LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN
ِMay 05/2011

Biblical Event Of The Day
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Mark 12,28-34. One of the scribes, when he came forward and heard them disputing and saw how well he had answered them, asked him, "Which is the first of all the commandments?"Jesus replied, "The first is this: 'Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is Lord alone! You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.' The second is this: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these." The scribe said to him, "Well said, teacher. You are right in saying, 'He is One and there is no other than he.' And 'to love him with all your heart, with all your understanding, with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself' is worth more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices." And when Jesus saw that (he) answered with understanding, he said to him, "You are not far from the kingdom of God." And no one dared to ask him any more questions.

Latest analysis, editorials, studies, reports, letters & Releases from miscellaneous sources
Will bin Laden killing pave way for similar moves by Israel?/By Amos Harel/May 04/11
A killing, and questions about U.S.-Pakistan collaboration/By David Ignatius/May 04/11
The president of Pakistan, Asif Ali Zardari: Pakistan did its part/May 04/11
The Middle East Channel: Hezbollah's most serious challenge/Foreign PolicyLMay 04/11
ANALYSIS : Many factors mitigate against Syrian revolt/The Name Age on line/May 04/11

Latest News Reports From Miscellaneous Sources for May 04/11
Lebanese woman repatriated from Israel: ICRC/Daily Star
US: Syrian actions in Daraa 'barbaric'/Ynetnews
Syria charges hundreds with "maligning the state/Daily Star
White House fumbles getting its Osama bin Laden story straight/DEBKAfile
Netanyahu: Hamas-Fatah unity pact is a victory for terrorism/Haaretz
U.S. slams 'outrageous' Hamas condemnation of bin Laden killing/Haaretz
Carter calls on international community to support Hamas-Fatah unity deal/Haaretz
Al-Qaeda revenge is coming: Lebanese militant Omar Bakri/Daily Star
Hamas chief at reconciliation ceremony: Palestinians' only battle is against Israel
Lebanon: Wikileaks cables expose Hezbollah, Syria allies/Ya Libnan
Lebanon's PM-designate says Hezbollah 'tumor': leaks/AFP
SYRIA: Banias protesters wave bread in solidarity/LAT
Turkey Worries Syria's Refugee Influx Could Cause Crisis/VOA
Rights group: Syria arrested 1000 since Saturday/AP
Syria charges hundreds with "degrading the state"/Reuters
FACTBOX-Key political risks to watch in Lebanon/Reuters


US: Syrian actions in Daraa 'barbaric'
State Department describes as barbaric Syria's use of tanks, arbitrary arrests, cuts in power in city of Daraa, where anti-government protests are held 
Reuters Published: 05.04.11, 00:03 / Israel News /The US State Department on Tuesday described as barbaric Syria's reported use of tanks, arbitrary arrests and cuts in power and communications in the city of Daraa, where anti-government protests erupted six weeks ago. Syrian President Bashar Assad, whose family has ruled the country 41 years, is pursuing a violent crackdown to quash six weeks of protests that began with demands for greater freedoms but now seek his overthrow. Last week Assad sent tanks and soldiers into the southern city of Daraa, where the uprising broke out on March 18. Syrian rights groups say more than 560 civilians have been killed by security forces since the start of the unrest. "We are very disturbed about recent reports, credible reports, of a Syrian military operation in Daraa that includes the use of tanks," State Department spokesman Mark Toner told reporters at his daily briefing. The spokesman said the US had also seen reports of Syria carrying out "a widespread campaign of arbitrary arrests that target young men in Daraa" and that the government had cut off electricity, communications and other public services. "These are, quite frankly, barbaric measures and they amount to the collective punishment of innocent civilians," Toner said, describing the humanitarian situation in Daraa as "quite grave."

Will bin Laden killing pave way for similar moves by Israel?
By Amos Harel /Haaretz
At the height of the second intifada, until the middle of the last decade, Israel developed and enhanced a system of assassinations of terrorists which was euphemistically referred to as "pinpointed assassinations." Maj. Gen. Aharon Ze'evi (Farkash ) headed the IDF General Staff intelligence branch at that time. While the American assault force's operation against al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden was an operation on a much bigger scale than the Israeli actions and took place far from the borders of the United States, to a large extent it employed a similar format to that used previously by the Israel Defense Forces and the Shin Bet security service. Will the assassination of bin Laden at the hands of the United States pave the way for similar moves by Israel in the future, against [Hezbollah leader] Hassan Nasrallah or even [Iranian President Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad?
We must not forget that we are not a power. Not everything that is permitted to the Americans is permitted to us as well. But nevertheless, there is a gradual change in the rules of confrontation in the framework of the war on terror. A wider maneuvering space has been opened. Nassrallah understands that too. It is no coincidence that he so seldom leaves his bunker in recent years. Is there greater legitimacy today, for Israel also, to make moves against heads of terrorist organizations that refuse to hold any kind of negotiations?
In the past, the countries of the West were opposed to the Israeli claim that no distinction should be made between the so-called political echelon and the "military" echelon in the terrorist organizations. There is an important message in the Americans' decision to do away with bin Laden. It is not possible to distinguish between the leader and the operational echelon subordinate to him. The decision-makers have to be dealt a blow. Seven years ago, when we killed the senior Hamas officials such as Ahmed Yassin and Abdel Aziz Rantisi, our approach was not accepted by the international community.
In retrospect, did the Israeli policy of assassinations prove itself at all? Did it not merely provide encouragement for revenge attacks and the continuation of the cycle of bloodshed?
Since Israel unfortunately suffered more terrorist attacks, it became a kind of experimental laboratory for the front line in this struggle. The assassinations were an important tool. It can't be helped. These leaders don't like committing suicide. It's different than sending other people to carry out suicide missions for them. When they are being chased, they are less effective. The pinpointed assassinations are still a very important deterrent tool against senior leaders of the terrorist organizations. It is true that every terrorist leader can be replaced. Bin laden will also have a replacement. What is important is the continuum of assassinations that is directed at the heads of the organization and indicates to them that they too have something to lose.
The immediate question that a lot of Israelis asked themselves, following the reports of the American success, was: Why do we not succeed in locating Gilad Shalit who is not hidden at the other end of the world but just a few kilometers from our border?
Organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah have successfully learned our strengths and weak points. They understand what precautions must be taken in order to safeguard an asset like an abducted Israeli. I think that Israel shares the same determination to bring Gilad back home that the Americans demonstrated in striking bin Laden.
Here too we must find the right combination of circumstances - precise intelligence information, the ability to organize an operation within a few hours while the target is "hot," a reasonable ratio between the chances of success and the risk that there will be losses - we still remember the failed attempt to rescue [kidnapped soldier] Nahshon Waxman - and the possibility of avoiding excessive collateral damage. To my regret, this is a combination that occurs very rarely.
I don't agree with the claim that the Shalit affair is a resounding failure on the part of intelligence. If you had asked me about the American efforts to hit at bin Laden a month ago, what would we have said? We would certainly have described them as terrible schlemiels. I can safely say that tremendous efforts are being made and that it is possible that the right timing will enable such an operation to be carried it out in the future. Israel has excellent intelligence capability but things have to fall together. One cannot carry out a rescue operation at any price. If they had told President Obama that there was a great risk that the entire American force would be harmed, he would not have sent the troops to kill bin Laden this week.
Everyone is praising the Americans for their intelligence work in this operation. What does it actually mean?
We must give credit to the American intelligence agencies for their sustained effort. I know the significance of chasing a terrorist for years. The people who head the agencies change every few years. One needs a great deal of determination, perseverance, and a high level of organization in order to continue running an operation like this until it succeeds. In this era, there must be a combination of exact information, cooperation between the various intelligence arms and sometimes also with foreign services, and a very sharp capability on the part of the force that carries out the operation. Consider the ability shown here by the American forces: tremendous firing power, accuracy, self-confidence, the ability to hit those you have come to kill and to leave without a scratch. Zero casualties is not a result that is achieved by chance.
TV programs like "24" actually present these kinds of operations in a fairly realistic way. They are not science fiction. There is a never-ending puzzle of information that has to be collected and collated. Without a fusion of this information, the operation won't work. Even what appears to be the most minute bits of information have tremendous importance. We saw that in the media reports: The fact that the compound in which bin Laden was living did not have Internet activity increased the Americans' suspicions. Various kinds of intelligence gathering are in operation here: human intelligence, visual information gathering, and wiretapping and other signal intelligence. In the end, this combination of intelligence enables a warning to be issued to the fighter heading the force: "Don't go into the yard now, there is suspicious movement there."
By the way, I was somewhat surprised to see the presence of President Obama in the war room in real time, with the ability to watch on the screens what appeared to be the force in the field. As the head of the intelligence division, I didn't want leaders and senior officers to enter the war room of the unit that was instructing the advance guard. I also tried not to go there. The commanders don't need too many kibitzers giving them advice while the business is still going on. That could influence the effectiveness of the fighting force.

Netanyahu: Hamas-Fatah unity pact is a victory for terrorism
White House fumbles getting its Osama bin Laden story straight
DEBKAfile Special Report May 4, 2011, Two days after the US President Barack Obama's triumphal announcement that Osama bin Laden was dead, the White House was grappling with a serious credibility problem: Questions and contradictions are mounting about the how and why US elite SEALs killed the most wanted man in the world at his mansion in Abbottabad, Pakistan on May 2. New information proving the first stories wrong comes not just from a defensive Pakistan government but also from US officials.
Dismissing the conflicting disclosures as "artificial stories" and "conspiracy theories" won't wash – not just in the US but in Arab and Muslim countries after Washington was forced to retract data the president's adviser on terrorism John Brennan put before the media on Tuesday. It was admitted tardily that bin Laden was not armed when he was killed, there was no firefight in the Abbottabad villa and his wife was not used as a human shield.
Pakistani sources challenged other parts of the original narrative and Wednesday, May 4, the dead terrorist's daughter told Al Arabiya TV most damagingly that her father was captured alive and then shot by US forces.
Even before that, amid rising demands for evidence that Osama bin Laden was dead, White House spokesman Jay Carney confessed Tuesday night: "Even I'm getting confused."
And no wonder. Monday, in his first statement on the operation, Obama stated: "And finally, last week, I determined that we had enough intelligence to take action, and authorized an operation to get Osama bin Laden and bring him to justice." Was he talking about a targeted assassination?
Brennan later said that in the firefight in the terrorist's bedroom he had been asked to surrender and was shot dead when he did not answer. Another US spokesman said the SEALs were ready to take him alive.
Other US sources described the shooting as happening quickly - "in the blink of an eye," said one. The Republican leader Mitt Romney remarked: "Osama bin Laden took one in the eye."
His daughter's evidence contradicted this jumble of American versions. Even though she must have had a Pakistani green light for the Al Arabiya interview, her testimony cannot be lightly dismissed because she was present and shot in the leg before being taken into Pakistani custody. Her version makes it look as though US troops executed her father in cold blood.
The backlash from her testimony will not do much good to the delicate relations between the Obama administration and Muslim rulers like Saudi King Abdullah which are already tested to the limit over US involvement in the Egyptian uprising and Libyan war.
Pakistani leaders are caught awkwardly between an effort to clear their intelligence service ISI of American accusations of collusion in concealing the al Qaeda leader's presence in its midst, and domestic opinion, which is outraged by their government's suspected connivance with Washington to betray a Muslim figure and permit American forces to violate sovereign territory.
Reporters in Islamabad heard from the Pakistani foreign secretary Salman Bashir Wednesday, May 4: "We had indicated this complex (in Abbottabad) as far back as 2009 as a possible place," after sighting suspected terrorist movements on the property. It was not known at the time that bin Laden was hiding there and there were millions of other suspect locations, he said.
Bashir also hit out at former CIA Director Leon Panetta's comments that informing Islamabad in advance about the raid had been ruled out as "worrying."
These comments are just the start of the war of words building up between the Zardari-Ghilani government and the Obama administration. Islamabad has one major advantage: The inmates of the Abbottabad villa and the injured persons present when bin Laden was killed are in Pakistani custody, some in military hospitals. They can be produced whenever necessary to rebut Arab and Muslim criticism of Pakistan's conduct and fend off any attempts to undermine its ties with the Taliban, which has already vowed to avenge Osama bin Laden's death in Pakistan and Afghanistan and outside those countries. This verbal war will make further inroads on the Obama White House's credibility.

Netanyahu: Hamas-Fatah unity pact is a victory for terrorism
By Jack Khoury, Haaretz Service and News Agencies/Haaretz
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday condemned a new unity pact between the Hamas and Fatah Palestinian factions.
"What happened today in Cairo is a tremendous blow to peace and a great victory for terrorism," he told reporters during a visit to London.
Leaders of the warring Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas met in Cairo on Wednesday to sign a reconciliation agreement that ends four years of bitter strife. Israel has condemned the reconciliation, calling on Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to choose between peace with Israel or peace with Hamas, who "aspires to destroy Israel."
Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal said at Wednesday's ceremony that the Islamist group wanted the establishment of an independent, sovereign Palestinian state on land of the West Bank and Gaza Strip with Jerusalem as its capital.
"Hamas was ready to pay any price for internal Palestinian reconciliation," Meshaal continued. "The only battle of the Palestinians is against Israel."
"Our aim is to establish a free and completely sovereign Palestinian state on the West Bank and Gaza Strip, whose capital is Jerusalem, without any settlers and without giving up a single inch of land and without giving up on the right of return (of Palestinian refugees)," Meshaal said.
Abbas said in his opening address at the ceremony that the Palestinians were turning a "black page" on division between Hamas and Fatah.
"We announce the good news from Egypt which has always carried its national and historical responsibility towards the Palestinian people. Four black years have affected the interests of Palestinians. Now we meet to assert a unified will," he said.
"Israel is using the Palestinian reconciliation as an excuse to evade" a peace deal," Abbas added. "Israel must choose between peace and settlement."
The ceremony finally got underway in the afternoon after a last-minute row over foreign policy threatened to scupper the deal.
The row that threatened to hold up the Egypt-brokered agreement signing of the reconciliation deal began when Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas insisted on being the sole speaker at the event. Abbas apparently wanted to sit alone by the podium, to emphasize his status as president, despite the fact that Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal was supposed to speak directly following him.
The move reportedly illustrated his expectance to be the head of the interim unity government, which would allow him to control Palestinian foreign policy.
Fatah's foreign policy includes negotiating toward a peace agreement with Israel, something which Hamas opposes.
Officials from all the Palestinian factions had earlier signed the deal that Meshaal and Abbas endorsed at the ceremony.
In a symbolic step before the ceremony on Wednesday, Hamas allowed Fatah-controlled Palestine TV to broadcast from Gaza for the first time since the 2007 takeover. The station's Gaza correspondent, Adel Zaanoun, discussed the excitement that Gazans felt about unity and invited Ismail Radwan, a Hamas leader, onto the program.
"Today we end a dark chapter in our recent history," Radwan said. "It's time now to work together ... With the support of our people and the Arab brothers, we will make this agreement work." Also for the first time, Hamas permitted residents to wave yellow Fatah banners along with the green Hamas flags. Fatah displays had been banned by Hamas police in the past.

Hamas chief at reconciliation ceremony: Palestinians' only battle is against Israel
By Jack Khoury, Avi Issacharoff and News Agencies /Haaretz
The leaders of warring Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas met in Cairo on Wednesday to sign a reconciliation agreement that ends four years of bitter strife.
Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal said at the ceremony that the Islamist group wanted the establishment of an independent, sovereign Palestinian state on land of the West Bank and Gaza Strip with Jerusalem as its capital.
"Hamas was ready to pay any price for internal Palestinian reconciliation," Meshaal continued. "The only battle of the Palestinians is against Israel."
"Our aim is to establish a free and completely sovereign Palestinian state on the West Bank and Gaza Strip, whose capital is Jerusalem, without any settlers and without giving up a single inch of land and without giving up on the right of return (of Palestinian refugees)," Meshaal said.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said in his opening address at the ceremony that the Palestinians were turning a "black page" on division between Hamas and Fatah.
"We announce the good news from Egypt which has always carried its national and historical responsibility towards the Palestinian people. Four black years have affected the interests of Palestinians. Now we meet to assert a unified will," he said.
"Israel is using the Palestinian reconciliation as an excuse to evade" a peace deal," Abbas added. "Israel must choose between peace and settlement."
The ceremony finally got underway in the afternoon after a last-minute row over foreign policy threatened to scupper the deal.
The row that threatened to hold up the Egypt-brokered agreement signing of the reconciliation deal began when Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas insisted on being the sole speaker at the event. Abbas apparently wanted to sit alone by the podium, to emphasize his status as president, despite the fact that Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal was supposed to speak directly following him.
The move reportedly illustrated his expectance to be the head of the interim unity government, which would allow him to control Palestinian foreign policy.
Fatah's foreign policy includes negotiating toward a peace agreement with Israel, something which Hamas opposes.
The leaders of the Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas arrived in Cairo on Wednesday to sign a reconciliation agreement to end four years of bitter in fighting sparked by Hamas' bloody takeover of the Gaza Strip in June 2007.
Fatah leader Abbas and Hamas' Meshal were to sign the agreement in the presence of representatives of Egypt's Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, Egypt's governing body since the January revolution in that country. Egypt is considered the patron of the reconciliation process and the agreement.
Officials from all the Palestinian factions had earlier signed the deal that Meshaal and Abbas were expected to endorse at the ceremony.
In a symbolic step before the ceremony on Wednesday, Hamas allowed Fatah-controlled Palestine TV to broadcast from Gaza for the first time since the 2007 takeover. The station's Gaza correspondent, Adel Zaanoun, discussed the excitement that Gazans felt about unity and invited Ismail Radwan, a Hamas leader, onto the program.
"Today we end a dark chapter in our recent history," Radwan said. "It's time now to work together ... With the support of our people and the Arab brothers, we will make this agreement work."
Also for the first time, Hamas permitted residents to wave yellow Fatah banners along with the green Hamas flags. Fatah displays had been banned by Hamas police in the past.

U.S. slams 'outrageous' Hamas condemnation of bin Laden killing
By Natasha Mozgovaya/Haaretz
Tags: Israel news Osama bin Laden Hamas
U.S. State Department Deputy Spokesman Mark Toner slammed comments on Monday made by a Hamas leader who criticized the U.S. for killing 'holy warrior' Osama bin Laden.
Ismael Haniyeh, head of the Hamas administration in the Gaza Strip, said in response to the U.S. operation against bin Laden "we regard this as a continuation of the American policy based on oppression and the shedding of Muslim and Arab blood." Toner said Haniyeh's comments were "outrageous." "It goes without saying bin Laden was a murderer and a terrorist. He ordered the killings of thousands of innocent men, women and children, and many of whom were Muslim," Toner said. Though he noted doctrinal differences between bin Laden's al-Qaida and Hamas, Haniyeh said: "We condemn the assassination and the killing of an Arab holy warrior. We ask God to offer him mercy with the true believers and the martyrs."
Toner said of bin Laden that "did not die a martyr. He died hiding in a mansion or a compound far away from the violence that was carried out in his name. And his defeat is a victory for all human beings seeking to live in peace, security and dignity." Toner also talked about the planned Hamas-Fatah reconciliation deal which is set to be signed in Cairo on Wednesday.
Representatives from Hamas and Fatah announced their intention to reconcile last week, after a four-year-long bitter and at times violent rift, which saw Hamas administering the Gaza Strip and the West Bank under the control of the Fatah dominated Palestinian Authority. "Our long-stated policy on this is that if Hamas wants to play a political role or a role in the political process, then it needs to abide by the Quartet principles," Toner said. "It needs to accept those principles, which are renouncing violence and terrorism, recognizing Israel's right to exist and abiding by previous diplomatic agreements

Al-Qaeda revenge is coming: Lebanese militant Omar Bakri
By Dana Khraiche The Daily Star
The grand operation, “bin Laden’s incursion,” would strike at the heart of the Western world, Bakri told The Daily Star.
BEIRUT: Lebanese militant Muslim preacher Omar Bakri warned Wednesday of massive retaliation by al-Qaeda in response to the killing of its leader, Osama bin Laden, an attack “worthy of this martyr.”
The grand operation, “bin Laden’s incursion,” would strike at the heart of the Western world, the sheikh told The Daily Star online in a telephone interview.
“Our information confirms that the response will be named ‘bin Laden’s incursion.’ Usually al-Qaeda responds to the death of one of its leaders with an operation named after him … an operation that would be worthy of this martyr,” Bakri said, adding that such a “cold-blooded assassination” would not go unpunished.
U.S. President Barack Obama announced Monday that bin Laden had been tracked down and killed Sunday in Pakistan. Reports also claim that Bin Laden had been unarmed during the operation by U.S. Navy SEALS and that his body was later buried at sea.
Bakri, who denies links with al-Qaeda but once praised the Sept. 11 attacks as “magnificent,” said that the expected retaliation would be carried out in countries such as the United States, France and Britain, while ruling out any attacks in Arab countries.
“I doubt that [anything will happen in Arab countries] because they had the chance to attack foreign embassies [but they didn’t] … Bin Laden urged his followers not to carry out such attacks so that Arab leaders would not take fighting terrorism as an excuse to attack revolutionaries,” Bakri said.
For Bakri, the fact that bin Laden was unarmed during the attack is considered an assassination and a violation of the sanctity of Muslims.
“This is considered a cold-blooded murder for a helpless man, especially that he was killed in the presence of his wife and children in bed,” Bakri said, adding that bin Laden now has been named “the martyr of the sea and land because he was killed on land and thrown in the sea.”
“The move by American forces to transport him from land to sea and bury him underwater is one of the manifestations of U.S. hegemony, and an offense to Muslims and a declaration of war against God, his profit and Muslims,” Bakri said.
Only under special circumstance are Muslims allowed to be buried at sea, Bakri said, conditions which the American forces had not met.
“Islam allows burying the body of a Muslim at sea. But only on condition there is some obstacle preventing the burial taking place on land,” he said, adding that “underwater burial necessitates a special prayer, wrapping the body in cloth and placing heavy rocks on the corpse to ensure the body reaches the bottom of the sea.”
The assassination of bin Laden, the reports that he had been buried at sea and the broadcasting of Americans “gloating” over the death of the Al-Qaeda leader would spur al-Qaeda followers and bin Laden loyalists into action, the Muslim preacher said.
“[This] is added to the list of incentives that al-Qaeda and other mujahidin movements on which they base their actions to wage war against Western countries,” Bakri said.
Bakri is a controversial preacher with joint Lebanese-Syrian nationality. He spent 20 years preaching in Britain following involvement with Syria’s Muslim Brotherhood and Hizb Ut-Tahrir in Lebanon.
He shot to notoriety following the September 11 attacks in the United States, praising the perpetrators as the “magnificent 19.” He returned to Lebanon after being barred by the UK government of traveling to London.
Bakri has two wives – one British and one Lebanese – and eight children.

Syria charges hundreds with "maligning the state"
May 04, 2011/ Khaled Yacoub Oweis Reuters
AMMAN: Hundreds of Syrians have been charged with "maligning the prestige of the state", a Syrian rights group said, in President Bashar al-Assad's drive to crush pro-democracy protests against his 11-year autocratic rule.
The charge, which carries a three-year prison sentence, was lodged on Tuesday against hundreds of people detained this week before the Muslim day of prayer on Friday, when the largest demonstrations calling for Assad's overthrow are typically seen. "Mass arrests are continuing across Syria in another violation of human rights and international conventions," said Rami Abdelrahman of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. The campaign intensified after a tank-backed army unit, led by Assad's brother Maher, last week shelled and machinegunned into submission the old quarter of Deraa, cradle of the six-week-old uprising. Assad said the army would end its mission in Deraa "very soon", according to the semi-official al-Watan newspaper, playing down the uprising there and the army's response, which Washington has condemned as "barbaric".
"Any country in the world could be subjected to events that Deraa has been subjected to," Assad was quoted as saying by the newspaper on Wednesday during a meeting with officials from Deir al-Zor and Albou Kamal near the Iraqi border. Authorities blame armed groups and infiltrators for stoking unrest and firing on civilians and security forces. A military official on state news agency SANA said security forces arrested members of an armed terrorist group in Deraa and found weapons and ammunition hidden underground and in gardens.
Wissam Tarif, executive director of the Insan human rights group, said 2,843 detainees had been verified by family members and the actual number could be as high as 8,000. More than 800 of them had been taken from Deraa.
Those detained across the country include activists, community leaders, people seen taking videos or pictures on mobile phones and people suspected of uploading videos on the Internet, Tarif said. But security forces were also randomly detaining people in Deraa and Douma, he said.
The demonstrations began with demands for political freedom and an end to corruption, but after a heavy security crackdown, protesters now want Assad to leave.
Assad belongs to the minority Alawite Shi'ite sect whose family has ruled majority Sunni Muslim Syria for 41 years.
Security forces have killed at least 560 civilians in attacks on demonstrators since the protests erupted in Deraa on March 18, human rights groups say.
Amnesty International said protesters told the rights group they had been beaten with sticks and cables and were subjected to harsh conditions, including a lack of food.
"The use of unwarranted lethal force, arbitrary detention and torture appear to be the desperate actions of a government that is intolerant of dissent and must be halted immediately," Amnesty official Philip Luther said.
Residents of Damascus suburbs, where many were arrested, said roadblocks and arrests had intensified this week in areas around the capital. One resident said she saw security forces in plain clothes putting up sandbags and a machinegun on a road near the town of Kfar Batna on Tuesday. A government official from a neighbouring Arab state said the security campaign seemed intended to prevent protests after Friday prayers, the only time Syrians are allowed to gather though security forces prevented thousands from praying in mosques last Friday. At least six people were arrested on Tuesday after security forces took control of the coastal city of Banias, another urban centre where demonstrators are challenging Assad.
Protest leader Anas al-Shughri said the army had sealed the northern entrance and security forces sealed the south.
But around 1,000 protesters marched in the Sunni district of Banias, just south of the main market, carrying loaves of bread to symbolise solidarity with the people of Deraa, a rights campaigner who provided photos of the demonstration, said. Some 1,000 students demonstrated in the University of Aleppo on Tuesday and thousands marched in the eastern, mostly Kurdish, city of Qamishli, carrying candles and chanting freedom slogans.International condemnation of the repression has intensified since the Deraa assault, which revived memories of the 1982 crushing of an armed Islamist uprising in the city of Hama by Assad's father, late President Hafez al-Assad. Germany and Britain said they were seeking the imposition of European Union sanctions against Syrian leaders -- after a U.S. announcement of sanctions last week -- and France said Assad should be among the targets of sanctions.
In a sign Syria was worried about a loss of confidence in the pound, which has seen some conversion to U.S. dollars, the central bank said it would raise interest rates on deposits by 2 percent and halved banks' reserve requirements to 5 percent.

Lebanese woman repatriated from Israel: ICRC
May 04, 2011/The Daily Star BEIRUT:
A 22-year-old Lebanese woman and the remains of another civilian were repatriated from Israel to Lebanon Wednesday, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said in a statement. The hand-over took place in Ras al-Naqoura on the Israeli-Lebanese border in the presence of the ICRC, the statement said. At the same time, the corpse of a Lebanese civilian who died in Israel was repatriated in order to be buried at home, the statement said, adding that the ICRC had carried out the handover as a neutral intermediary between Lebanon and Israel. “Our role is strictly humanitarian and part of our ongoing work to restore and maintain contact between people detained or separated in connection with armed conflict and their families,” said Georges Comninos, head of the ICRC delegation in Lebanon. “The ICRC is acting in its capacity as a neutral intermediary at the request of the Israeli and Lebanese authorities and with the full consent of all parties concerned.” In 2010, the ICRC repatriated six Lebanese civilians and the mortal remains of six others from Israel to Lebanon. The ICRC has been permanently present in Lebanon since 1967.

A killing, and questions about U.S.-Pakistan collaboration
By David Ignatius The Daily Star
The assault on Osama bin Laden – as quick and ruthless an operation as you would see in any spy movie – shows that the CIA and the military’s super-secret Joint Special Operations Command have combined to create what amounts to a highly effective killing machine. The shorthand for these operations is “find, fix, finish.” The CIA and other intelligence agencies typically provide the first two, and the bin Laden attack shows that this process can take years of patient detective work. JSOC warriors then come in for the finish.
A reconstruction of how this operation was put together shows how the pieces of America’s counter-terrorism policy fit together. It also illuminates one of the CIA’s biggest puzzles, which is whether it can work effectively with Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence directorate. The answer seems to be “sometimes.”
The trail that led to bin Laden’s hideout in the town of Abbottabad, about 120 kilometers north of Islamabad, began between 2002 and 2004 with the CIA’s interrogation of Al-Qaeda “high-value targets” at secret CIA sites overseas. Several detainees mentioned the “nom de guerre,” or nickname, of one of bin Laden’s couriers.
Some of the detainees who confirmed the courier’s nickname were subjected to “enhanced interrogation techniques,” the CIA’s formal name for what is now widely viewed as torture. This adds a moral ambiguity to a story that is otherwise one of triumphal retribution and justice.
The CIA spent years trying to figure out the courier’s identity. Using sources that U.S. officials won’t discuss, the agency finally discovered the courier’s real name in 2007, along with the important fact that he had a brother. In early 2009, a team from the agency’s counterterrorism center traced him to a compound in Abbottabad that he shared with the brother.
Pakistan was told little about the bin Laden manhunt, for fear that the information would leak. But a U.S. official said the Pakistanis offered some help. “They provided information that helped us identify where one of the brothers might be located,” this official said. He added: “They didn’t tell us he was in Abbottabad, but their information allowed us to track him there.”
Now the agency had a suspect location but no firm idea bin Laden was there. Surveillance confirmed that this was an unusual compound. The surrounding walls were up to 18 feet high, and even the balconies had seven-foot walls. And the compound maintained unusual security: It had no telephone or Internet service, and trash was regularly burned.
As the CIA continued its surveillance, analysts concluded that another family was secretly living in the compound, along with the two brothers. The number of family members and other details matched bin Laden’s likely family group. This crucial “circumstantial” evidence was briefed to President Barack Obama last August, says a U.S. official.
This year, JSOC began preparing the “finish” operation, using members of Seal Team 6, its most elite counter-terrorism unit. Obama was given a choice between bombing the compound or staging the raid. He opted for the latter, believing the U.S. needed to capture bin Laden’s body.
One of the mysteries is whether the Pakistani government knew all along who was hiding in Abbottabad. It is hardly remote territory: A Pakistani military college is two miles away. A senior U.S. official says the CIA has examined this question but has “zero evidence” of Pakistani government knowledge of bin Laden’s location. That’s not quite the same as saying for certain that the Pakistanis didn’t know, and it allows the ISI and CIA to continue working as sometime partners.
CIA Director Leon Panetta, who directed the operation, told Pakistan nothing until the helicopters had left Abbottabad to return to Afghanistan. But U.S. officials describe the subsequent Pakistani reaction as helpful. Pakistani officials urged Obama to make his unusual late-night announcement so the Pakistani public would immediately know the U.S. had attacked bin Laden, not a Pakistani target. And Islamabad promised to try to mitigate Pakistani popular anger, which officials did by issuing a supportive statement Monday.
Does bin Laden’s demise mean the death of Al-Qaeda? CIA analysts won’t go that far. But they have concluded that the operation “will accelerate its demise,” and that the battered organization is now at a “tipping point” that could lead to collapse.
The hidden trophy of Sunday’s raid: The JSOC team captured intelligence materials from the compound that might reveal the location of Ayman al-Zawahiri, the organization’s new commander. “That’s where we’re going next,” says one U.S. official involved in planning the operation.
**Syndicated columnist David Ignatius is published twice weekly by THE DAILY STAR.

Pakistan did its part
By Asif Ali Zardari,
Published: May 2
Pakistan, perhaps the world’s greatest victim of terrorism, joins the other targets of al-Qaeda — the people of the United States, Britain, Spain, Indonesia, Afghanistan, Turkey, Yemen, Kenya, Tanzania, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Algeria — in our satisfaction that the source of the greatest evil of the new millennium has been silenced, and his victims given justice. He was not anywhere we had anticipated he would be, but now he is gone.
Although the events of Sunday were not a joint operation, a decade of cooperation and partnership between the United States and Pakistan led up to the elimination of Osama bin Laden as a continuing threat to the civilized world. And we in Pakistan take some satisfaction that our early assistance in identifying an al-Qaeda courier ultimately led to this day.
Let us be frank. Pakistan has paid an enormous price for its stand against terrorism. More of our soldiers have died than all of NATO’s casualties combined. Two thousand police officers, as many as 30,000 innocent civilians and a generation of social progress for our people have been lost. And for me, justice against bin Laden was not just political; it was also personal, as the terrorists murdered our greatest leader, the mother of my children. Twice he tried to assassinate my wife. In 1989 he poured $50 million into a no-confidence vote to topple her first government. She said that she was bin Laden’s worst nightmare — a democratically elected, progressive, moderate, pluralistic female leader. She was right, and she paid for it with her life.
Some in the U.S. press have suggested that Pakistan lacked vitality in its pursuit of terrorism, or worse yet that we were disingenuous and actually protected the terrorists we claimed to be pursuing. Such baseless speculation may make exciting cable news, but it doesn’t reflect fact. Pakistan had as much reason to despise al-Qaeda as any nation. The war on terrorism is as much Pakistan’s war as as it is America’s. And though it may have started with bin Laden, the forces of modernity and moderation remain under serious threat.
My government endorses the words of President Obama and appreciates the credit he gave us Sunday night for the successful operation in Khyber Pakhtunkhawa. We also applaud and endorse the words of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton that we must “press forward, bolstering our partnerships, strengthening our networks, investing in a positive vision of peace and progress, and relentlessly pursuing the murderers who target innocent people.” We have not yet won this war, but we now clearly can see the beginning of the end, and the kind of South and Central Asia that lies in our future.
Only hours after bin Laden’s death, the Taliban reacted by blaming the government of Pakistan and calling for retribution against its leaders, and specifically against me as the nation’s president. We will not be intimidated. Pakistan has never been and never will be the hotbed of fanaticism that is often described by the media.
Radical religious parties have never received more than 11 percent of the vote. Recent polls showed that 85 percent of our people are strongly opposed to al-Qaeda. In 2009, when the Taliban briefly took over the Swat Valley, it demonstrated to the people of Pakistan what our future would look like under its rule — repressive politics, religious fanaticism, bigotry and discrimination against girls and women, closing of schools and burning of books. Those few months did more to unite the people of Pakistan around our moderate vision of the future than anything else possibly could.
A freely elected democratic government, with the support and mandate of the people, working with democracies all over the world, is determined to build a viable, economic prosperous Pakistan that is a model to the entire Islamic world on what can be accomplished in giving hope to our people and opportunity to our children. We can become everything that al-Qaeda and the Taliban most fear — a vision of a modern Islamic future. Our people, our government, our military, our intelligence agencies are very much united. Some abroad insist that this is not the case, but they are wrong. Pakistanis are united.
Together, our nations have suffered and sacrificed. We have fought bravely and with passion and commitment. Ultimately we will prevail. For, in the words of my martyred wife Benazir Bhutto, “truth, justice and the forces of history are on our side.”
**The writer is the president of Pakistan.

NDP's gang of rookies includes 4 McGill students, 19-year-old, Vegas visitor
MONTREAL - The sudden, startling rise of the NDP was best summed up in Tuesday's headline on the website of McGill University's daily newspaper: Four McGill Students Elected to Parliament.Another university student, a 19-year-old from Sherbrooke, Que., was not only voting in his first election but also became the youngest person ever elected to Canada's Parliament. The motley crew of victorious underdogs includes two newly elected MPs, running in largely French-speaking ridings, who have been accused of barely speaking the language. One, who works far away at a pub in Ottawa, spent a week vacationing in Las Vegas during the campaign.
Many admitted to having low expectations when the writ was dropped.
Yet they were among dozens of unlikely Quebec NDP candidates who won Monday as the party's caucus in the province skyrocketed to 58 from one. Many will bring impressive backgrounds into Parliament.
Among the newcomers are a former diplomat, a prominent Cree leader and an ex-Liberal MP once considered a shoo-in for a cabinet post.
Pierre-Luc Dusseault, a 19-year-old student of applied politics at the Universite de Sherbrooke, now becomes the youngest member of Parliament in Canadian history, according to the House of Commons website.
He surpasses Claude-Andre Lachance, a Trudeau Liberal who was elected at age 20 in 1974.
Dusseault, who will earn the basic MP's salary of $157,731, used his Facebook page to thank voters for expressing confidence in him.
"We worked very hard to win," he said. "I'm obviously very proud of my own win."
On Monday night, he told a local radio station the victory was the result of the "fruit of the NDP's efforts throughout the campaign."
"People wanted change, including in Sherbrooke, and that's what happened tonight," Dusseault said
The McGill Daily reported Tuesday that four McGill University students also won for the NDP on Monday night.
Tyrone Benskin, another surprise NDP winner, said he was asked all night Monday about the impact of so many fresh faces in the House of Commons.
"Yes, there are newcomers, there are always newcomers to any party," said Benskin, a veteran actor, director and musician.
"All these people are very good at what they did in their private lives and they're bringing that experience."
In Toronto on Tuesday, NDP Leader Jack Layton was peppered with media questions about his inexperienced team.
"Yes, we have some young people," he replied. "But you know young people got involved in this election in an unprecedented way. I think it was very exciting.
"And the fact that some of these young people have now been chosen . . . I think we should see that as something to celebrate — not something to criticize."
Benskin himself was singled out during the campaign by outgoing Bloc Quebecois Leader Gilles Duceppe for not being at ease in French.
The 52-year-old will be joined in Ottawa by Ruth Ellen Brosseau, perhaps the most improbable newly elected member of the NDP.
Brosseau, an assistant manager at a university pub in Ottawa, won a central Quebec riding that is 98 per cent francophone even though the party has acknowledged she has difficulties in French, spent a week in Vegas during the campaign and never spoke to the media.
The NDP said Brosseau, who returned from Vegas last week, wasn't in the riding on election day and wouldn't immediately be available for interviews.
Brosseau won with a very healthy 6,000 majority.
Benskin said the NDP's young MPs, like Brosseau, will receive whatever guidance they need.
"As a newly elected member of Parliament she'll get the support and she'll get the mentorship to perform her duties," he said as he sipped a bottle of beer at the party's boisterous rally in Montreal after the election.
"It's something that we're aware of and something that we have a plan to address."
The NDP Quebec caucus will also feature Romeo Saganash, former deputy grand chief of the Grand Council of the Crees; Francoise Boivin, an ex-Liberal MP; and Helene Laverdiere, who was posted for the Department of Foreign Affairs in Washington, Senegal and Chile.
Laverdiere earned some of the loudest cheers at the NDP rally when TV screens flashed that she had knocked off Duceppe in Montreal's Laurier-Sainte-Marie.
She seemed stunned to have pulled off the upset, but admitted she had an inkling it could happen.
"A month ago it was a dream," she said.
"(Then), a few weeks ago seeing how people were listening to what we had to say, we started to think, 'Well, maybe the dream will come true.' "
Other new faces, like MP-elect Alexandre Boulerice of Rosemont-La-Petite-Patrie, still can't believe what happened.
"Am I surprised? Of course," said the elated father of four shortly after beating Bloc incumbent Bernard Bigras.
"This is not a wave, this is a tsunami — a political earthquake."
Boulerice, a communications adviser for the Quebec division of the Canadian Union of Public Employees, lost to Bigras by more than 17,000 votes in the 2008 election.
This campaign started off much the same way as 2008 for him, as people told him on the street he was a nice guy who would never win.
That was until Easter weekend, when families talked politics, he said.
In the last two weeks of the campaign, he was flooded with emails from supporters asking how they could help, where they could get a sign for their balcony and how they could get themselves an NDP button.
The buttons disappeared so fast that Boulerice didn't even have one to wear for election night.
"Because every time we had a button on, people were asking, "Can I have it?' " Boulerice said.
"So (there's) a back order on buttons."
But he insists the NDP's new team from Quebec will be ready to hit the Hill.
"But maybe not tomorrow (Tuesday), maybe Wednesday," he said, shouting over the ear-splitting rumble of music and cheers.
"For the moment, we celebrate."

Afghan official says Pakistan must have been aware bin Laden was living in military town
Canadian Press/KABUL - The Afghan government said Wednesday that Pakistan must have known Osama bin Laden was living in a military garrison town near the capital, echoing international suspicions about Islamabad in the aftermath of the deadly strike against al-Qaida's chief.
The two countries have long had tense relations, especially over the issue of Pakistan failing to target Taliban militants using its territory as sanctuary to launch cross-border attacks against Afghan and international forces.
"Not only Pakistan, with its strong intelligence service, but even a very weak government with a weak intelligence service would have known who was living in that house in such a location," said Defence Ministry spokesman Gen. Mohammad Zahir Azimi.
The house where bin Laden lived in the town of Abbottabad was close to the gate of the Kakul Military Academy, an army run institution where top Pakistani officers train, Azimi said, adding that many neighbouring houses are home to military officials.
"There are lots of questions that need answers," Azimi said.
Others have made similar remarks.
Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron said Tuesday that bin Laden must have had an extensive support network in Pakistan in the years before his death. And White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters that the U.S. is committed to co-operating with Pakistan despite questions about who in the Islamabad government may have known bin Laden was in hiding in the compound in Abbottabad.
Afghan officials have long said that the real war against terrorism is not in Afghanistan, but across the border in Pakistan. And while they have welcomed international troops who are fighting back the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan, they have also criticized these forces for backing a Pakistani government that Afghan officials say is double-dealing.
Azimi went on to say that Afghanistan is bracing for revenge attacks following the bin Laden strike, but expects that the al-Qaida leader's death will eventually make it easier to defeat the Taliban. The nearly 10-year war in Afghanistan started as a manhunt for bin Laden in 2001. Many inside Afghanistan and in foreign countries fighting the war have raised questions about whether his death will shorten or ease the battle with the Taliban insurgency, but the U.S. and others pledged there wouldn't be a rapid withdrawal.
On the day that bin Laden's death was announced, Afghan President Hamid Karzai called it a blow to terrorism but made no predictions about how it would affect the war in his country.
Azimi, for his part, predicted al-Qaida revenge attacks in the immediate aftermath of the terror chief's death.
"The first phase will be for a short period of time, a revenge phase in order show that even if he is gone, others are keeping the network together," he said, adding that Afghan security forces have already increased their presence in key areas and their readiness in anticipation of such attacks.
"Then slowly the situation will become more normal and that will start to show how Osama's absence effects the structure of the network," Azimi said.
International forces say a persistent campaign against insurgents over the summer has driven them out of their traditional strongholds and destroyed the weapons caches they depend on to mount their seasonal spring offensive.
The Taliban, however, have started the spring fighting season with high-profile attacks apparently designed to show their strength and their ability to infiltrate the government. In April, the insurgent group launched deadly attacks from within the Defence Ministry in Kabul, the main police headquarters in southern Kandahar city and a joint U.S.-Afghan base in the east. The militants also managed to break more than 480 of their compatriots out of the Kandahar city prison with an elaborate tunnel escape.
On Wednesday, U.S. officials confirmed that two rockets had struck inside Bagram Air Field — the main U.S. base in Afghanistan — the night before.
The strikes resulted in only "a couple very minor injuries," said Lt. Col. Patrick Seiber, a spokesman for U.S. forces in the east. He also noted that rockets hit inside Bagram about once every two or three weeks. But the strike are a reminder that violence continues unabated in Afghanistan despite the removal of bin Laden.
Separately Wednesday, NATO forces rejected accusations that they had killed a private security guard under contract to protect a road travelled by their supply convoys. The international military coalition said that the man who was killed was not working for a security company and was a militant involved in setting up an ambush.
Afghan police and the man's alleged employer — Watan Risk Management — have maintained that it was a Watan guard who was killed while trying to protect the road.

CIA chief believes Gadhafi survived NATO strike on his house, though unseen in public
ِThe Associated Press | The Canadian Press
TRIPOLI, Libya - The CIA director said he believes Moammar Gadhafi survived a NATO airstrike that reduced much of the Libyan leader's family compound to rubble.
Gadhafi has not been seen in public since Saturday's attack, which Libyan officials said killed one of his sons and three grandchildren. Gadhafi was in the building, but survived, Libyan officials have said, providing no details.Asked about Gadhafi's fate since the air strike, CIA director Leon Panetta told the U.S. TV network NBC on Tuesday that "the best intelligence we have is that he's still alive." Libya's deputy foreign minister, Khaled Kaim, said Gadhafi met with tribal leaders on Tuesday. Gadhafi, Libya's ruler for 42 years, has appeared in public only infrequently since an armed uprising against him erupted in February. Kaim, meanwhile, refused to praise or condemn the U.S. action that killed terror mastermind Osama bin Laden earlier this week in a hideout in Pakistan. The Libyan official would only say that his country has long fought against bin Laden's al-Qaida terror network. In a news conference late Tuesday, Kaim also confirmed that the Gadhafi regime is trying to block access by sea to the besieged port city of Misrata — the rebels' bridgehead in western Libya, which remains largely under Gadhafi's control. "There was an announcement from the Libyan government, the ministry of transportation, that Misrata port is closed and that any foreign ship or vessel would be targeted by the Libyan armed forces," Kaim said when asked about attempts by the regime on Friday to lay anti-ship mines along the access route to Misrata's port. Two of the mines were destroyed, but a third floated away, and NATO vessels have been searching for it. The attempted mining has disrupted the delivery of desperately needed supplies to Misrata, a city of 300,000 that has been under siege by Gadhafi's forces for more than two months. On Wednesday, the International Organization for Migration said one of its aid ships has received permission to dock at Misrata after days of waiting. IOM spokesman Jumbe Omari Jumbe said the Red Star One was being guided into the port by a tugboat to avoid hitting possible sea mines. Jumbe said the ship is meant to deliver basic supplies and evacuate some 1,000 migrants and wounded civilians from the city. Two seriously ill civilians died earlier this week while IOM was waiting for permission from NATO and Libyan authorities to dock the ship in Misrata.
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