LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN

Bible Of the Day
27:1 Don’t boast about tomorrow; for you don’t know what a day may bring forth. 27:2 Let another man praise you, and not your own mouth; a stranger, and not your own lips. 27:3 A stone is heavy, and sand is a burden; but a fool’s provocation is heavier than both. 27:4 Wrath is cruel, and anger is overwhelming; but who is able to stand before jealousy? 27:5 Better is open rebuke than hidden love. 27:6 Faithful are the wounds of a friend; although the kisses of an enemy are profuse.
27:7 A full soul loathes a honeycomb; but to a hungry soul, every bitter thing is sweet. 27:8 As a bird that wanders from her nest, so is a man who wanders from his home.
27:9 Perfume and incense bring joy to the heart; so does earnest counsel from a man’s friend. 27:10 Don’t forsake your friend and your father’s friend. Don’t go to your brother’s house in the day of your disaster: better is a neighbor who is near than a distant brother.

Former US Ambassador John Bolton: Obama Damages Israeli Security
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu /Arutz Sheva
John Bolton, former United States ambassador to the United Nations, told Bar Shem-Ur on IDF Army Radio Tuesday morning that ”[U.S. President Barack] Obama is harming Israeli security and is playing into the hands of [Iranian President Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad” by agreeing to talk with Egypt about a nuclear-free Middle East.
Listen to statements by former US ambassador to UN John Bolton
mms://msmedia.a7.org/arutz7/eng-perm/10/JohnBolton-4May2010.mp3
“All of us know this suggestion [of Egypt] relates to one country - Israel,” Bolton stated. "The question right now is how much pressure he is prepared to apply to achieve his objective. If I were an Israeli, I would be afraid of the results of these contacts because of the very fact that Obama agrees to talk with Egypt” about its proposal.
“It is clear that we are talking about an absurd and very aggravating” action by President Obama, “but this is how it has worked for years since the days of Castro, and the ‘shining” period of [Yasser] Arafat,” Bolton told Army Radio.
He also said he is not surprised that the “head of an enemy state can arrive in the United States, take the podium in the center of New York, castigate the United States and Israel and accuse them of mutual nuclear aid.
“This really is not an exceptional step for the U.N. to give the podium to the president of Iran. The best thing I can say about the visit of Ahmadinejad is that his speech was so ridiculous that he actually damages himself more than he does himself any good.”
Calling the United Nations an organization “empty of all content” that “lost its legitimacy a long time ago,” Bolton suggested the establishment of an alternative body comprising only those countries that are democratic.
“There needs to be a wide-ranging discussion on the lack of effectiveness of the United Nations in dealing with international challenges,” he explained. “In its history, it has failed time after time to deal with global threats. This happened with Communism and today it is happening with worldwide terror.”
He dismissed the U.N. committee for preventing the spread of nuclear weapons as another “great name of an organization that has no teeth or significance."
Bolton, who advised then-President George W. Bush to stop paying dues to the United Nations, quit his U.N. post out of frustration.

US Links De-Nuking Israel with Removing Iranian Threat
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu/Arutz Sheva
The United States, which already has tied Israel’s agreeing to Palestinian Authority demands with solving the Iranian nuclear threat, now cites Israel’s nuclear arsenal as the key.
Ellen Tauscher, U.S. Undersecretary of State for arms control, was quoted by the London Guardian as saying last week, "The best chance we have to achieve a WMD-free zone in the Middle East is to reach an agreement on a lasting and just peace in the Middle East." A proposal for a ban on mass destruction weapons in the Middle East is being circulated by the Obama administration and Russia.
Egypt also is circulating a proposal that links removing nuclear weapons from Israel with eliminating the Iranian threat to become a nuclear power. Egyptian Ambassador to the United Nations Maged A. Abdelaziz said last week, “Success in dealing with Iran will depend to a large extent on how successfully we deal with the establishment of a nuclear-free zone" in the Middle East, meaning Israel.
Cairo also is using its “Israel card” to refuse to participate in the chemical weapons convention, arguing that Israel first must sign the nuclear non-proliferation treaty (NPT).
Israel’s “ambiguity” policy does not admit or confirm that it has nuclear weapons. It has declined to sign the NPT, which would require opening up state secrets on nuclear capability.
The United Nations this week opened its NPT conference and heard Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad charge, “The Zionist regime continues to threaten the countries of the Middle East with its arsenal. It continues to threaten the world's countries with acts of terror and invasion, and even gets the necessary assistance for its nuclear program.”
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton revealed to the conference Monday that the United States has 5,113 nuclear weapons, nearly 50 percent less than most estimates.
However, she did not disclose how many weapons have long-range capability. The United States and Russia have “enough nuclear weapons to destroy the world many times over,” she said. American officials noted that the United States has reduced its nuclear capability by 84 percent since the mid-1960s and 90 percent since 1991.
Revealing the classified information in the American nuclear arsenal is designed at putting pressure on China to do the same.
An American-inspired Middle East peace, with Israel at the core, remains in the background of the official statements. Besides the Russian-American proposal, Egypt’s position paper calls for countries signing the non-proliferation treaty "to disclose all information available to them on the nature and scope of Israeli nuclear capabilities, including information pertaining to previous nuclear transfers to Israel."
The proposal is buried in its working paper being circulated in New York, according to the Washington Post’s Walter Pincus.
Pincus noted, “How the Obama administration deals with the nettlesome problem of Israel's nuclear arsenal and the establishment of a nuclear-weapons-free zone in the Middle East will determine U.S. success or failure at the NPT conference.” (IsraelNationalNews.com)

Obama Renews Syria Sanctions
By AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Published: May 3, 2010
WASHINGTON (Agence France-Presse) — President Obama on Monday renewed sanctions against Syria for a year, accusing Damascus of supporting terrorist groups and pursuing missile programs and weapons of mass destruction. There had been no expectation that Mr. Obama was ready to lift the measures, but the renewal comes at a delicate time in relations between the United States and Syria, despite efforts by the administration to return an ambassador to Damascus. The United States also recently expressed concerns after Israel accused Syria of arming Hezbollah with increasingly sophisticated rockets and missiles, which the United States says undermine stability in the region. Mr. Obama said in a message to Congress renewing the sanctions, first imposed by President George W. Bush in 2004, that the Syrian government had made “some progress” in suppressing the infiltration of foreign fighters into Iraq.
But he added that Syria’s “continuing support for terrorist organizations and pursuit of weapons of mass destruction and missile programs, continue to pose an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security, foreign policy and economy of the United States.”

Environmentalists warn Jordan River drying up
By DANIEL ESTRIN (AP)
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gQMVxbB3qaTsrS5OHPj3ViLTWtBQD9FFQRG00
QASR AL-YAHUD, West Bank — Christian pilgrims who flock to the Jordan River to immerse themselves in the water where Jesus was baptized may have nothing left to dunk in next year.
A team of Israeli, Jordanian and Palestinian environmental scientists says large stretches of the biblical river could dry up by 2011. And much of what remains is nothing but a canal of sewage, they said in a report released Monday.
"You can almost jump across this river. In other places, you don't need to even jump — you can just cross it. It's ankle deep," said Gidon Bromberg, Israeli director of Friends of the Earth Middle East, the organization that commissioned the report. "You struggle to see the water."
Sadly, it is one of the efforts to save the river that has helped doom it, the report said. Israel and Jordan have agreed to stop dumping waste into the river and instead treat it in plants expected to be up and running in both countries in 2011.
But if no wastewater enters the lower Jordan — the river's largest section — then no water will flow in it at all, the report notes.
According to Christian tradition, John baptized Jesus in the Jordan River. Typical of the region's conflicting land claims, both Jordan and Israel maintain the New Testament baptismal site stands on their soil, and the sites face each other on either side of the Jordan.
On the Israeli-controlled side in the West Bank, the site is called Qasr al-Yahud, Arabic for "Castle of the Jews" or "Crossing of the Jews." In Jordan, it is called al-Maghtas, or "Baptism Site."
The Bible describes the river, which flows south from the Sea of Galilee into the Dead Sea, marking the border shared by Israel, Jordan and the West Bank, as "overflowing." In 1847, a U.S. Naval officer visiting the area reported on the "deafening roar of the tumultuous waters."
But over the past five decades, Israel, Jordan and Syria have diverted about 98 percent of the Jordan River and its tributaries for drinking water and agricultural use. Only 700 million to about 1 billion cubic feet (20 million to 30 million cubic meters) flow through the river today, a tiny fraction of the 45 billion cubic feet (1.3 billion cubic meters) that used to surge through before the 1930s, when the first dam was built on the river in what is now Israel.
What was once the narrowest stretch of the river has now become its widest. In some spots, the Jordan is only a trickle. Otters and other creatures that used to live on its banks are long gone.
Today, the lower section of the Jordan is choked with sewage from towns on the Israeli, West Bank and Jordanian sides.
The report's authors praised the Israeli and Jordanian wastewater treatment plan, while noting that it will dry up large stretches of the river by the end of next year because the treated sewage will be used for agriculture rather than being pumped into the Jordan.
The report recommends that Israel and Jordan rehabilitate the river by filling it with freshwater pumped in from the Sea of Galilee and the Yarmouk river, the Jordan's largest tributary, in addition to highly treated wastewater, to return a third of the volume that once flowed there.
Today, most Christian pilgrims who visit Israel immerse themselves in the fresh waters of the Jordan river at Yardenit, a modern-day baptismal tourist site near the Sea of Galilee, 60 miles (100 kilometers) upstream.
Less than a mile (about one kilometer) away, a dam built by Israel blocks the water for agricultural use. Steps away, a fountain of murky sewage from nearby Israeli communities shoot through a rusty pipe, where it joins up with agricultural runoff and saline water from nearby salt springs to form the rest of the river.
Some still go to the traditional baptism site of Jesus. On Sunday, a grinning Christian pilgrim from Moscow donned a long white robe and bobbed up and down in the brown waters, gesturing the sign of the cross with his hand each time he came up for air.
Some environmentalists strongly discourage baptisms there because the foul state of the waters make it a health hazard.
On the Israeli-controlled side, the site is closed most of the year because of its location in a military zone, surrounded by minefields, on the international border with Jordan.
About 30,000 pilgrims were allowed to visit this year, according to the Israel Nature and Parks Authority, and Israel is now renovating the site to accommodate more tourists.
The sad state of the Jordan River does not exist in a vacuum. Political deadlock between governments sharing the river and its tributaries has exacerbated the water shortage. Israel and neighboring Arab countries have complained about each other's projects to divert shared water sources for their own needs.
The diversion of waters from the Jordan is also a major reason why the Dead Sea is shrinking so dramatically. The legendary salt-water lake has lost one-third of its volume since Israel and Jordan built plants in the 1960s to divert the waters of the Jordan.
Copyright © 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

Another human-rights irony at the U.N
By Anne Applebaum
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/03/AR2010050303950.html?hpid=opinionsbox1
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad campaigned in Uganda and Zimbabwe. Behind the scenes, his flunkies twisted arms and offered favors. For weeks, feelers were sent out to all kinds of unlikely allies. What was the diplomatic prize at stake? Nothing less than a seat on the United Nations council on human rights.
Which was perfectly appropriate: Despite its title, this is a committee whose past members -- Syria, Saudi Arabia, Zimbabwe among them -- have not been renowned for their adherence to the Universal Declaration on Human Rights. On the contrary, authoritarian regimes have long battled to join the council and its predecessor organizations, the better to prevent any outsiders from investigating their own governments. Once they became members, much of their time was spent denouncing Israel and the United States, while studiously avoiding anything that might sound like, say, criticism of Russian behavior in Chechnya.
Different American administrations have adopted different approaches to this peculiar institution. In recent years the United States has quit the council, denounced the council and isolated the council, generally with bipartisan support. Perhaps the only New York Times editorial ever written in praise of John Bolton, President Bush's pugnacious U.N. ambassador, complimented him for advocating its radical reform.
Yet the council kept working to the advantage of its members: The fact is that in such places as Iran, Syria, Saudi Arabia and Zimbabwe, praise -- or even lack of condemnation -- from something called the "U.N. human rights council" still carries a good deal of political weight. We might roll our eyes when a committee headed by Libya solemnly pats China on the back for its good behavior in Tibet, but in China this makes useful propaganda. We might not take seriously the umpteenth denunciation of Israel by yet another U.N. body, but the Syrian government probably finds it useful.
Knowing this to be the case, the Obama administration, while it was pressing its other reset buttons, decided to rejoin the council in 2009, the better to "reform the institution from within." This was not just a gesture of friendship to the human rights council but an olive branch for the United Nations itself: We were going to engage with the process, work with others, use diplomacy. We were going to change the way the committee functioned, make the United Nations work for democratic values and not against them.
And we did. When Iran began to campaign for membership, Western diplomats -- French, Swiss, American and others -- took this prospect seriously for the first time in recent memory. They, too, began twisting arms and offering favors. They, too, sent their ambassadors to bat. Western human rights groups planned major events around the council meeting. Two French human rights activists made a film about the whole affair. Other experts mobilized their evidence: The wave of arrests and killings that followed last June's disputed Iranian election; the women who are severely beaten for not covering their bodies; the wider discrimination against women and religious minorities in courts of law; the ubiquitous presence of police thugs and informers on the streets.
It worked. Fearing it would lose, or fearing bad publicity that might get beamed back into the country, Iran withdrew its bid on April 23. The human rights groups claimed "victory." American officials spoke loftily of a "step in the right direction."
And the result? Five days later, another committee, the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women -- a body dedicated to "gender equality and the advancement of women" -- put out a turgid news release announcing its new members. Among them will be . . . the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Which is fine, unless you think that the "advancement of women" should not include stoning them for alleged adultery. And unless you think, as I do, that it is time to abandon the fiction of U.N. human rights diplomacy altogether -- or if you worry, as perhaps we all ought to, that Iran knows its way around U.N. nuclear diplomacy better than we imagine.
**applebaumletters@washpost.com

Netanyahu, Mubarak Meet on PA Talks
by Maayana Miskin/Arutz Sheva
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu plans to meet on Monday with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. The two will discuss the resumption of negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. The two leaders are expected to discuss PA demands, among them the extension of the construction freeze in Jewish cities in Judea and Samaria and a building freeze in Jerusalem. The PA has demanded a complete building freeze in those areas as a precondition for talks. "If even one house is built, we will break off the talks," said PA negotiator Saeb Erekat. Netanyahu will be accompanied by Minister of Trade and Labor Binyamin Ben-Eliezer. Israel-PA talks may resume within the next several days, with the return to the Middle East of United State envoy George Mitchell. Talks will begin as indirect negotiations mediated by the US. On Wednesday, Mubarak plans to meet with PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas. Egypt and the Arab League have backed Abbas's demand to freeze Israeli construction in much of Jerusalem prior to the resumption of peace talks.
The PA demands that Israel ultimately hand over half of Jerusalem to the PA, which will make it the capital of yet another Arab state. Abbas sees all parts of Jerusalem that were under Jordanian control from 1948 to 1967 as rightfully belonging to the Arab world, including neighborhoods that have historically been Jewish.
Previously, Abbas agreed to direct negotiations with Israel in the absence of a construction freeze. However, following Israel's agreement to a construction freeze in Judea and Samaria, and US pressure on Israel over Jewish housing in northern Jerusalem, the PA began to demand an indefinite building freeze as a condition for talks

Iran, Syria, Turkey Cementing Ties
by Hillel Fendel/Arutz Sheva/Iran made a point of declaring its solidarity with both Syria and Turkey in recent days, on the heels of joint Turkish-Syrian military exercises.
Turkish and Syrian troops conducted three days of joint military drills and exercises last week, in the latest manifestation of the close ties between the two former adversaries. The exercises were aimed at increasing “cooperation and confidence between the land forces of the two countries, and rais[ing] border units' level of training and ability to work together," according to a joint statement.
On Friday, Iranian Vice President Mohammad Reza Rahimi visited Syria’s capital, Damascus, and said that Iran will always remain alongside Syria as the latter prepares to "confront any threat." Appearing in a joint press conference with Syrian Prime Minister Mohammad Naji Otri, Rahimi added that Iran will never stop for a moment supporting Syria against the “occupiers of the Palestine land.”
It was also announced during the visit that Iran and Syria are seriously considering the formation of a regional economic bloc, with Turkey and Iraq as their key partners.
Just a few days earlier, Iranian dictator Mahmoud Ahmadinejad stressed the shared interests and concerns of his country and Turkey. He said that both can play important roles not only in safeguarding security in the region, but in “influencing the new world order.”
"Safeguarding the regional security and efforts aimed at influencing the new world order are the most important duties of our two countries," Ahmadinejad reiterated in a meeting with the newly-appointed Turkish envoy to Tehran. "Tehran and Ankara have lots of shared historic moments and interests, and at the international scene, too, our standpoints are quite close to each other… Iran and Turkey are also the center of the entire Muslims' reliance within the Islamic world, too."
Syria is immediately north-east of Israel, and Iraq is east of Syria; Turkey is located north of both Syria and Iraq, and Iran is east of both Turkey and Iraq. Israel has long eyed the improving relations among these three countries with concern, while at the same time once-warm Israeli-Turkish relations have cooled down significantly.

US Targets Israel as Anti-Nuke Conference Begins
/by Hillel Fendel/Arutz Sheva/
The United States is working with both Egypt and Russia to rid Israel of its nuclear weapons, as part of a comprehensive plan to neutralize Iran’s nuclear power.
Reports of this nature are being reported in various news media. The Guardian (London) reports that the US and Russia have drafted an initiative to ban nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East, while the Wall Street Journal says the Obama Administration is considering support for a “nuclear-free Middle East.”
The Guardian adds that the proposal involves the appointment of a special coordinator to conduct exploratory talks with Israel, Iran and the Arab states, followed by a regional conference. It is to be a central issue at an anti-proliferation United Nations conference beginning Monday in New York.
According to the Wall Street Journal report, the US is strongly considering opposing Israeli nuclear weapons more strongly than it ever has before. However, the US government has, at the same time, sent Jerusalem a message designed to calm Israeli anxieties on the matter, stating that the U.S. would not take such a drastic approach before it sees significant progress in the peace process between Israel and the Arab nations.
Specifically, Ellen Tauscher, undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, said the conditions are not right “unless all members of the region participate, which would be unlikely unless there is a comprehensive peace plan which is accepted.”
Such a message is actually not very calming, in that it does not state that there must be “peace” before the U.S. would take such a position. Furthermore, it is widely felt in Israel that its nuclear potential is as critical for maintaining peace as it is during times of war.
This may not be Israel’s official position, however – at least according to the Wall Street Journal. An Israeli source is quoted in the report as saying that Jerusalem’s vision is one of a Middle East without weapons of mass destruction, but that this must occur only as the climax of a peace process with all nations of the region.
The UN conference, held every five years, is to begin with an address by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose nuclear program and soon-expected capabilities have thrown the region into turmoil. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will also address the conference on Monday.
“The last NPT conference in 2005 ended in collapse,” the Journal reported, “but U.S. officials said they have been laying the groundwork for this conference for nearly a year.”

North Korea and Syria: A Warning in the Desert
By Gregory L. Schulte
May 3, 2010 Last Updated: May 3, 2010
http://www.theepochtimes.com/n2/content/view/34656/
South Korean conservative activists shout slogans with placards showing pictures of North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il during a rally in Seoul denouncing the North's launch of missiles on Oct. 13, 2009. (Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Images) North Korea has dropped tantalizing hints about rejoining the six-party talks on its nuclear program, having walked out of the talks in 2009. There is at least one catch: After its two nuclear tests, Pyongyang wants to rejoin as a nuclear weapon state and not as a party that had committed to abandoning its nuclear program.
According to South Korean press, North Korea’s foreign ministry recently wrote that it is ready to “take part in international efforts on nuclear disarmament on an equal footing with other nuclear weapons states.” Perhaps miffed at being excluded from President Barack Obama’s recent nuclear security summit, North Korea reportedly proposes to “join forces with the international community in nuclear nonproliferation and safe storage of nuclear materials.”
The recent sinking of a South Korean ship may also sink the six-party talks, making moot both their purpose and the agenda. If the talks resume nonetheless, the United States and its diplomatic partners cannot accept North Korea’s desire to be recognized as a nuclear weapon state. However, the five countries—the United States, Russia, Japan, South Korea, and China—can and should accept North Korea’s suggestion that the talks address nonproliferation.
Syrian Nuclear Reactor
North Korea has a penchant to proliferate to earn a living, and a warning about this proliferation lies buried in Syria’s desert. There, at a remote location near the Euphrates, North Korean technicians were helping Syria build a covert nuclear reactor until Israel warplanes bombed it in September 2007.
This reactor, destroyed before it started operations, had no obvious civil applications. It was built in great secrecy and without the required notification to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Once destroyed by Israeli bombs, Syria quickly hid the remains from international scrutiny. Much of a neighboring hill was bulldozed over the reactor remains, and a new building erected on top.
North Korean experts were reportedly involved in both construction and coverup.
This gas-cooled, graphite-moderated reactor was strikingly similar to the North Korean reactor at Yongbyong, the same reactor which produced plutonium for Pyongyang’s small stockpile of nuclear weapons. Indeed, the external configuration looked much the same until the shape of the facility in Syria was disguised with a false roof and walls.
Much of this joint Syrian-North Korean venture—from source of reactor fuel to funding—remains shrouded in mystery as do the motives. In the case of Syria, Bashar al-Assad, Syria’s president since 2000, may have been seeking personal prestige, regional influence, or a reinforced deterrent against Israel. North Korea, for its part, could have been seeking an offshore backup to its reactor at Yongbyong. More likely its leaders just wanted cash.
North Korea is an active trafficker in conventional weapons, missiles, and associated technologies. The Syrian reactor provides a stark warning that Pyongyang is ready to extend its illicit marketing to nuclear technology.
In October 2006, after North Korea’s first nuclear test, President George W. Bush warned that North Korea’s transfer of nuclear weapons or material to states or non-state entities would be considered “a grave threat to the United States,” and that the nation “would hold North Korea fully accountable for the consequences of such action.” Yet when the United States became aware of North Korea’s nuclear cooperation with Syria, there were no consequences other than Israel’s destruction of the North Korean reactor in Syria.
The Road Ahead
In the context of the six-party talks, Syria’s illicit venture was seen more as an unwelcome distraction than as a dangerous development. The U.S. chief negotiator at the time was satisfied with North Korea not denying its involvement and promising not to proliferate again. And while the IAEA launched an investigation of the covert reactor—an investigation now stymied by Syria’s refusal to cooperate—little was said in Vienna about the role of North Korea. The IAEA director general even removed North Korea from the agency’s agenda.
The world’s nonproliferation regime has been shaken by North Korea’s flagrant violations and by Iran’s determined pursuit of nuclear weapons capabilities. A nuclear armed Iran risks sparking a nuclear arms race in the Middle East. Middle East countries that might consider acquiring their own atomic arsenals but generally lack the necessary bomb-making technologies would look abroad for equipment, material, and technical assistance. North Korea has shown its availability.
To prevent further proliferation, North Korea’s activities need to be exposed, penalized, and disrupted. Three approaches should be pursued with those goals in mind.
First, proliferation should be moved to the top of the agenda of renewed six-party talks rather than being relegated to the bottom. Effective verification—two words detested by the North Koreans—must be a priority. Promises are not enough, particularly from a regime that has regularly dissembled about the scope of its nuclear activities. A better understanding of North Korea’s nuclear activities will not only thwart proliferation but also better position efforts to limit and ultimately roll back the nation’s nuclear program.
Second, the United States and like-minded countries should encourage the IAEA to revitalize its investigation of Syria’s covert reactor. Convincing President Assad to cooperate will require some adept diplomacy backed by the threat of IAEA special inspections and, if Assad refuses, subsequent referral to the U.N. Security Council. It is important to ensure that there are no other undeclared activities in Syria, to demonstrate that a country cannot stymie the IAEA by refusing to cooperate, and to protect the integrity of the nuclear nonproliferation treaty. Getting Damascus to “rat out” Pyongyang would expose the North Korean network, make future joint ventures easier to detect, and discourage other countries—whether in the Middle East or Far East—from embarking on similar projects.
Third, the United States should step up its efforts to interdict North Korea’s illicit trafficking and encourage China and others to do the same. The Proliferation Security Initiative, endorsed a year ago by President Obama, needs to be re-energized and targeted on North Korea. It should renew high-level diplomatic efforts to secure participation by countries like China, Indonesia, and Malaysia that lie on the maritime routes used by North Korean shipping. The initiative should also be expanded to include financial measures of the type that the U.S. Treasury has used so effectively. Because China is a regular transshipment point for North Korean vessels, it is essential to bring Beijing into maritime and financial interdiction efforts.
If the six-party talks remain on hold, the United States should not sit pat. It should instead convene the parties without North Korea, restate international expectations that North Korea disarm, and develop a regional approach to detect and disrupt Pyongyang’s black market in weapons technology. The reactor in the Syrian desert may lie in rubble, but the world cannot ignore its warning of North Korea’s readiness to market the most dangerous of technologies.
***Gregory L. Schulte was the U.S. ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency from 2005 to 2009. He previously served three tours in the White House under two presidents and six years on the NATO International Staff, working on nuclear policy and the Balkans. He is now a senior fellow at the Center for the Study of Weapons of Mass Destruction at the National Defense University. This essay reflects his personal views. With permission from YaleGlobal Online. Copyright © 2010, Yale Center for the Study of Globalization, Yale University.

U.S.-Israel Ties Remain Intact
By GERALD F. SEIB
A serious accusation, one rarely heard previously, was leveled against the Obama administration on Monday. The charge: It is too vigorously defending Israel.
Patrick Seale, a prominent British writer on Middle East affairs, published an article declaring that the administration "is beginning to adopt the vociferously pro-Israeli, anti-Arab rhetoric of its predecessor—the neocon-dominated administration of former President George W. Bush." He cited a speech last week by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in which she "used unusually strong language" to warn Syria and Iran that "America's commitment to Israel's security was unshakable."
Hyperbole aside, Mr. Seale's assertion points to an important but little-noted reality. The very public feuding between the Obama administration and Israel over the Palestinian peace process has gotten lots of attention, as has the strained relationship between President Barack Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
But beyond those headlines, the two countries actually have undertaken a broad effort at military and strategic cooperation—including supplying Israel with sophisticated American military equipment—to counter threats from Iran and Hezbollah fighters armed by Syria.
While there may be public feuding between the Obama administration and Israel over the peace process, the two countries have also begun a high level of military and intelligence cooperation in other areas, WSJ's Jerry Seib explains.
.In a week when Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is at the United Nations to talk at a nuclear nonproliferation conference—an ironic appearance given that most of the world worries he's seeking to proliferate—the level of security cooperation between Israel and the U.S. is of more than passing interest.
Israel believes Iran and Syria are creating a here-and-now threat by supplying Hezbollah fighters in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip with rockets and, possibly, missiles. But, of course, for Israel the real long-term threat lies in Iran's potential development of nuclear arms.
In the face of those dangers, the crucial question is simply: What are the U.S. and Israel doing about them?
Actually, they're cooperating more than most people think. It's important to note that this cooperation isn't designed to facilitate an Israeli attack on Iran's nuclear facilities. Actually, it's more the opposite. By making Israel feel its has, on its own and in conjunction with the U.S., the defenses needed to either deter or defend against Iran, the Obama administration undoubtedly hopes to reduce Israel's inclination to launch a pre-emptive strike on Iran, which the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Adm. Mike Mullen, for one, has openly fretted might be ineffective and destabilizing.
Beyond that, making it clear that there is a robust American-Israeli security relationship is one way of preventing miscalculations by the Middle East's more dangerous characters.
If Iran, Syria, Hezbollah or their extremist friends think U.S.-Israeli relations are so strained that Washington is backing away from its commitment to defend Israel, the perception of a newly vulnerable Israel might well invite attacks that could spin out of control.
That's one reason why both Secretary Clinton and Defense Secretary Robert Gates have gone out of their way in the last two weeks to publicly restate America's commitment to Israeli security.
And in fact, officials from both countries say that military and security cooperation has weathered the political storms of recent months, and in some areas actually thrived. An advanced American radar system, for example, has been deployed to Israel's Negev Desert, whence it can help the burgeoning Israeli missile-defense network.
A large military exercise last fall, code-named Juniper Cobra, was used to practice linking up that radar with American defense systems. The U.S. is funding the development of an advanced Israeli long-range, high-altitude system for knocking out ballistic missiles of the kind that might come from Iran. Israel is discussing purchasing the new American F-35 fighter jet, now nearing completion.
At the heart of much of this joint work is the relationship between Mr. Gates and his counterpart, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak. Both men are veteran political survivors and hard-eyed realists, and their ties seem to have grown stronger even as political strains between the White House and Prime Minister Netanyahu have increased. The two defense chiefs met last week and emerged uttering strikingly similar statements of warning to Israel's enemies.
U.S. officials also say there is a high level of intelligence sharing. One outgrowth appears to be a significant effort to detect and then stop arms shipments going from Iran to Syria, and potentially on to Hezbollah fighters in Lebanon.
Last fall, for example, U.S. forces stopped and inspected a ship called the Hansa India, which was carrying shipping containers that originated in Iran and were headed for Syria. The ship later was detained in Malta, where, the American government asserts, it was found to be carrying tons of bullet casings.
None of this means there aren't real strains between Washington and Tel Aviv over settlements in the West Bank, or over the value of a robust Arab-Israeli peace process to the broad American effort to knit Arab states into a coalition opposing Iran. Nor does strategic cooperation now mean that there won't, at some point down the road, be a serious rupture between the U.S. and Israel over the wisdom of a military strike at Iran's nuclear facilities.
It simply means that, as in all matters Middle Eastern, the situation isn't entirely as it appears on the surface.
Write to Gerald F. Seib at jerry.seib@wsj.com

Amnesty blasts Hezbollah sentences
Published: May 3, 2010
LONDON, May 3 (UPI) -- The trial of 26 members of Hezbollah in an extrajudicial court in Egypt "leaves a bitter taste in the mouth," Amnesty International complained. An emergency court last week sentenced members of an alleged Hezbollah cell to terms ranging from six months to life in prison. Amnesty International said that the trial in emergency court undermines and bypasses conventional forms of justice. "These men should be retried by an ordinary court which gives them a chance of getting a fair trial," the group said. Egypt enacted a state of emergency following the 1981 assassination of President Anwar El Sadat. Amnesty International said the special courts operating under the state of emergency "flout basic guarantees" for a fair trial and permit extraordinary measures to extract confessions. Cairo said the members of the alleged Hezbollah cell were charged with plotting attacks on tourist sites in the Sinai Peninsula and coordinating with militants in the Gaza Strip. Several of the accused said they confessed to the crimes under torture, however. "This trial leaves a bitter taste in the mouth," said Amnesty International. Cairo denies the torture claims. The sentence handed down Wednesday comes just weeks after authorities extended the state of emergency by another two years.

Al-Shami Criticizes Ban for Linking 1559 with Taef
Naharnet/Foreign Minister Ali al-Shami has said linking U.N. Security Council resolution 1559 with the Taef accord was "not right" adding that exchange of ambassadors between Lebanon and Syria was a "sovereign issue." Al-Shami's comment to reporters on Monday came in response to U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon's latest report on the implementation of 1559.
"The primary goal of resolution 1559 (2004) is to strengthen the sovereignty, territorial integrity, unity and political independence of Lebanon under the sole and exclusive authority of the government of Lebanon throughout the country, consistent with the Taef agreement of 1989," Ban said in the report. Border demarcation and the opening of embassies do not fall within the jurisdiction of the provisions of 1559 about respect for Lebanon's sovereignty and territorial integrity, he said. "Consequently, the exchange of ambassadors was a bilateral sovereign issue not called for by resolution 1559," the minister told reporters. "In addition, the issue of border demarcation between Lebanon and Syria is not a topic of controversy between them because both countries' highest authorities have agreed to engage in dialogue over it," he added. When asked to comment about Ban's dubbing of Hizbullah a militia, al-Shami said: "This is rejected, particularly that the 6th clause of the cabinet policy statement stresses the right of Lebanon, its people, army and resistance to liberate" occupied Lebanese territories.
"The armed component of Hizbullah remains the most significant Lebanese militia in the country," the report said.

Cover the sun with a screen
Ahmad Jarallah
THE Iranian Embassy in Kuwait has made a futile attempt to refute reports on the arrest of a spy network working for the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, because this is part of its fundamental diplomatic activities.
The denial does not change anything, since the fact is as glaring as the sun. There is no need for proof concerning plans of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard leaders on the Arabian Gulf nations, particularly since numerous pieces of evidence were exposed in the past.
Our newspaper had earlier cautioned - more than once - against “the planted cells” of the Revolutionary Guard in Kuwait and the entire Gulf nations in general. In addition, the action of Iran speaks for itself, especially the situation in North Yemen, since Iran has adopted the destructive Houthi dissidents who tried to attack Saudi Arabia and disintegrate Yemen. They nearly turned Yemen to another Somalia by making it a safe haven for al-Qaeda terrorists.
I think there is no need to reiterate the fact that the Iranian strategy on the ‘import of revolution’, which means importing tension and crisis, has not changed since 1979. The recent political steps taken by Iran, particularly instigating unnecessary tension in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and launching unfounded cheap campaigns, made the country look like an architect of fake campaigns to hide the truth behind the UAE’s occupied islands. Iran imagines itself as the lion of the region but it is actually a peacock with ruffled wings.
Everybody knows that the Iranian trumpets cannot conceal speeches, which do not conform to Islam and are aimed at actualizing certain objectives. The irrational noisemaking cannot cover the sun with a screen. Iranian statements have become historical debris and part of a strategy to instigate conflicts, in a bid to drag the region towards political and military tension, as well as cover divergent domestic and foreign crises which have already been exposed.
The recent discovery does not mean the Iranian spy network has just started its operations in Kuwait, since it is an age-long activity. Iran has never announced its good intentions towards Kuwait, and the latest discoveries contradict such claims. It is then pertinent for us to drop mild policies with the cruel neighbor, while the other GCC nations should expose consistent Iranian brutality and join the international community in taking a decisive step in this regard.
GCC nations should not fold their arms amid talks on the Iranian nuclear file, since it might escalate tension between the world powers and Iran at the expense of the region. Iran has no right to violate regional security regulations. It should not destabilize our security up to the extent of ‘celebrating’ explosions and ammunitions, similar to what happened in the 1980s.
Kuwait has never and will never become a backyard garden for instigating tension between a regional state and the international community. The region cannot afford any type of frivolous adventures by the Iranian regime under the current political and economic circumstances.
Iran has been playing with the security of Arab nations under the guise of liberating Al-Quds which has opened the door for its destructive groups. However, Iran has not exerted any effort to rescue Al-Quds and the entire Palestine from Israeli aggression. Has the Iranian compass changed its direction as it now finds Al-Quds, which it has been claiming to liberate for almost three decades, in Kuwait, Abu Dhabi or Manama? Iran continues to spill the blood of Muslims and contribute to the destruction of Muslim and Arab nations.
It is extremely important to curb excesses of the Iranian spies and Revolutionary Guards, not only to preserve regional security but also to protect Iranian citizens from the consequences of blind destruction and extreme cruelty that Iran carries out everywhere. Are we going to fold our arms against actions of this dragon, which has never satisfied its craving for blood and destruction?
Email: ahmed@aljarallah.com

We will not tolerate expats fighting on Kuwait’s soil
Need to respect and abide by the laws
‘Nine individuals were seriously injured, with two of them admitted to the Intensive Care Unit of Mubarak Hospital, during clashes among over 150 Arab nationals from the Salmiya and Hawalli zones. The mob attacked each other with knives and other sharp weapons, inside a famous commercial complex in Salmiya.” (Arab Times May 1, 2010).
This is not the first time that reckless “foreign” individuals commit such anti-social behavior as knives fights. What is reckless and in fact disturbing is that those Arab nationals’ behavior will definitely have greater consequences. Being a foreigner in any country carries with it more obligations to respect and abide by the laws of the host country.
Therefore, it is logical to assume that a foreign individual will put himself/herself in a precarious and vulnerable position if they intentionally break the laws of their host country. In the case of the 150 fighting Arab nationals, it is quite baffling how such people harm through their violent behavior the lives of their loved ones and families. The outcome of such criminal behavior is going to be either being sent to jail or deported or both!
Any law-abiding, hardworking expat realizes that following the rules and regulations, maintaining social peace will usually guarantee, for all, harmonious and prosperous living in Kuwait. Therefore, the violent actions of those Arab nationals will subject them and their families’ too under uncertain conditions. In other words, we continue to live in the Middle East where negative generalizations, stereotyping are part of the general psyche. Moreover, in addition to tainting the image of their countries, expats who involve in fights will get deported.
They will lose the chance of ever enjoying the many blessings of Kuwait!
It is a bit ironic that someone who works and lives in Kuwait would contribute negatively in our environment. We know of course that we are not perfect, yet we also know that Kuwait offers its expats numerous opportunities for greater financial independence and prosperity. Those knives and sharp weapons-fighting Arab nationals remind one of what usually happen when one loses their moral compass. The outcome of any reckless behavior will always bring with it negative outcomes. Furthermore, we as Kuwaitis already have enough on our hands to tolerate foreigners fighting each other on our national soil !
khaledaljenfawi@yahoo.com

Mitchell Starts Regional Trip to Push New Peace Talks
Naharnet/U.S. Middle East envoy George Mitchell was in Israel on Tuesday at the start of his latest regional trip aimed at pushing new peace talks between the Israelis and Palestinians
Mitchell was due to hold consultations with his team on Tuesday ahead of planned talks with Israeli officials on Wednesday, a U.S. embassy spokesman said.
He is expected to hold talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and, on Friday, with Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas.
Mitchell hopes to convince the two sides to begin indirect talks, after direct negotiations were halted in December 2008 when Israel launched a devastating 22-day military offensive in Gaza.
The Palestinians had reluctantly agreed to take parts in the talks in March but reversed their decision after Israel announced plans to build 1,600 homes for settlers in Arab east Jerusalem, also infuriating the U.S. administration which had sent Vice President Joe Biden to promote the negotiations.
U.S. President Barack Obama on Monday stressed to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the importance of holding "substantive" peace talks as soon as possible.
He made the remarks in a phone call to the Israeli premier who on Monday held talks with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.(AFP)

3 Electoral Lists, FPM Solo Compete for Zahle Municipal Elections
Naharnet/Three electoral lists will compete for seats in Zahle municipality. The Free Patriotic Movement, however, has decided to run solo. Zahle, in east Lebanon's Bekaa Valley, is the key election political battleground in the May 9 polls. The third list, which was recently formed, is headed by retired army officer Walid Shweiri. The other lists competing for these elections are one supported by ex-MP Elias Skaff and another headed by incumbent Zahle municipal head Asaad Zogheib and backed by the majority March 14 forces. Meanwhile, Michel Aoun's FPM supported only one candidate for the Zahle elections without engaging in any coalition.

The myth of the Arab triangle
Now Lebanon/Tony Badran, May 4, 2010
The last couple of weeks have shed the spotlight again on the tensions between Egypt and the regional Iranian axis, which includes Syria. The tensions surged with the conviction of Hezbollah cell members by the Egyptian judiciary, as well as with Cairo’s friction with Hamas and the persistence of its strained relations with Syria. Despite talk of reconciliation between Cairo and Damascus, the gap dividing the two states remains wide, as they have conflicting objectives and opposing strategic alignments.
The possibility of Egyptian-Syrian reconciliation had received ample airtime ahead of the Arab Summit in late March, but it amounted to very little. During the summit, the political differences dividing the two states were on display, pitting Egypt and Syria in opposing camps on key issues such as Palestinian politics, the resumption of negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, its stand on “resistance,” and, in general, Syria’s strategic position within the Iranian camp.
In the end, the Egyptians and Syrians only agreed to stop media campaigns against each other, which had reached a fevered pitch. It was speculated that the freeze in media wars was to pave the way for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to visit his Egyptian counterpart, Hosni Mubarak, who had undergone surgery.
A host of Arab papers kept talking up the prospect of such a visit throughout last month. The Kuwaiti paper Ad-Dar claimed that the visit was due in mid-April. It was soon followed by similar reports in a number of Kuwaiti outlets, as well as in the London-based Al-Quds Al-Arabi and the Lebanese Al-Liwaa, which announced everything from a visit within a “few hours,” to a readjusted “in the next two days,” all the way to a more vague “very soon.”
Al-Quds al-Arabi’s widely-recycled April 21 report claimed that Assad’s visit would be to participate in a tripartite summit along with Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah. Perhaps reflecting a Saudi push in that direction, one unnamed Saudi source, quoted in a separate report, went as far as to declare that the summit would signal the return of the so-called “Arab triangle” of Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Syria. The men were also reportedly set to discuss the growing tensions with Israel as a result of the crisis of the Scud missiles, which Syria is said to have smuggled to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Cold water was quickly poured over this story, as both the Egyptians and the Syrians denied it. A couple of days later, during a trip to Lebanon, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmad Abu al-Gheit diplomatically told reporters that Assad’s visit, while welcome, “has not yet been scheduled.” Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with President Mubarak yesterday.
Moreover, the Saudi monarch has also yet to pay a visit to Egypt. Instead, King Abdullah dispatched a letter to Mubarak with Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faysal, who traveled to Cairo to participate in the meetings of the Arab League’s Peace Initiative Follow-up Committee.
Evidently, there was no change in the political status quo to warrant even a pro-forma photo op. There were several sources for the continued strain, not least being the Scud story, and they quickly bubbled to the surface.
For instance, one of Bashar al-Assad’s closest Lebanese associates, former Minister Michel Samaha, unleashed a scathing diatribe on Al-Manar TV against Egypt immediately following Abu al-Gheit’s visit to Beirut. Samaha rehashed all the issues dividing Syria and Egypt (specifically Cairo’s position on Hezbollah and Hamas), strongly criticizing the Egyptians and accusing them of seeking to sow dissent among the Lebanese and the Palestinians, to sabotage the Syrian-Saudi rapprochement and to lend Arab cover for an Israeli attack on Lebanon. He added, “Egypt is still holding on to its position, and we [sic] to ours.”
Indeed, Hamas officials have also come out criticizing Egypt’s rigidity over its proposed solution for the inter-Palestinian conflict. Hamas, backed by Syria and Iran, wants to introduce amendments (for example, on the issue of “resistance”) to the Egyptian document, while Egypt refuses any change. Hamas and its sponsors in Tehran and Damascus have also railed against Egypt’s increasingly tight border measures with Gaza. Most recently, Hamas accused Egypt of gassing smuggling tunnels from Gaza.
Then came the Egyptian judiciary’s conviction of members of the Hezbollah cell caught operating in Egypt, which revived tensions with the Party of God, including public condemnation by the party’s secretary general and a vow to work to set free the incarcerated cell members. And finally, at the Follow-up Committee’s meeting last week, Syria repeated its objection to granting Arab cover for renewed talks between the Palestinians and Israel, and its ambassador to the Arab League strongly attacked the committee’s resolution.
Therefore, the issues dividing Egypt and Syria remain unresolved, regardless of whether Assad ends up visiting Cairo or not. These are strategic differences highlighting how, in the regional cold war between Iran and pro-American Arab states, Egypt and Syria are entrenched in opposing camps. This reality exposes the fallacy of the theory of the “Arab triangle” – a variant of the “returning Syria to the Arab fold” argument.
The Jordanian analyst Saleh al-Qallab made this keen observation in his As-Sharq al-Awsat column last Thursday. The calls for reviving the “Arab triangle” are badly misplaced, he wrote. In fact, this “triangle” never really existed, he added. Contrary to the common wisdom about Syria’s supposed “marriage of convenience” with Iran, in reality, it was the so-called “Arab triangle” that was the transient, ad hoc arrangement that faded, whereas Syria’s alliance with Iran endured for three decades. Egypt sees Syrian policies as subverting Cairo’s regional clout, which Damascus holds as its own entitlement. That is partly why, as Qallab noted, the idea of an "Arab triangle" was always unsustainable.
It is Egypt’s ongoing conflict with Iran’s regional axis that lies at the heart of the divide, all visits of protocol and wishful thinking about a Syrian “strategic realignment” notwithstanding.
**Tony Badran is a research fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies

Resistance declares right to defend itself
By Dalila Mahdawi
Daily Star staff
Thursday, April 29, 2010

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BEIRUT: Hizbullah Wednesday reacted to US claims it was stockpiling Scud missiles by saying it had a right to defend itself, as a senior UN official said tensions were expected to “dissipate” soon.

“The resistance has the right to use all legitimate means to build its capacity to defend Lebanon,” Hizbullah MP Hassan Fadlallah told AFP. He added that US arms were “annihilating” civilians in Palestine, Afghanistan, Iraq and Lebanon, and were the chief “cause of all suffering in the region.”

Last week, Israeli President Shimon Peres accused Syria of furnishing Hizbullah with Scud missiles. The charges were repeated late on Tuesday by US Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who said the military capabilities of the Shiite group undermined stability in the region. “Syria and Iran are providing Hizbullah with rockets and missiles of ever-increasing capability,” Gates said at a press conference with his Israeli counterpart Ehud Barak. “We’re at a point now where Hizbullah has far more rockets and missiles than most governments in the world,” Gates said, adding that Washington was monitoring the situation “very carefully.”

Gates did not, however, explicitly accuse Syria of supplying Hizbullah with Scud missiles. Barak also voiced concern over Syrian support for Hizbullah but did not repeat the claim that Damascus was supplying the group with Scuds. “We do not intend to provoke any kind of a major collision in Lebanon or vis-a-vis Syria,” he said.

The Scud charges have been denied by Syria, which says Tel Aviv fabricated the story to justify a possible military strike in the future. Lebanese Armed Forces chief General Jean Kahwaji has also dismissed the claims, noting the outdated 30-meter Scuds would be too hard for Hizbullah to conceal and too cumbersome to launch.

The charges showed the US was “waging a diplomatic and political battle” to help its ally Israel maintain superior military capabilities, Fadlallah said. “The US is asking us to accept Israel’s alleged superiority to ensure Israel remains capable of launching attacks at its will, while we are stripped of the ability to face these aggressions,” he told AFP. “We have no interest in acceding to these attempts to concretize Israeli superiority.” The US, rather than Hizbullah, was “the principle factor destabilizing the region, undermining its security and preventing development,” Fadlallah added.

At a meeting with Lebanese Premier Saad Hariri Wednesday, UN Special Coordinator for Lebanon Michal Williams said he expected regional tensions over the Scud controversy to subside.

“The last thing this region wants and needs is further conflict. It has had enough of that over the years,” he said. Williams added he didn’t believe another war was likely, saying there was “too much at stake to lose for all the parties.” “I expect all parties will do their part to maintain the stability in the south and across the Blue Line and that tensions will dissipate,” he added.

In comments published Wednesday by the Qatari Al-Watan daily, Hariri reiterated comments that by claiming Hizbullah had Scud missiles. Israel was trying to justify new war against Lebanon that it could launch whenever it wants.”

He asked whether there was any proof that Hizbullah possessed Scuds, adding that Israel possessed nuclear weapons.

He said he would refuse to ask the Shiite group to deny possessing the missiles. “Why put ourselves in the position of being accused, and why give Israel the right to make such accusations?”

Heightened tensions over the Scud missiles have prompted EU officials to urge Israel, Lebanon and Syria to avoid provocative acts. “The European Union is concerned by the public statements that have been exchanged recently between various parties to the Arab-Israeli conflict in the Middle East,” EU Foreign Affairs chief Catherine Ashton said in a statement Tuesday.

In July 2006, Israel launched a devastating 34-day war on Lebanon. Over 1,200 Lebanese, mostly civilians, and 160 Israelis, mostly soldiers, were killed during the conflict.

UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended the conflict, called for Israel to fully withdraw from Lebanese territory and for the disarmament of all armed groups in Lebanon outside the control of the government.

Read more: http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=1&categ_id=2&article_id=114343#ixzz0mREaHOD4
(The Daily Star :: Lebanon News :: http://www.dailystar.com.lb)