LCCC ENGLISH NEWS BULLETIN
August 27/2006

Latest New from miscellaneous sources for August 27/06
Members defect from UK's Labour due to Lebanon war-Jerusalem Post - Israel
Government control over Lebanon has weakened, Siniora says-CBC New Brunswick, Canada 
Erdogan Discusses Troop Deployment with Siniora and Annan-Zaman Online
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation trolling or polling for removing Hezbollah from the Terror list-Canada Free Press - Canada
Syria Denies Cutting Power Supplies to Lebanon-Naharnet
Annan in Beirut Monday for Talks About UN Force, Measures-Naharnet
Israel won't lift Lebanon embargo-Jerusalem Post - Israel
At Funeral, a Sunni Village Condemns Hezbollah-New York Times
EU ends impasse on Lebanon force-Financial Times
EU hopes for further Iran dialogue-Financial Times
Family of American contractors beheaded in Iraq suing Syria-Raw Story
Analysis: Too early for Israel-Syria talks-United Press International - USA
Russia denies Hezbollah arms link-BBC News - UK
Government control over Lebanon has weakened, Siniora says-CBC New Brunswick
In Lebanon's Rubble, Aftershocks of War-Washington Post 
Postwar Israel, Olmert Loses Support-Washington Post 
Eu troops to arrive as soon as possible in Lebanon-Euronews.net
Did Syria cut power to blackmail Lebanon ?Ya Libnan
Analysis: Breaking the Syria-Iran alliance-BBC News - UK
Yossi Beilin on Facing the Challenge-Executive Intelligence Review (EIR)

Hezbollah, Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Terrorists, Polls
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation trolling or polling for removing Hezbollah from terrorist list?
By Judi McLeod
Saturday, August 26, 2006
It seems that the last chapter has yet to be written on Liberal deputy foreign affairs critic Borys Wrzesnewskyj, who resigned last week in the public heat over his controversial statement on Hezbollah. Wrzesnewskyj said that Canada should negotiate directly with Lebanon's Hezbollah, which is on Canada's list of terrorist organizations.
Condemnation for Wrzenewskyj, who made the statement during a self-styled visit by opposition MPs to Lebanon last week, included his own party. Indeed, all 10 Liberal leadership candidates condemned the remarks, including Wrzesnewskyj's preferred candidate Gerard Kennedy.
Wrzesnewskyj, himself the pit of election campaign anti-Semitism when his election signs were defaced by Swastikas, devil's horns and a Hitler moustache, seems to have learned very little about what he then described as the"ugly side to politics".
His siding with Hezbollah seems all that more striking given his public admission that brown shirts had terrorized his family during World War II.
Last week, Wrzenewskyj was called onto the carpet by boss man Interim Liberal Leader Bill Graham, who had asked him to meet with him to explain his controversial comments.
"He did that and in the course of doing that, he tendered his resignation as associate critic (of foreign affairs), which I accepted in the circumstances’" Graham told reporters. "Therefore, I consider that matter closed.’"
But the taxpayer funded Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) through its partner CTV.ca, does not seem to view the Wrzenewskyj matter as closed. In its section Your Opinion, described as "Click here to complete more polls & win fast cash", people are being asked:"Do you think Hezbollah should be removed from Canada's terrorist list?’"
An Internet message from Judith Binder states: "We urgently need you to vote in a CBC poll that asks whether Hezbollah should be removed from the terrorist list. To vote click on the link below" the poll is on the right side of the page. Naturally, we ask that you vote "No".
"On completion, please pass this on as quickly as possible and to as many people as possible."
And CBC, through its partner CTV.ca is not the only entity pushing the envelope on the Borys Wrzesnewskyj affair.
The Canadian Lebanese Coordinating Council (LCCC) does not see the Wrzenewskyj resignation as the closing chapter.
"The LCCC does not actually consider that this very sensitive case, which has created a great deal of public uproar, should simply end with Mr. Wrzesnewskyj's resignation. In this context, we call on the Liberal Party leadership to seriously consider applying the same problem solving process that was executed with ex-MP Carolyn Parrish.
(Former Mississauga MP Carolyn Parrish was booted out of the Liberal Party for among other things having stomped on a President George W. Bush doll on national television.)
"The LCCC reiterates its denunciation of Mr. Wrzesnewskyj's outrageous comments and affirms its strong belief that Hezbollah and all other organizations and groups that are on the Canadian terror list should not be negotiated with unless they completely fulfill all the legal provisions stipulated in the Terrorist Act and prove with no shred of doubt that they have given up and practically abandoned all the tactics conduct, ideology, attitudes and behaviour that initially were behind their classification as terror groups," said LCCC chairman Elias Bejjani and political adviser Charbel Barakat in a media communiqué.
Perhaps LCCC should take up it up with the envelope pushing CBC.
Canada Free Press founding editor Judi McLeod is an award-winning journalist with 30 years experience in the print media. A former Toronto Sun columnist, she also worked for the Kingston Whig Standard.
Judi can be reached at: letters@canadafreepress.com

This presentation appears in the Sept. 1, 2006 issue of Executive Intelligence Review.
Documentation
Yossi Beilin on Facing the Challenge
These are the opening remarks of Yossi Beilin, member of the Israeli Knesset (parliament) and leader of the Meretz-Yachad Party in Israel, to a conference call sponsored by the Jewish Alliance for Justice and Peace, Aug. 20. The transcript is posted on the group's website, http://btvshalom.org/resources/transcripts.shtml, under the title "After the Ceasefire: What Comes Next?" An audiotape of the questions and answers is also available on the website. Some punctuation has been added.
I believe that we find ourselves—in the beginning of the ceasefire after 33 days of the second war in Lebanon—in a very strange situation. One of the most interesting results is that it is a kind of a meeting point of weak leaders. We are talking about Bashir al-Assad of Syria, who is considered much weaker than his father, who is boycotted by the Americans and not only by them, who was pushed into a corner to create an alliance with Iran, and who is backing Hezbollah, despite the fact that he is representing a very secular regime while Hezbollah is one of the most religious movements in the region. Even after a period in which there was very tough tension between Syria and Hezbollah, even bloodshed, years ago, he is not considered as strong as his father. He has suggested several times to negotiate with Israel on a peace agreement and was rejected, first by Sharon and then by Olmert.
Another weak leader is Fuad Siniora. Fuad Siniora is the Prime Minister of Lebanon. He is considered a moderate, a pragmatic leader, close to the late Rafik Hariri. He is close to the west—the Americans are supporting him very much. Many western countries would like to see him stronger, and we are watching him struggle with his president, the Christian Emile Lahoud, who is close to Syria, and of course with Hezbollah which became a kind of state within a state, an army within a state. He [Siniora] would like to see a peaceful development; he was the one who called for a ceasefire a month ago, and there is no question that had it been up to him we could have had peace with Lebanon, but unfortunately it is not only up to him.
The third weak leader is Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen). Rather than negotiating with him when he became the Palestinian President, Sharon preferred not to negotiate with him, and go on with his unilateral withdrawal from Gaza. In the meantime Hamas won the parliamentary elections, and Mahmoud Abbas became an even weaker leader who doesn't have a majority in his party. Officially he is the leader of both the Palestinian Authority and the PLO, but practically, he is restricted and limited by Hamas and is far from being in the situation in which he can do exactly what he wants. He is considered one of the most moderate Palestinian leaders, and had it been up to him he would have liked to have a permanent agreement with Israel—he said so many many times.
There is a new weak leader in this strange club, and his name is Ehud Olmert. Until a month ago he was considered a new promise, backed by Bush, by the Americans, supported by many leaders and countries in the world, the new hope of Israel, who formed the government with the Labor Party and Amir Peretz, and promised to put an end to our occupation in the West Bank and even talked about withdrawing from 90% of the West Bank eventually. He did not believe it was possible to negotiate with the Palestinians for a permanent agreement, but he did believe that Israel should not remain in the territories.
His electoral agenda was a convergence plan of moving many, maybe 70,000, settlers, from the eastern side of the security fence to the western side of it. Today, after more than a month of war, he did not fulfill the promise, he is not considered as the one who won this war. He cannot go on with the convergence plan, and has already said that for the time being, his plan should be shelved, and one should deal only with the reconstruction of the Galilee, the north.
His support in public opinion went down dramatically to unprecedented numbers, and he is only 100 days into his job as an elected Prime Minister. His government is already shaky, he is already considered a kind of a lame duck, he is struggling against the demand to have an investigative committee, but I believe eventually he will have to comply with this because the public call is very strong. He will have to find a new agenda. For the time being his agenda is just maintenance. I believe that he himself knows that this is not attractive enough.
The fifth weak leader, of course, is President Bush. His support as you know is very low. He is approaching elections for the Congress in which he might lose his majority. Those who are close to him ideologically, like Senator Lieberman, are paying a political price for it. Iraq seems right now as a very big failure, and his plan to democratize the non-democratic states seems today a very big failure.
The question I am asking myself, and I am asking you, is whether in certain situations one can hope for a change just because of this weakness. Is it possible to use, or, in inverted quotations, to exploit, this weakness so that decent leaders will understand that they might find a common denominator by going for something big enough, which might serve the national interest and save their political lives?
I do believe that the role of the peace camp, wherever it is—Israel, Palestine, in other places, in the United States—is to try and push for this big thing, and one of the options for such a big thing is to have a second Madrid Conference 15 years after the first one, which took place on Oct. 31, 1991. My idea is that we should push for something like this so that Syria, Lebanon, Palestinians, Israelis, and of course America, or the Quartet, will participate in such a conference, will launch bilateral talks between Israel and Syria, Israel and Lebanon, Israel and the Palestinians, and try to suggest that in a few months it could be possible to have peace treaties with our neighbors.
From Darkness Into Light
I must admit that right now it might seem quite detached from reality. The reality seems very gloomy when you think about Israel, when you think of these 30 days of nightmare in which it was almost a courageous step to go from Tel Aviv to Haifa. And people do think that this mighty army of ours could not overcome the small militia of Hezbollah in a short while.
So the question right now is whether the embarrassment, the confusion, the gloomy feelings, and the weakness of the leaders, might lead us, at the appropriate time, to go toward something which will attract the attention of the peoples in the region, of the peoples in the world, away from this sadness, or darkness, into a hope and into light. This is the question.
I don't want to be a commentator, and I don't want to analyze exactly what went wrong, what happened, what exactly is the situation right now, because I do not believe I am a [objective] commentator. I can see things from my own very narrow point of view in which I can only tell you, that had we only been wise enough to make peace with Syria and with the Palestinians and with the Lebanese when it was possible years ago, we wouldn't have found ourselves in this situation and in war with Lebanon at the beginning of the 21st Century.
But we failed in the past, we made our mistakes, and we have to face the future and the new challenges, and ask ourselves whether it is possible now. And this is the question that I am asking myself, that I am asking my constituency, and trying to ask other constituencies, and I am asking you.

Government control over Lebanon has weakened: Siniora
Last Updated Fri, 25 Aug 2006 20:41:51 EDT
CBC News
The authority of the Lebanese government over some parts of the country became "very insignificant" over the past three decades, Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora says.
Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora addressed a number of issues in an exclusive interview with CBC's Nahlah Ayed. (CBC) In an exclusive interview with CBC News airing Friday, the prime minister also suggested that the government should seek ways to bring some members of the militant group Hezbollah into the Lebanese army.
Siniora didn't directly address the question of whether Hezbollah was running the country, saying instead that developments over the past three decades have "weakened" the state.
"Its authority over the various parts and various activities of the country, again in certain aspects, became very insignificant," he said.
South Lebanon has been widely considered to be under Hezbollah control for several years.
Siniora stressed that the state should become the sole authority and that only the Lebanese army, internal security and the international force carry weapons.
The UN resolution ending the 34-day conflict between Israel and Hezbollah called for a 15,000-member international force to be deployed in Lebanon and be joined with 15,000 Lebanese troops.
'It's not a matter of disarming'
But asked whether Hezbollah should be disarmed, Siniora said the word disarmed is "not at all the right word."

He said that it will be "through dialogue, through co-operation," with Hezbollah that the goal of no weapons in the region is achieved.
"It's not a matter of disarming. It's through dialogue that we have to reach that point. And I think this can be achieved while at the same time you see, trying to find out how to integrate the numbers of Hezbollah that want to really get integrated within the Lebanese army," he said.
Siniora also said the Lebanese army is "definitely entitled" to prevent the movement of weapons from other countries into Lebanon, but suggested it won't act aggressively.
"But I mean, it's not there to use force. Let's make it very clear it's not there to use force, but if it has to use force to protect itself and to stop any infringement on the law, then definitely, this is the army and it has to do so.
"But it's different being there to go and use force, or being there to defend law and order and to stop any infringement of the law. That's something else."