syrian forces were there as part of Al Tayif agreement to bring stability to Lebanon after the civil war. Anyway i dont see how this is relevant to anything.

Yes they were invited, but then they refused to leave.

MaaaD wrote:

mraph33 wrote:Nothing justifies that, but it is still only a fraction of the number that is being held in Syrian prisions.

Again two wrongs dont make a right, and i dont see the relevance of bringing this up.

The fact explains itself.

MaaaD wrote:

mraph33 wrote:According to the UN, there are 150,000 mines in Lebanon, as a result of the long civil war as well as the foreign occupations. Israel actually did supply UNIFIL maps, but the Lebanese govt. disputes the accuracy.

Actually they were forced to give in mine maps for exchange for the israeli buisnessman / spy that was captured by hizbollah a few years ago.

Initially you said they didn't provide maps....I'm glad you agree that that your initial post was incorrect

Ah, we have more rational discussion in this topic again. Thanks Maaad and mraph33. It makes for much more useful reading now.

<edit>
In response to someone complaining about wikipedia, I think there's a great deal of time and effort from wikipedia authors that goes into trying to accurately present information from a neutral point of view. This discussion about the current conflict is a good example...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:2006_ ... non_crisis
</edit>

message deleted

Don't feed the troll!

sharewadi wrote:Ah, we have more rational discussion in this topic again. Thanks Maaad and mraph33. It makes for much more useful reading now.

<edit>
In response to someone complaining about wikipedia, I think there's a great deal of time and effort from wikipedia authors that goes into trying to accurately present information from a neutral point of view. This discussion about the current conflict is a good example...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:2006_ ... non_crisis
</edit>

Its kind of hard to figure out what's going on in those talk pages.

http://in.today.reuters.com/News/newsArticle.aspx?type=worldNews&storyID=2006-07-14T170700Z_01_NOOTR_RTRJONC_0_India-259565-1.xml

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - The Vatican on Friday strongly deplored Israel's strikes on Lebanon, saying they were "an attack" on a sovereign and free nation.

Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Angelo Sodano said Pope Benedict and his aides were very worried that the developments in the Middle East risked degenerating into "a conflict with international repercussions."

"In particular, the Holy See deplores right now the attack on Lebanon, a free and sovereign nation, and assures its closeness to these people who already have suffered so much to defend their independence," he told Vatican Radio.

Israel struck Beirut airport again on Friday and bombed Lebanese roads, power supplies and communication networks in a widening campaign after Hizbollah guerrillas seized two Israeli soldiers and killed eight.

Sodano said the Vatican condemned both "terroristic attacks" and military reprisals.

Hizbollah, which wants to trade its captives for prisoners held in Israel, has showered rockets across the frontier in its fiercest bombardment since 1996 when Israel launched a 17-day blitz against southern Lebanon and Hizbollah.

But Sodano reserved his harshest words for Israel.

"The right of defence on the part of a state does not exempt it from its responsibility to respect international law, particularly regarding the safeguarding of civilian populations," he said.

Analysis from Noam Chomsky, professor of linguistics and philosophy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is author of dozens of books, including his latest "Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy." In May he traveled to Beirut where he met, among others, Hezbollah leader Sayyid Hassan Nasrallah. Chomsky is speaking from Massachusetts.

Mouin Rabbani, senior Middle East analyst with the International Crisis Group and a contributing editor of Middle East report, speaking from Jerusalem.



http://ia301208.us.archive.org/3/items/dn2006-0714/dn2006-0714-1_64kb.mp3




BAGHDAD, Iraq, July 14 — The firebrand Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr said on today that Iraqis would not “sit by with folded hands” while Israel struck at Lebanon, signaling a possible increase in attacks from his mercurial militia, the Mahdi Army.

Mr. Sadr made it clear in a written statement that he considered the United States culpable in the conflict unfolding in Lebanon, since America is the largest foreign ally of Israel. Mr. Sadr’s incitement, which was repeated at his mosques across Iraq during Friday prayers, could ignite further attacks against American troops here. Tensions have been rising in recent weeks between the American military and the Mahdi Army, with American forces carrying out raids against Mahdi hideouts and arresting senior leaders.

American commanders have strongly denounced militias in recent days and have pledged to try to stop the role of death squads in the spiraling cycles of sectarian violence. Many Sunni Arabs blame the Sadr militia for abductions and execution-style killings, including an incident on July 9 in which militiamen seized as many as dozens of Sunni Arabs from homes and cars in the Jihad neighborhood and shot them in the head.

In 2004, Mr. Sadr led two rebellions against the Americans, which resulted in negotiations that ultimately allowed him to win enormous power in the new government through elections.

“Eyes are shedding tears and the heart feels pain and sadness for our people in Lebanon due to the bombing, terror and clear aggression that the Zionist enemy conducts and that is shielded by a number of countries, including the United States,” Mr. Sadr said in a written statement released by his office.

“Let be known to everybody that we in Iraq will not sit by with folded hands before the creep of Zionism,” he said. “It will enslave us if we keep silent.”

The fury was echoed in the Friday mosque sermon given by a Sadr cleric, Sheik Asad al-Nasri, to thousands of worshippers from the southern holy cities of Kufa and Najaf.

“We address all the arrogant powers of the world, including the United States and Israel, and tell them to realize the true reality and take lessons from history that show that all world powers, no matter how strong they are, prove to be failures and will definitely vanish,” the sheik said.

Since 2004, Mr. Sadr has transformed his organization into one similar to Hezbollah, the militant Shiite faction in Lebanon. Sadr followers are now composed of politicians working in Parliament and important ministries, as well as thousands of impoverished young men ready at a moment’s notice to take to the streets with Kalashnikovs. Mr. Sadr emerged from the December 2005 elections with at least 30 of 275 parliamentary seats, making his legislative bloc the equal of any political party in Iraq.

Mr. Sadr’s connections to Lebanon are manifold. Iran backs both the Sadr militia and Hezbollah. Some military officials in Iraq have said Shiite militiamen here may have gotten bomb-making technology from Iran through Hezbollah.

Some analysts of the Middle East say that if Iran is inflamed by the Israeli attack on Hezbollah, it could stir up trouble for the Americans here by prodding the Mahdi Army. Iran could be motivated to do the same if pressure grows from America and European nations over the Iranian nuclear program.

A relative of Mr. Sadr’s, Musa al-Sadr, was a prominent cleric in Lebanon before disappearing on a trip to Libya in 1978.

Many Sunni Arabs in Baghdad and other mixed areas of Iraq blame the young Mr. Sadr’s militiamen for prolifically carrying out torture and murder. Some Sunnis have described checkpoints where Sunnis are snatched by Sadr followers. Others say the militiamen fire mortars regularly at Sunni neighborhoods.

Sadr officials say there are rogue elements of the Mahdi Army that they do not control.

With the sectarian bloodshed in Iraq rising, “the Shiite leader and his movement have become more central than ever,” according to a report on Mr. Sadr that was released by the International Crisis Group this week. “Seen by many as a spoiler, his political positioning and legitimacy in the eyes of a restless, disenfranchised population have made Muqtada a key to Iraq’s stability, and he must be treated as such.”

Anthony Cordesman, a military analyst in the Washington area, said today in a report that Hezbollah, Mr. Sadr and other radical groups or figures in the region can “broaden the conflict at minimal risk, attacking both the U.S. and Israel indirectly with considerable safety.”

Another armed group here, the Islamic Resistance Movement in Iraq, also issued a statement today supporting Lebanese resistance against Israel and calling for more attacks in Iraq to support “our jihad brothers in Palestine and Lebanon,” according to the SITE Institute, which tracks jihadist Internet messages.


http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/14/world/middleeast/14cnd-iraq.html?_r=2&oref=login&oref=slogin

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/07BD096E-D25C-45C1-9483-8F2FD01F7278.htm

Thousands of protesters across the Arab world have taken to the streets to condemn Israeli offensives in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip.



Nearly 5,000 people gathered near Cairo's Al-Azhar Mosque, chanting anti-Israel slogans and carrying banners that read "No to Israel" and "Hey Arab leaders, you should be united."

Hosni Mubarak, the Egyptian president, met Jordan's King Abdullah II nearby to discuss the situation.

They issued a joint statement demanding "an immediate halt on attacking civilians and vital infrastructure," saying such attacks breached international humanitarian conventions, and called for restraint on all sides.

Egypt and Jordan are the only countries in the region to have signed peace treaties with Israel.

In Amman, more than 2,000 demonstrators gathered at a mosque after Friday prayers, shouting "Zionists get out, get out!" and "Lebanon, Palestine and Jordan are one people!"

Flagrant defiance

Abdul-Hadi Majali, the speaker of Jordan's lower house of parliament, called on the international community to oppose Israel's actions, calling them a "flagrant defiance" of international law, the official Petra news agency reported.

Thousands of Iraqis demonstrated in Baghdad praising Hezbollah's leader and denouncing Israel and the US over the attacks. Some protesters said they were ready to fight the Israelis.

Nouri al-Maliki, the Iraqi president condemned the attacks and warned that they could lead to "an escalation of violence in the region." The influential Sunni Association of Muslim Scholars issued a statement urging the international community not to be silent.

In Kuwait, hundreds rallied in front of the seaside parliament, shouting "Death to Israel!" and "Death to America!" Some waved posters of Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, the Hezbollah leader, whose headquarters were bombed on Friday by Israeli planes.

"Arab countries can do nothing but condemn," Kuwaiti lawmaker Musallam al-Barrak said.

Hamas rally

In Gaza, thousands of protesters marched at a Hamas-organised rally waving Palestinian and Lebanese flags.

"We in Hamas came here to tell our people in Lebanon that your blood is our blood, your enemy is ours and your aim is ours," one demonstrator shouted through loudspeakers.

Omar al-Bashir, the Sudanese president, said his country stands with the "Palestinian mujahedeen" and "backs the steadfastness of the Lebanese resistance," Sudan's official news agency reported.

Amr Moussa, the Arab League secretary-general, issued a statement calling on Israel to halt its military operations, and asking the UN security council to intervene. He met UN officials in Cairo ahead of an emergency summit of Arab foreign ministers on Saturday.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-5952845,00.html


BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) - At least 12 Lebanese villagers, including women and children, were killed Saturday in what appeared to be an Israeli airstrike on a convoy of vehicles fleeing a village near the border with Israel in southern Lebanon, a witness said.

The convoy was leaving the border village of Marwaheen, when it was attacked. An Associated Press photographer said he counted 12 bodies in two cars that were destroyed by the attack shortly after midday.

Several hours earlier, Israeli forces across the border told villagers by loudspeaker to leave the area or else the village would be destroyed. They did not give a reason for the ultimatum.

The convoy of several vehicles was hit near the border fence less than half a mile from the village.

The residents said they had first gone to a U.N. peacekeepers position manned by Ghanian forces to take refuge but they were turned down. There was no immediate confirmation from U.N. peacekeepers, who have a force in southern Lebanon.

http://www.washtimes.com/upi/20060715-071140-8349r.htm


An Israeli airstrike hit a Lebanese minibus between the cities of Shamaa and Bayada Saturday killing at least 15 civilians, Lebanese security officials said.
The bus traveling along a coastal road was transporting 20 civilians, CNN reported.
Israel had stepped up airstrikes against Lebanon, pushing north and targeting bridges and fuel storage tanks, military officials said.
The warplanes also cut off communication near Syria by destroying an area where radio and satellite TV antennas were located.
Hezbollah militants kept up their attacks from southern Lebanon, firing Katyusha rockets into northern Israel, CNN reported. One of the rockets hit a well in the city of Tiberias about 22 miles south of the border with Lebanon.
As the violence escalated, the Israeli military recovered the body of one of four sailors reported missing after a naval vessel was hit by Hezbollah fire off the coast of Lebanon, Israeli television reported Saturday.
Other Israeli military officials said two bodies had been found.
Israel launched its offensive after Hezbollah guerrillas crossed the Israel-Lebanon border Wednesday and captured two Israeli soldiers

i am watching my city burning now, the smoke is everywhere.. i can hear children crying on the streets , homeless .no one is safe now .. the world is so dark now..my heart is broken now... i wish i was there now...i have to stop crying now ... i cant stop crying ..beirut is burning and my future is gone.......................

*SIGHS* *SIGHS**SIGHS**SIGHS**SIGHS**SIGHS**SIGHS**SIGHS**SIGHS**SIGHS**SIGHS**SIGHS**SIGHS**SIGHS**SIGHS**SIGHS*

Corcs

Theres nothing me or anyone can say to make you feel better at this sad time for you, but i and others are thinking of you

did you see this?

http://today.reuters.co.uk/tv/videoStory.aspx?isSummitStory=False&storyId=015b4fc1001dd19f748db28b472528a62767a8e8&WTmodLoc=NewsArt-R3-RelatedNews-7

this is an interesting view...not unexpected

http://today.reuters.co.uk/tv/videostory.aspx?issummitstory=false&storyid=2d84221d81d258ebd2630f4620acd5d10208eb8f&wtmodloc=newsart-r3-relatednews-10

I think the Iraqi's have too many problems of their own to care. They've just had their Oylmpic coaches kidnapped and wrestling team murdered.

I am amazed to see how Lebanon has survived as a country. I mean dont they have any milatary, navy or airforce to defend their cities? Yeah we know about Hezbullah rockets, but lets be honest, those like firecrackers. No offense.

Hezbollah have rocket capacity enough to do serious damage to both Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.

I still condemn the Israeli attacks in Lebanon, I am very sad and angry about this.
Anyhow, some things are getting clearer at this time.
The missile, that was used by Hizbollah to attack this Israeli warship was an iranian C802 anti-ship missile.
Hizbollah does not own such high-tech weapons, only China and Iran do.
Quite interesting I think, it makes it somehow clearer who is feeding the fire.
In my opinion this is a crime about equal as evil as the attacks on Lebanon.

murphy wrote:Hezbollah have rocket capacity enough to do serious damage to both Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.

Well I hope so. Israelies deserve the same kind of treatment.

Foreign ministers of 18 Arab countries held an emergency summit in Cairo Saturday over Israel's expanding assault on Lebanon, but squabbles over the legitimacy of Hizbullah's attacks on Israel — including the capture of two Israeli soldiers that sparked the four-day battle — appeared likely to keep participants from reaching a consensus, delegates said.

arniegang wrote:Corcs

Theres nothing me or anyone can say to make you feel better at this sad time for you, but i and others are thinking of you

thank u all for ur support , it means the world to me

Edited, erased whatever. No point whatsoever in arguing anymore...

Zouk is next Corc. They're going to reduce us to even worse than we were at the end of the civil war. This is how we are paying the price. The only positive thing that could come out of this, THE ONLY THING, is the eradication of Hezbollah.

Arab leaders condemn Israeli attacks, but fail to support Hezbollah
By Hannah Allam and Miret el Naggar
McClatchy Newspapers

CAIRO, Egypt - Arab leaders meeting here Saturday condemned Israel's bombing campaign in Lebanon as the death knell for any hope of negotiating peace between Israel and the Palestinians. But they stopped short of supporting the militant Lebanese group Hezbollah, which triggered the latest round of violence by kidnapping two Israeli soldiers last week.


Arab governments are hamstrung over what to tell their citizens, who are incensed by four days of Israeli land, sea and air attacks on a fellow Arab nation that now threaten to engulf the entire region.


Responding too timidly could erode the Arab governments' legitimacy, but reacting more boldly could be interpreted as tacit approval of Hezbollah, which has ties to the Islamist groups that threaten their own autocratic regimes, monarchies and start-up democracies.


"They condemn Israel, but at the same time they have their own problems with the Islamist movements and don't support them," said Diaa Rashwan, an expert on militant Islam at the Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies in Cairo. "They're confused."


The Bush administration has hailed elections in Iraq, Lebanon and the Palestinian territories as the harbingers of a democratic tide in the Middle East. But Sunni and Shiite Muslim Islamist parties have been the biggest winners in all three places, emerging as the most credible alternative to the region's U.S.-backed regimes, which are widely considered corrupt, stagnant and ineffectual.


Hezbollah now has members in the Lebanese cabinet as well as the parliament; Hamas won control of the Palestinian government in January; and the powerful Muslim Brotherhood is the strongest opposition force in Egypt, Syria, Jordan and several other predominantly Sunni nations. In Iraq, Shiite political parties with ties to Iran's Islamic Republic emerged strongest from parliamentary elections last December.


Israel's incursion into Lebanon has highlighted the gap between Arab government policies and public sentiment. While state-backed newspapers in Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt criticized Hezbollah's operation as a "miscalculation," independent and opposition papers across the region reflected support for militants and printed graphic photos of the civilian victims of Israel's air strikes.


Similar divisions surfaced during the talks Saturday at the Arab League, said several representatives who took part in the meeting but asked not to be quoted by name because the discussions are supposed to remain confidential.


They said officials split into three camps over how to address the crisis. Syria, Lebanon, Yemen and Algeria showed strong support for Hezbollah. American-allied nations such as Egypt, Jordan, Iraq and the Persian Gulf states, meanwhile, consider the group responsible for much of the violence. Countries such as Morocco, Sudan, Libya and Oman didn't blame Hezbollah, but urged it to work more closely with the Lebanese government.




In an acknowledgment of the wide support for militant Islamists, Qatar's foreign minister told his counterparts that it was their duty to find a response consistent with Arab public opinion, several participants said.


In Syria, pro-Hezbollah rallies erupted in Palestinian refugee camps, and cars carrying the group's yellow-and-green flags paraded through the streets of a Shiite suburb outside Damascus, the capital.


"We are with Hezbollah - we're just waiting for the word," said Sadeq Mashhadiyeh, 41, a sidewalk vendor in Damascus who lived in Lebanon until Syrian forces withdrew from the country last year. "In Iraq, they did not allow us to fight. There, they will welcome us."


Other Syrians said they were confident that Israel wouldn't attack their country because Iran's hard-line leadership has pledged to defend Syria against any Israeli attack, a move almost certain to plunge the region into chaos.


"Nothing will happen here because Iran warned them that if they come close to Syria, they will defend us," said Sami Bazarto, a 29-year-old Syrian barber.


Kazem Jalali, a powerful member of the Iranian legislature's national security and foreign policy committee, told McClatchy newspapers that Hezbollah, which is supported largely by Iran, had made "missteps" but charged that Israel had been waiting for any small transgression to punish Palestinians and Lebanese for voting militants into office.


"The resistance movement and the new intifada (uprising) was like a slap to Israel's face," Jalali said. "They've been looking for a perfect moment to take revenge . . . they want to totally ignore the elections."


McClatchy Newspapers special correspondents Rhonda Romani in Damascus, Syria and Salome Abtahi in Tehran, Iran contributed to this report.

Audio


"Israel has reached the end of the road.....Israel has lost the ability to terrify the people of the region."

http://electronicintifada.net/download/audio/20060713-flashpoints.mp3

Nick81 .. shit is hitting the fan regardless .. as a true patriot to your country i would think you would be in solidarity together to protect the country against this agression rather than jump and use this to create internal tensions. Its "open war" right now, and no time to blame hezbollah .. now its time to defend lebanon .... If you look at history you will see the hezbollah has been able to win over and over again against Israel. So lets not be defeatist.