ISRAEL - IRAN - SYRIA - HAMAS - HEZBOLLAH - WWWIII?

revel wrote:

It was simply unfair the way the UN set up Israel in the middle of a place where people already lived. Ever since the Arabs and Palestinians were just made to either accept it or keep fighting and be labelled a terrorist.
...

The UN in 1947 resolved that Palestine, where both Jews and Arabs already lived, be divided into two states: one Arab; one Jew.

TO WHOM DOES PALESTINE BELONG?

Here's an abbreviated chronology of the ownership of the land called Palestine (some years are approximate). The Encyclopedia Britannica, "Palestine," is the source.

2000 BC: First Canaanite Culture.
1400 BC: Eqypt conquers Palestine.
1300 BC: First Israelite Culture.
1100 BC: First Philistine Culture.
1000 BC: Saul King of Palestine except Philistra and Phoenicia.
0721 BC: Israel is conquered.
0333 BC: Alexander the Great conquers Palestine.
0135 BC: Maccabees conquer all Palestine.
0040 BC: Romans conquer Palestine.

0638 AD: Arabs begin conqueringJPalestine.
1099 AD: Crusaders conquer Palestine.
1187 AD: Saladin conquers Palestine.
1244 AD: Turks conquer Palestine.
1516 AD: Ottomans conquer Palestine.
1831 AD: Egypt conquers Palestine.
1841 AD: Ottomans conquer Palestine.
1918 AD: Ottoman governance of Palestine ends.
1918 AD: British Protectorate of Palestine Begins.

1920: 5 Jews killed, 200 wounded in anti-zionist riots in Palestine.
1921: 46 Jews killed, 146 wounded in anti-zionist riots in Palestine.
1929: 133 Jews killed, 339 wounded; 116 Arabs killed, 232 wounded.
1936-1939: 329 Jews killed, 857 wounded; 3,112 Arabs killed, 1,775 wounded; 135 Brits killed, 386 wounded; 110 Arabs hanged, 5,679 jailed.
1947: UN resolution partitions Palestine into a Jewish State and into an Arab State.
1948: Jews declare independence and establish the State of Israel.
1948: War breaks out between Jews defending Israel and Arabs invading Israel.
1948: State of Israel successfully defends itself and additionally conquers a part of Palestine originally granted by the UN to the Arabs.

SOME OF THE TERRORISM OF JEWS BY ARABS
1970: Avivim school bus massacre by Palestinian PLO members, killing nine children, three adults and crippling 19.
1972: Black September kidnaps and kills eleven Israeli Olympic athletes and one German policeman in the Munich Massacre.
1974: Kiryat Shmona massacre at an apartment building by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine members, killing 18 people, nine of whom were children.
1974: Ma'alot massacre at the Ma'alot High School in Northern Israel by Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine members: 26 of the hostages were killed, 66 wounded.
1975: In the Savoy Operation PLO gunmen from Lebanon take dozens of hostages at the Tel Aviv Savoy Hotel eventually killing eight hostages and three IDF soldiers, and wounding eleven hostages.
1976: Hijacking of Air France Flight 139 (Tel Aviv-Paris) by Palestinian PFLP and German Revolutionäre Zellen; see Operation Entebbe: four hostages, one Sayeret Matkal soldier and 45 Ugandian soldiers killed.
1978: Members of the Arab Revolutionary Council poison Israeli oranges with mercury, injuring at least twelve people and reducing exports by 40 percent.
1978: Coastal Road massacre: Fatah gunmen killed several tourists and hijack a bus near Haifa; 37 Israelis on the bus are killed.
1984: three killed and nine injured in the bombing of a civilian bus in Ashdod.
1984: 48 people are wounded by a machine gun attack on a crowded shopping mall in Jerusalem.
1986: A bomb place on a bus in the West Bank kills one and severely injures three.
1990: PLF attacks the beaches of Tel Aviv.
1990: PLO attacks the US embassy.
1992: Israeli Embassy bombing by "Islamic Jihad" in Buenos Aires, Argentina--29 killed, 242 injured.
1994: Bombing of Jewish Center in Buenos Aires, Argentina, kills 86 and wounds 300.
1996: A series of four suicide bombings in Israel leave 60 dead and 284 wounded within 10 days.
2001: Israeli infant Shalhevet Pass is fatally shot in the head by a Palestinian sniper in Hebron.
2001: 21 civilians, mostly teenagers from the former Soviet Union, are killed by a Hamas suicide bomber in the Dolphinarium massacre in Tel Aviv, Israel.
2001: A suicide bomber in Jerusalem kills seven and wounds 130 in the Sbarro restaurant suicide bombing; Hamas and Islamic Jihad claim responsibility.
2001: Israeli tourism minister Rehavam Zeevi is assassinated by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.
2002: Terrorism against Israel in 2002.
2002: A Palestinian suicide bomber kills 30 and injures 140 during Passover festivities in a hotel in Netanya, Israel in the Passover massacre.
2002: A Hamas suicide bomber kills 15 and injures over 40 in Haifa, Israel, in the Matza restaurant massacre.
2002: A Hamas suicide bomber detonates himself on a bus in Jerusalem in the Patt junction massacre. The attack kills 19 people and wounds over 74.
2002: Hamas orchestrates the Jerusalem bus 20 massacre. 11 people were killed and over 50 wounded when a suicide bomber detonated on a crowded bus in central Jerusalem.
2003: A Hamas suicide bomber kills 17 people and wounds 53 when he detonates a bomb hidden under his clothing in the Haifa bus 37 massacre.
2003: Jerusalem bus 2 massacre: A Hamas suicide bomber detonates himself on a crowded bus carrying mostly Orthodox Jewish Israelis, including many children returning from the Western Wall. 23 people are killed and over 130 wounded.
2003: A Palestinian suicide bomber kills 21 and wounds 51 in a Haifa restaurant in the Maxim restaurant massacre.
2004: Violence in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict 2004.
2004: Jerusalem bus 19 massacre: Hamas and Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades orchestrate a suicide bombing on a bus in Jerusalem, Israel killing 11 people and wounding more than 50.
2004: Israeli soldiers arrest Hussam Abdo, a 15 year-old Palestinian boy with explosives strapped to his chest at the Hawara Checkpoint. The Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades sent Abdo on a suicide mission to bomb the checkpoint.
2004: Pregnant Israeli commuter Tali Hatuel and her four young children are gunned down at close range by militants from the Popular Resistance Committees and Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
2005: A suicide bomber in Tel Aviv kills five Israelis and undermines a weeks-old truce between the two sides.
2005: Islamic Jihad takes responsibility for a suicide bombing in Netanya, Israel, which kills five people at a shopping mall.
2005: Jewish settler in an IDF uniform opens fire on a bus in Shfaram, Israel, killing 4 Israeli Arabs and wounding 5.
2005: A Palestinian suicide bomber detonates a bomb near a falafel stand in Hadera, Israel that kills himself and six others. Twenty-six people were also wounded.
2005: A suicide bomb attack kills at least five people in Netanya in north-western Israel.
2006: Qassam rockets fired by Hamas into Israel, especially the cities of Ashkelon and Sderot, injures many citizens.
2006: Palestinian suicide bomber kills himself and four others at Kedumim Junction in the West Bank.
2006: Sami Hammad, a Palestinian suicide bomber, detonates an explosive device in Tel Aviv, Israel, killing eleven people and injuring 70.
...

TO WHOM DOES PALESTINE BELONG?

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"The land of Palestine is an Islamic trust... It is forbidden to anyone to yield or concede any part of it... Israel will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it."

Quote:

http://www.adl.org/main_israel/hamas_facts.htm

Hamas Fact Sheet

Posted: January 30, 2006

Since its founding in 1987 in Gaza by Sheikh Ahmad Yassin, Hamas - an Arabic acronym for Islamic Resistance Movement meaning "zeal" - has been committed to destroying the Jewish state and replacing it with an Islamic state in all of Palestine.

Origins:

Hamas was created shortly before the December 1987 Intifada as a more militant, Palestinian offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, a religious, political and social movement founded in Egypt and dedicated to the gradual victory of Islam. Since the mid-1970s, the Brotherhood had been expanding its influence in the West Bank and Gaza Strip through its vast array of social services. Hamas advocacy of an immediate holy war to liberate Palestine rendered the Brotherhood's policy of gradual Islamicization ineffectual.

Ideology:

Hamas preaches and engages in violence and terror in order to destroy the state of Israel and replace it with an Islamic state. Its virulent hatred of Jews and Judaism is deeply rooted in the anti-Semitic writings of Muslim Brotherhood theologians.

In August 1988, Hamas issued its Covenant laying down its ideological principles and goals. Replete with anti-Semitism, it echoes the notorious Protocols of the Elders of Zion and charges Jews with an international conspiracy to gain control of the world. In Hamas' worldview, Islamic precepts forbid a Jewish state in the area known as Palestine, the Jewish people have no legitimate connection to the land of Israel and Yasir Arafat is a traitor to the Islamic Palestinian cause. As the Hamas Covenant proclaims, "The land of Palestine is an Islamic trust... It is forbidden to anyone to yield or concede any part of it... Israel will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it..."

Organizational Structure:

Hamas is both a terrorist organization and a mass social, political and religious movement. The military branch is reportedly divided into three wings: an intelligence arm which gathers information about Palestinians suspected of collaboration, an arm which pursues those who have violated Islamic law and the Izzedine al-Qassam squads who are responsible for most of the terror attacks. The al-Qassam squads are comprised of a few dozen activists loosely organized into small, shadowy terror cells, at times operating independently of each other. Hamas' military and political leaders are based throughout the West Bank and Gaza and the organization maintains offices and representatives in Teheran, Damascus and Amman. The connections and levels of coordination between the military and political branches are concealed.

The division of Hamas into military and political/social wings has led many observers to erroneously assume that the social wing of Hamas is completely separate from its military wing. However, funds raised for the social programs of Hamas free up other funds for the military wing and there is no open accounting system whereby the international community can ascertain whether or not the social wing finances the military wing. For instance, so-called humanitarian donations reward the families of Hamas suicide bombers.

Hamas' military wing also utilizes the organization's social wing for indoctrination and recruitment. The social, cultural, religious and educational institutions of Hamas are well-known venues for anti-Israel and anti-Jewish hatred and serve as recruitment centers for Hamas suicide bombers. For example, a Hamas-sponsored soccer team in Hebron provided a ready supply of several Hamas suicide bombers. In early 2006, Hamas began operation of a television station based in Gaza, Al Aksa TV, which broadcasts primarily religious and children's programming. Al Aksa TV - which Hamas says it hopes to soon broadcast via satellite to broaden its audience - is likely to become a key tool in propagating Hamas' extremist message. Indeed, the host of the station's children's program told the New York Times that his show "will teach children the basics of militant Palestinian politics."

Terrorism and Violence:

Hamas launched its campaign of violence in 1989, first against Israeli soldiers and suspected Palestinian collaborators, and then against Israeli civilians. In the wake of the Oslo agreement, Hamas leaders intensified their rhetoric and vowed to derail the peace process through violent attacks. Drive-by shootings, firebombings and stabbings increased. Suicide missions began in April 1994, when a Hamas suicide bomber rammed an explosives-laden car into a bus in Afula killing eight and wounding 50 others.

Since that time Hamas has claimed responsibility for hundreds of attacks against Israeli civilian and military targets. Israeli security sources have thwarted scores more. Following Israel's unilateral disengagement from the Gaza Strip in August 2005, Hamas carried out dozens of rocket attacks against civilian targets in southern Israel. According to the Israel Defense Forces, through suicide bombings and other violent attacks, Hamas has killed nearly 300 Israelis since September 2000, and wounded over 2,000.

While Hamas agreed to a ceasefire or "tahdia" on terrorist operations in March 2005, according to Israeli sources, Hamas continued to plan and perpetrate terrorist attacks, and helped provide support for attacks claimed by other terrorist organizations.

Through systematic religious and political indoctrination and social pressure, Hamas leaders recruit young Palestinian men for suicide missions and other attacks. Hamas has also recruited beyond the West Bank and Gaza. According to Israeli sources, Hamas has recruited and operated a number of Israeli Arab terror cells. In June 2003, Israel indicted five senior officials of the Israeli Arab Islamic Movement, including movement leader Sheikh Ra'ad Salah, on various terrorism-related charges including membership in Hamas and raising funds abroad for Hamas agencies in the West Bank and Gaza. According to Israeli sources, two British Muslim suicide bombers who blew up a pub in Tel Aviv in April 2003 were Hamas recruits dispatched by the Hamas military command in Gaza.

Financial Support:

Hamas enjoys strong financial backing from Iran (an estimated $20 - $30 million), private benefactors and Muslim charities in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states, Palestinian expatriates across the globe and American donors. Its budget has been estimated at $70 million and 85 percent of it reportedly comes from abroad; the remaining 15 percent is raised among Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. A number of Americans and U.S.-based charities have been implicated in funneling money to Hamas. It is estimated that Saudi Arabia continues to channel between $12 - $14 million to Hamas annually. At a June 2003 press conference, Adel al-Jubeir, a senior adviser to the Saudi Crown Prince, did acknowledge that many Palestinian institutions funded by the Saudis may be run or managed by the political wing of Hamas.

Syria remains a key center for Hamas operations, and the Assad regime provides support and protection to key Hamas leadership based in Damascus.

There's more!

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Who in hell granted Palestine to an Islamic trust?

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TO WHOM DOES PALESTINE BELONG?

It belongs to the peoples living in Palestine.

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Please define the borders of "Palestine'. What were the borders of Palestine before the nation of Israel was re-established? And is there any question that Jews were a substantial percentage of the population there at the time the nation of Israel was established?

Further is there any question that many Arabs who live within the present borders of Israel were residents or descendents of residents there at the time Israel was established?

And finally is there any question that Arabs who fled prior to the first military assault on the State of Israel were asked by Israel to stay? They chose not to on the theory that the Jews would be driven out and they could return to establish an Arab state?

These are all important components of the history when you consider who owns "Palestine".

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Foxfyre wrote:

Please define the borders of "Palestine'. What were the borders of Palestine before the nation of Israel was re-established? And is there any question that Jews were a substantial percentage of the population there at the time the nation of Israel was established?

Further is there any question that many Arabs who live within the present borders of Israel were residents or descendents of residents there at the time Israel was established?

And finally is there any question that Arabs who fled prior to the first military assault on the State of Israel were asked by Israel to stay? They chose not to on the theory that the Jews would be driven out and they could return to establish an Arab state?

These are all important components of the history when you consider who owns "Palestine".

The borders of Palestine were established by Britain's Palestine Mandate following the First World War and specifically through a memorandum it presented to the League of Nations in September of 1922 declaring its intention to split its Palestine Mandate into two areas, the area east of the Jordan River, which would it would administer as Transjordan, and the remaining 23% of the area of the mandate west of the Jordan River which it would administer as Palestine, and where it would establish a Jewish homeland as it had stipulated to the British Zionist Federation in its Balfour Declaration of 1917.

Of course there are questions about the assertions that "that Arabs who fled prior to the first military assault on the State of Israel were asked by Israel to stay." What the Israeli historian Benny Morris states about the issue is that the Mayor of Haifa who was Jewish entreated the city's Arab residents to remain. At the same time Morris writes about massacres committed by Israel's military in carrying out the expulsion orders they had received from high command, and specifically Ben Gurion in October of 1948.

In an interview with Ha'aretz in 2004 when asked about the number of massacres the Israeli military had committed in 1948 Morris responded:

"Twenty-four. In some cases four or five people were executed, in others the numbers were 70, 80, 100. There was also a great deal of arbitrary killing. Two old men are spotted walking in a field - they are shot. A woman is found in an abandoned village - she is shot. There are cases such as the village of Dawayima [in the Hebron region], in which a column entered the village with all guns blazing and killed anything that moved.

"The worst cases were Saliha (70-80 killed), Deir Yassin (100-110), Lod (250), Dawayima (hundreds) and perhaps Abu Shusha (70). There is no unequivocal proof of a large-scale massacre at Tantura, but war crimes were perpetrated there. At Jaffa there was a massacre about which nothing had been known until now. The same at Arab al Muwassi, in the north. About half of the acts of massacre were part of Operation Hiram [in the north, in October 1948]: at Safsaf, Saliha, Jish, Eilaboun, Arab al Muwasi, Deir al Asad, Majdal Krum, Sasa. In Operation Hiram there was a unusually high concentration of executions of people against a wall or next to a well in an orderly fashion.

"That can't be chance. It's a pattern. Apparently, various officers who took part in the operation understood that the expulsion order they received permitted them to do these deeds in order to encourage the population to take to the roads. The fact is that no one was punished for these acts of murder. Ben-Gurion silenced the matter. He covered up for the officers who did the massacres."

Even earlier, beginning in April of 1948 during the Civil War in Mandatory Palestine the Zionist forces engaged in Plan Dalet which they carried out to empty the areas controlled by them of their Arab populations. Scores of villages were ethnically cleansed and oftentimes razed to the ground as the various operations were carried out under Plan Dalet. In April of 1948 Operation Nachshon cleared villages in a swath between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Operation Harel was a continuation of Operation Nachshon that attempted to ethnically cleanse areas near Latrun of its Arab villages. It was only partially successful after the Zionist forces relocated the Harel brigade to Jerusalem. Operation Misparayim ethnically cleansed Haifa (the Mayor's beseeching notwithstanding) of its Arab population. Operation Chametz ethnically cleansed areas around Jaffa. Operation Jevussi attempted to isolate Jerusalem by destroying the Arab villages that surround the city, but was thwarted. Operation Yiftach cleansed eastern Galilee of its Arab population. Begining in May of that same year Operation Matateh razed the Arab villages between Tiberias and eastern Galilee. Operation Maccabi attempted again to cleanse areas near Latrun of its Arab villages, and to reach Ramalah district but was foiled. Operation Gideon cleansed Beisan of its Bedouin population which had been semi-sedintary. Operation Barak was partially successful in razing the Arab villages in the area of Bureir to the Negev desert. Through Operation Ben Ami the Zionist forces occupied Acre and cleansed Western Galilee of its Arab population. All of this occurred before the start of the war immediately following Britain's withdrawal and the surrounding Arab states' rush to assist the beleaguered Palestinian Arab population.

What's closer to the truth about the Arab initiated flight is that Arab commanders instructed the Arab populations to clear areas of fighting, and ethnic cleansing that was being carried out by the Zionist forces.

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InfraBlue wrote:

...

Of course there are questions about the assertions that "that Arabs who fled prior to the first military assault on the State of Israel were asked by Israel to stay."

...

What's closer to the truth about the Arab initiated flight is that Arab commanders instructed the Arab populations to clear areas of fighting, and ethnic cleansing that was being carried out by the Zionist forces.

Thousands of Israel's Arabs chose, despite Israel's alleged genocides, to remain in Israel during the 1948 war. Thousands more who chose to flee Israel during the 1948 war chose, despite Israel's alleged genocides, to return and were allowed to return soon after the 1948 war ended. Thousands more who chose to flee Israel during the 1948 war chose not to return until much later and were consequently denied the right of return by Israel.

Based on that, it appears to me that many of the allegations of Israel genocides are malarkey.

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The Pals have a new strategy to destroy Israel. It is euphemistically called "One Land For Two Peoples."

"One Land for Two Peoples"
Is it a solution to the Arab/Israeli conflict or a recipe for disaster?

For decades, the declared thrust of the Palestinians has been their desire of having their own state - in Judea/Samaria (the "West Bank") and in the Gaza Strip. Now, a new idea has taken hold and is propagated in national media: a binational state, encompassing those territories and "Israel proper." The slogan is "One Land for Two Peoples."

What are the facts?

Review of history: The Arabs have launched four major wars against Israel, at the end of which Israel remained in possession of all the lands west of the Jordan River, the undivided city of Jerusalem, the vast Sinai, the Golan Heights and the Gaza Strip. In what was in all likelihood a major act of folly, but in order to attain peace with Egypt, Israel returned the Sinai to Egypt. But the peace with Egypt is the coldest imaginable.

Thus, having been unable to defeat Israel in war and unable to wear it down by their "intifadas," the Arabs had to think up something new in order to destroy Israel. And they did indeed come up with something. According to the late and unlamented Yasser Arafat, the most important weapon of the Arabs is the "Arab womb," the motto being: "If we can't defeat them in war, let's outbreed them." And that is exactly what would happen if there ever were a "binational" state. There can be little doubt that, within a generation or less, the Arabs would have outbred their Jewish fellow citizens and would have become the majority in the country. They would thus have accomplished what they were unable to attain by any other means, namely the destruction of the Jewish state.

Artificial countries: With the exception of Egypt, all the countries of the Middle East are artificial creations. After World War I, England and France carved up the Ottoman Empire, with England retaining what are now Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Israel and Iraq, and France being in possession of what are now Syria and Lebanon.

In 1917, the Balfour Declaration, proclaimed by the British mandatory power, established all of Palestine - east and west of the Jordan River - as the reconstituted homeland for the Jewish people. This was ratified by the 52 countries of the League of Nations. Insistence that these are Arab lands and that the Jews are "occupiers" is a notion that is fairly new. But it has been repeated so often and for so long that most of the world has come to believe it. But it has no basis in fact at all. It is a myth.

If Israel were ever to consent to the creation of a binational state, how would it work out? To get the answer, one only needs to go next door to Lebanon. In order to provide a safe haven for the Maronite Christians, the French carved out the artificial state of Lebanon. Within just one generation, the population ratio had begun to change in favor of the Muslims. Strife broke out, which ultimately culminated in a bloody civil war that lasted for close to ten years and in which scores of thousands died. Can anybody really believe that, given the mortal hatred of the Muslims against the Jews, things would be any different in Israel/Palestine? Of course not! A bloody civil war would be the inevitable result.

Created as a Jewish state: Israel was created as a Jewish state by the will of the nations of the world and by the brain and brawn of the Jewish people. There is no reason why the Israelis would turn their country over to those who are their declared mortal enemies. Do the Turks plan to establish a binational state with the Kurds (or do the Iranians or Iraqis, for that matter)? Do the Spaniards consider a binational state with the Basques? Do the Chinese propose the formation of a binational state with the Tibetans? Of course not. Why, therefore, should Israel even consider sharing its country with those whose never-changing agenda is its destruction? Why should Israel, one of the most advanced countries in the world in virtually every field of endeavor, make itself hostage to those who live in backwardness and ignorance and who are guided by religious fanaticism? Israel was founded to be the Jewish homeland and it will never acquiesce to its own destruction by allowing itself to become a binational state.

A binational state is a non-starter and, realistically, a Palestinian state in any portion of Judea/Samaria and Gaza (even in the unlikely case that the Israelis were ever willing to concede it) would not be viable. What then is the possible solution to this enduring problem? The Palestinians, just as the over one million Arabs now living in Israel with full rights as citizens, could be part of Israel, with full autonomy and with their own internal governance (something that the Kurds would give anything to attain). If they were unhappy with that solution they would be at liberty to migrate to any of the over twenty Arab countries that, one would hope, would welcome them with open arms.

--factsandlogic.org

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And the latest from Lebanon (do you suppose we will see an outcry against deaths of innocent civilians when Israel isn't involved at all?):

Hezbollah overruns west Beirut as Lebanon on brink
May 9 06:55 AM US/Eastern

Hezbollah gunmen seized control of west Beirut on Friday after a third day of battles with pro-government foes in the Lebanese capital pushed the nation dangerously close to all-out civil war.

The sectarian fighting had eased by early afternoon as the army and police moved across areas now in the hands of Shiite opposition forces who routed Sunni militants loyal to the Western-backed government.

"There are no clashes anymore because no one is standing in the way of the opposition forces," a security official said on condition of anonymity.

The rattle of gunfire and the thump of exploding rocket-propelled grenades rang out across mainly Muslim west Beirut during much of the morning as Sunni government loyalists fought street battles with Shiite gunmen.

At least 11 people have been killed and dozens wounded in the fighting that erupted on Thursday after Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah said a government crackdown on his Iranian- and Syrian-backed group was a declaration of war.

The unrest triggered urgent international appeals for calm amid fears that the protracted political feud could plunge the divided multi-confessional nation back to the dark days of the 1975-1990 civil war.

Beirut residents were fleeing for shelter elsewhere as tanks rolled through the streets and hundreds of riot police and troops patrolled the city, but did not get involved in the fighting.

Lebanon was largely cut off from the outside world, with the international airport and Beirut port shut and some roads to neighbouring Syria blockaded by burning tyres.

Arab nations led by regional powerhouse Saudi Arabia are pushing for a special session of foreign ministers to tackle the crisis and some Middle East states have begun trying to evacuating residents.

President Shimon Peres of Israel -- whose country fought a devastating war against Hezbollah in 2006 -- claimed the violence was fomented by Iran to further what he said was Tehran's goal to control all of the Middle East.

In Damascus, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad -- whose country is Iran's closest regional ally -- said the unrest was a purely "internal affair."

Witnesses reported fierce gunbattles in several parts of west Beirut as the Sunni neighourhoods considered bastions of Lebanon's ruling bloc fell to militants from Hezbollah and its ally Amal.

"Everyone is running away," said 35-year-old businessman Imad as people rushed to stores that remained open to stock up, while others remained trapped in their homes by the fighting.

"It was a hellish night. The armed militants were everywhere shooting all over the place," said Rima, another west Beirut resident.

Hezbollah, the most powerful armed movement in Lebanon, has also forced the shutdown of all media belonging to the family of parliamentary majority leader Saad Hariri, while a rocket hit the outer perimeter of his Beirut residence.

Hariri, whose father Rafiq Hariri was assassinated in 2005, had made a television appeal to try to calm the situation but this was rejected by Hezbollah.

Gunmen firing rocket-propelled grenades surrounded the headquarters of the Hariri's Future Television and his movement's Al-Mustaqbal newspaper early Friday, forcing all its media outlets to close.

"The army is in control of institutions placed under its authority, such as the media outlets of the Future Movement," the army said.

"It also controls the area around the government headquarters, the central bank, major roads and the area where Hariri and Jumblatt's residences are located in west Beirut," referring to prominent Druze leader Walid Jumblatt.

Air traffic was paralysed for the third straight day with no flights scheduled to land or take off from Beirut international airport, an airport official said, after Hezbollah supporters blocked access with mounds of earth and burning tyres.

Nasrallah delivered his defiant speech on Thursday after the government launched a probe into a private communications network run by Hezbollah, which is seen in the West as a terrorist outfit and which critics say has become a "state within a state."

"The decisions are tantamount to a declaration of war and the start of a war... on behalf of the United States and Israel," Nasrallah charged. "The hand that touches the weapons of the resistance will be cut off."

The United States delivered a blunt warning to Hezbollah to stop its "disruptive activities" while UN Security Council members said they were "deeply concerned" over the crisis, a view reflected by other Arab and European leaders.

The crisis will be the focus of talks between President George W. Bush and Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Siniora in Egypt next week during the US leader's tour of the Middle East.

Regional powerhouse Saudi Arabia, which backs the Siniora government, called for an urgent meeting of Arab foreign ministers, while Yemen suggested army chief Michel Sleiman be mandated to chair a dialogue to resolve the crisis.

The long-running political standoff, which first erupted in November 2006 when six pro-Syrian ministers quit the cabinet, has left the country without a president since November, when pro-Syrian Emile Lahoud stepped down.

While the rival factions have agreed on Sleiman as a consensus candidate, they disagree on the make-up of the new cabinet and so far 18 sessions of parliament to choose a president have been cancelled.
LINK

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One commentator said that whenever Iran comes under some type of pressure, such as it is now for supplying arms for use against us in Iraq, Hezbollah takes some type of radical action.

In any event, I think that this is a very dangerous development. One thing the area doesn't need is a country run by a terrorist group.

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Iran, International Peace and Security

by Gordon Prather
In a joint press conference held this week with the head of the European Commission, Mohamed ElBaradei, Director-General of the International Atomic Energy Agency reported that the talks with Iran that began on April 21 to "clarify" certain "alleged studies of weaponization" have resulted in "good progress."

What "alleged studies" is ElBaradei talking about?

Well, scroll back to the summer of 2005.

Since February, 2003, ElBaradei and his IAEA inspectors had been conducting intrusive investigations into Iran's Safeguarded nuclear programs.

And since December, 2003, Iran had been voluntarily adhering to an (as yet) unratified Additional Protocol to its Safeguards Agreement.

Iran had searched for and provided ElBaradei documentation of its past procurement activities for nuclear programs, going back two decades - documentation that Iran had been under no obligation to provide the IAEA at the time, much less obligated to preserve for later inspection.

In that summer of 2005, ElBaradei again reported that he had found no indication that (a) there were any undeclared "source or special nuclear materials" in Iran nor that (b) "source or special nuclear materials" were being or had ever been "used in furtherance of a military purpose." Hence, Iran was in compliance with the Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.

However, ElBaradei, personally, still had some "concerns" that Iran had been unwilling to address.

So, in mid-July, our intelligence officials rushed to Vienna to brief ElBaradei and senior staff on some of the sensitive "intelligence" they had gleaned from a laptop computer, allegedly stolen from a deceased Iranian engineer and obtained by our intelligence agencies from another intelligence agency sometime in 2004.

ElBaradei and staff were reportedly "unimpressed" with the documents contained on the "smoking laptop," most of which were about "studies" involving missiles and high-explosives, which were unrelated to ElBaradei's mission and, hence, unrelated to his "concerns."

Nevertheless, Bonkers Bolton, the Likudniks and other neo-crazies - in and out of government - kept up the pressure on the IAEA Board of Governors and upon the UN Security Council, with the result that both passed resolutions demanding that Iran explain any and everything to ElBaradei's satisfaction, including all the alleged "studies."

Well, on 25 February, 2008, Olli Heinonen, IAEA Deputy Director-General for Safeguards, finally got around to showing the Iranian Ambassador to the IAEA (as well as other IAEA Ambassadors assembled) for the first time exactly what it was the Iranians were being required to explain!

It was supposed to be a confidential briefing, not to be discussed outside the IAEA, but several brief-ees promptly gave their versions of the Heinonen briefing to neo-crazy media sycophants.

According to nuclear fuel-cycle student David Albright, who had been shown the smoking laptop documents years before, the Iranians were being asked to explain four projects which were alleged to have been pursued as part of a secret military program directed an Iranian General named Mohsen Fakrizadeh.

Only one of the alleged four projects would clearly have been within the IAEA's purview; the activities of a small Iranian private sector firm, Kimeya Madon, who, beginning in the spring of 2001 and ending in May 2003, allegedly developed a set of technical drawings for a small "bench scale" plant for converting Uranium Oxide "yellowcake" to Uranium Tetrafluoride "green salt."

The Iranians deny that Kimeya Madon had been involved in a uranium-conversion design project. But even if it was, Iran would not have been required under its existing Safeguards Agreement to have informed the IAEA about it until six months before the plant actually began operations.

Hence, as far as ElBaradei is concerned, the real issue is whether the Iranians are truth-tellers or inveterate liars - liars who lie when there is no reason to lie.

ElBaradei already knows that virtually all intelligence provided the IAEA by our "intelligence community" has been - to put it politely - wrong.

At Deputy Heinonen's February 2008 briefing, the Iranians were reportedly excitedly photographing everything being presented with camera phones. And a few weeks later the Iranians sent a Note Verbale to ElBaradei, incorporating a letter sent the day before to UN Secretary General regarding the Security Council's Resolution 1803 of March 3, 2008.

UNSCR 1803 begins with the Security Council -

"Reaffirming its commitment to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, the need for all States Party to that Treaty to comply fully with all their obligations, and recalling the right of States Party, in conformity with Articles I and II of that Treaty, to develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes without discrimination."

The Security Council then proceeds to discriminate, to deny Iran the "inalienable rights" it has just "reaffirmed."

So, Iran's letter to Secretary General begins by noting - correctly - that Iran "has consistently complied with its obligations" under the NPT and the IAEA Statute.

It then notes the "irrational opposition" of the United States and the Brits-Germans-French to Iran's exercising its "inalienable rights" as affirmed in the NPT and IAEA Statute, and charges that their "instrumental manipulation" of the IAEA Board and Security Council have resulted in international law and the UN Charter being "seriously violated."

Iran goes on to charge that the U.S.-Brits-Germans-French have provided "erroneous information" with the result that the IAEA has been prevented from fulfilling "its real tasks on important issues such as the prevention of actual [nuke] proliferation, disarmament and developing a mechanism to effectively verify the nuclear activities of the non-parties to the NPT, particularly the Zionist regime that is continuing to develop nuclear weapons in the [Mid-East] region."

Iran then reminds the Secretary General of the substantive and procedural legal requirements set out in the IAEA Safeguards Agreements, the IAEA Statute and the UN Charter for involving the Security Council in issues related to Iran's Safeguarded nuclear programs.

In particular, Iran correctly notes that "there has never been any reference in the Agency's reports to any non-compliance by Iran or and diversion in its peaceful nuclear activities. On the contrary, "the IAEA Director-General has repeatedly stressed that there has been no diversion of the declared nuclear materials." And the IAEA Statute requires the IAEA Board to "find" that the Director-General has not been able to verify there has been no diversion before referring the matter to the Security Council.

Hence, Iran finds it "necessary to stress that the engagement of the Security Council in this issue - and also the resolutions adopted in this regard - have been unlawful."

In conclusion, Iran notes that "the maintenance and strengthening of international peace and security requires, as a first step, our endeavor to ensure a safer world through developing equitable international rules, and through their evenhanded implementation."

And so say all of us.

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BF, your piece takes a cheap shot at Israel, implying that it is over-concerned with Iran's nuclear program.

As you know, a key Iranian leader said that Israel must be destroyed. I wager that, had that threat been made against the USA, we would have already destroyed the program.

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Advocate, regime change would be great for Israel. Iran calls for a nuke free ME and international non-proliferation. Good stances I hope Obama pursues.

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That would be suicide for Israel, which is surrounded by over a billion enemies.

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link

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There is no genocide in Gaza, or the WB for that matter. However, the Pals would love to commit it in Israel.

We are committing war crimes in Iraq, just as we did (big time) in Nam.

Our criticism of Iran's nuclear program does ring hollow.

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"There is no genocide in Gaza". Just every day. It's that kind of policy that threatens Israel the most.

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As for Bushie's insane nuclear ideas here is a better way very similar to what JFK was aiming for. BERLIN (Reuters) - The head of the United Nations' nuclear watchdog called on the United States Tuesday to set an example to the rest of the world by cutting its nuclear arsenal and halting research programs.

"The U.S. government demands that other nations not possess nuclear weapons. Meanwhile, it is arming itself," Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, told Germany's Stern weekly.

Criticizing President Bush's plan for a national missile defense shield, he said: "Then a small number of privileged countries will be under a nuclear protective shield, with the rest of the world outside."

"In truth there are no good or bad nuclear weapons. If we do not stop applying double standards we will end up with more nuclear weapons. We are at a turning point," ElBaradei told Stern in the interview released ahead of publication.

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Main Entry: geno·cide
Function: noun
Pronunciation: 'je-n&-"sīd
: the deliberate and systematic destruction of a racial, political, or cultural group
- geno·cid·al/"je-n&-'sī-d & l/ adjective

--Merriam-Webster

Maybe you don't realize that you are using the wrong word. Israel's relatively mild reaction to incessant attacks by the Pals is hardly genocide.

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Advocate lame. This is the international standard. "Convention on the
Prevention and Punishment
of the Crime of Genocide"

Adopted by Resolution 260 (III) A of the United Nations General Assembly on 9 December 1948.

Article 1
The Contracting Parties confirm that genocide, whether committed in time of peace or in time of war, is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and to punish.

Article 2
In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. http://www.hrweb.org/legal/genocide.html

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ISRAEL - IRAN - SYRIA - HAMAS - HEZBOLLAH - WWWIII?

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