LCCC ENGLISH NEWS BULLETIN
August 28/2006

Latest New from the Daily Star for August 28/06
Hizbullah, Israel agree to swap captives - report
Annan due for 2-day visit to help solidify shaky cease-fire
Nasrallah regrets war in hindsight
Tyre to host ceremony marking Sadr's disappearance
Siniora admits weakness of state's authority
US legislator vows to block aid to Beirut
Much to question about US press coverage
Homes carry telltale signs of unwelcome guests
Syrian ports gain from Lebanon blockade
Hizbullah's efficiency leaves Lebanese government behind
Lights start to go back on across Lebanon
Displaced race bulldozers to recover keepsakes
Saudi king says he intervened to spare militants
Latest New from miscellaneous sources for August 28/06
US legislator threatens to block aid to Lebanon-EiTB
Jumblat Calls for Effective Mechanism to Protect Lebanon-Naharnet
UN force won't stop smuggling of arms into Lebanon-Ha'aretz
Israelis still occupy nine positions in south Lebanon-Zee News
Israeli airstrike hits Reuters vehicle-AP
Cleric Terms Disarmament of Hezbollah an Illusion-National Review Online Blogs
More French Troops Arrive In Lebanon-All Headline News
Iran, Syria coordinate positions on Lebanon-Ynetnews
Hizbollah Has Learned A Lesson From War-All Headline News
Lebanon to discuss UN force with Annan on Monday-Reuters
In south Lebanon village, Sunnis express disdain for Hezbollah-Ha'aretz
US military blocks Iranian arms shipment to Hezbollah-The Militant
Hezbollah: Israel surprised us-News24
Hezbollah: Israeli response to kidnapped soldiers was surprising-Ha'aretz
Law Put to Unusual Use in Hezbollah TV Case, Some Legal Experts-New York Times
UN mission not tasked to disarm Hezbollah: Annan-People's Daily Online
Israel vs. Syria-Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
Torture fear for blogger-Guardian Unlimited - UK
IRAN - HEZBOLLAH, The fall out from another misadventure-Persian Journal - Iran
Lebanon villages still without aid-NEWS.com.au
Jesse Jackson in Syria on "humanitarian mission"-Raw Story
Kin of beheaded US hostages sue Syria-United Press International
Tension mounts over role of peacekeepers in Lebanon-Euronews.net
240 French troops arriving to aid Lebanon rebuilding-International Herald Tribune
Russia: No Kornet missiles in Lebanon-Jerusalem Post

US legislator threatens to block aid to Lebanon
08/27/2006
Syria has threatened to shut its border with Lebanon if U.N. troops deploy there. Israel says it will not lift a sea and air blockade of Lebanon unless a U.N. force helps ensure that no new weapons reach Hizbollah.
Tom Lantos
Related news EU to deliver half of Lebanon force
Annan´s Mideast tour to begin on Monday in Beirut
A key U.S. legislator said in Israel on Sunday he would block aid President George W. Bush promised Lebanon and free the funds only when Beirut agreed to the deployment of international troops on the border with Syria.
"The international community must use all our available means to stiffen Lebanon's spine and to convince the government of Lebanon to have the new UNIFIL troops on the Syrian border in adequate numbers," said Tom Lantos, the ranking Democrat on the U.S. House of Representatives' International Relations Committee.
Lantos said he was putting a legislative hold on Bush's proposal to provide $230 million in aid for Lebanon in the aftermath of the 34-day war between Israel and Lebanese Hizbollah guerrillas.
As the top Democrat on the International Relations Committee, Lantos has the power to hold up legislation. "It is very much my hope that I will be able to lift the hold when the reasons will no longer be present," he said at Israel's Foreign Ministry, where he met Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni after talks with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.
Closing of the Lebanon-Syria border to arms
"My purpose is not to withhold aid from Lebanon, my purpose ... is to persuade the government of Lebanon that the closing of the Lebanon-Syria border to arms smuggling from Iran and Syria is in the prime national interest of Lebanon and the Lebanes
people."
Syria has threatened to shut its border with Lebanon if U.N. troops deploy there. Israel says it will not lift a sea and air blockade of Lebanon unless a U.N. force helps ensure that no new weapons reach Hizbollah in the south.
In response to the dispute between Israel and Syria over the deployment, Lebanon undertook on Thursday to prevent smuggling.
The United Nations has approved an expanded force of up to 15,000 troops to beef up the 2,000-strong UNIFIL contingent that has been in south Lebanon since 1978. The Lebanese government has estimated that the damage from the war will cost $3.6 billion to repair and Bush administration officials have expressed concern that Hizbollah was gaining an early advantage in rebuilding shattered south Lebanon.
Aid to Israel
Lantos, from California, said he would introduce bipartisan legislation to provide more aid to Israel, which already receives more than $2 billion annually in assistance from the United States.
"Lebanon will get help from both Europe, the Arab world and the United States. Unless the United States provides some aid to Israel, Israel receives no aid," Lantos said. He did not provide any estimate of how much money he would seek for Israel.

The fall out from another misadventure
Aug 26, 2006
Iqbal Latif, Paris - Persian Journal
26th Aug 2006 'Iran no threat to Israel.'(President Ahmadinejad)
26th October 2005,'Israel to be wiped off the map.' (President Ahmadinejad)
What a difference a rout can make? Ahmadinejad climb down, is a tactical admission of defeat and surrender! 'The Economist' in its cover story is as wrong about 'victory of Hezbollah' as it was about 'Oil under $10' The consequences of disastrous and botched up 'Hezbollites adventures,' are emerging. The climb down has already begun. The world waited anxiously on 22nd Aug for the cataclysmic events from Iran which distinguished Professor Lewis was extremely worried about. However what came out on Aug 26th was a pleasant surprise for the world and a discreditable climb-down from President Ahmadinejad. At least once again calling the bluff of an adversary has proven to be a better strategy than appeasement. The ramifications in the aftermath of this self delusional destructive exercise in Lebanon by their proxies and suffering a major defeat where Nasarullah freehand is soon to be compromised by 15,000 strong UN forces has resulted in a new language of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, saying that the Islamic republic of Iran is 'no threat' to Israel.
The myth of the martyrdom and false victories of Arabs over Israel since last 58 years has become epic legends like modern of versions Greek imaginary classic of Homer and Odyssey, lot of heroics but little authenticity. The radicals love to live in their cocoon of 'imaginary sanctuaries' where worldly defeats are promoted shamelessly as great victories in heavens, the body bag counts are irrelevant since the rewards in the heavenly abode outstrip the miserable worldly existence. If one talks to anyone on the streets in the Middle East they will invariably talk about great victory of Hezbollah by being take on the might of the Israeli army, the inability of the Israeli army to clean out the crude missiles in the caves and tunnels until the last day of cease fire and inability to cut a swathe through the Hezbollah guerillas.
Iran's Ahmadinejad was intending to give his final answer to the world community about nuclear development by Aug. 22, which this year corresponded to the 27th day of the month of Rajab of the year 1427, it was the date that by ritual, was the night when Muslims revere the voyage of the prophet Muhammad on the winged horse Buraq, first to 'the farthest mosque, 'identified with Jerusalem, and then to heaven and back. Ironically there's a Lebanese saying; "the mountain roared and delivered a mouse!" President did speak but what a dismount from a zealot and born again 'Hujjati' when on 26th October 2005 he declared that 'Israel must be wiped off the map, four days later, a startling statement surfaced from the Iranian President that is 'Iran is no threat to Israel.'
When a nation acts beyond the sum total of its tactical and strategic abilities there comes a time where a nation needs to withdraw and dismount from induced high, in typical circumstances of a lost warrior President Ahmadinejad offered a retreat which practically means burying the injunction of the Imam Khomeini, Israel must be wiped off the map. This statement sums up the blunders and strategic errors that have led to retreat, the overestimation of the crude systems, the overplaying of its proxy in Lebanon and underestimation of the response f the enemy. The Economist in a front page article like their 'Oil under 10 $' blunder gave premature victory to Hezbollah, but the fact is this is a very big statement, this renounces his earlier condemnations, provocations, censures and ultimatum where he practically put Iran on a collision course with rest of the world. It is not too late, the only worry one would have is if it is not an act of 'Dissimulation (Arabic: Taqiyya).' It is a part of a strategy predominantly used by Shi'as, the dissimulation of one's religious or political beliefs when one fears for one's life and the lives of one's family members. The defeat in Lebanon and the indiscriminate bombing of the Lebanon infrastructure has opened the eyes of Ahmdeinejad that no heavenly Imam is forthcoming in the near future to save his nation, only pragmatism would.
There is a radical difference between the Islamic Republic of Iran and other governments with nuclear weapons. This dissimilarity is articulated in what can only be described as the apocalyptic worldview of Iran's current ideological junta. In Islam, there are certain beliefs regarding the cosmic struggle at the end of time Gog and Magog, anti-Christ, and for Shiite Muslims, the long awaited return of the Hidden Imam, ending in the final victory of the forces of good over evil. This recent change of tone from the apocalyptic worldview is based apparently more on Taqiyya than anything else. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad "and his followers clearly believe that this time is now, and that the terminal struggle has already begun and is indeed well advanced." Iran's ambitions for acquiring nuclear weapons have been well-known. The most well-known one that was made by Ayatollah Mohajerani, that "as long as the Zionist regime is a nuclear power, every Islamic country, especially the Islamic Republic of Iran, must be capable of developing a nuclear weapon."
The genuine query is that the this worthless war was pursued with verve by the Hezbollah sponsors with a clear cut strategy to divert attention of international community and UN Security Council away from the arguable issue of uranium enrichment. The abduction of soldiers had a clear purpose a bargain where Hezbollah would secure the release as a matter of precedent 'fear diplomacy' thousand of their imprisoned man back and continues to exert disproportionate leverage through the balance of terror. Thousands of armed suicide guerillas continue to hang over the northern borders of Israel encapsulating and infringing the sovereignty of two nations unswervingly trapped in this terror web, the coalition government of Lebanon and the government of Israel. The forceful encampment of the UN forces is the first step to break this self serving terror web. Rockets ands abductions cannot happen and Syrian assisted gunrunning from Iran would be a difficult task. The wings of Hezbollah are practically clipped; no one else but Iranian comprehend it thoroughly.
The Hezbollah proxy was most brilliantly and fiercely used by the strategists of the axis of evil; Hezbollah extracted far greater advantages by being the 'real government' in the south on the back of huge arsenals of antiquated deadly missiles and gun running operations across the Syrian border. An axis of evil that includes Syrians, Iranians and Hezbollah stretching their link in to the heartland of Lebanon, this was an effective control of the Lebanese territory by virtue of a armed mafia. The sponsors of Nasarullah in Tehran had effectively built a direct hot border contiguous to the soft belly of Israel. It was this proximity of a hot border and 15,000 missiles that gave Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad the cheek and the resources of fright to pronounce on 26th October 2005, openly calling for Israel to be wiped off the map. These were his exact words "The establishment of the Zionist regime was a move by the world oppressor against the Islamic world," the president told a conference in Tehran on Wednesday, entitled The World without Zionism. "The skirmishes in the occupied land are part of a war of destiny. The outcome of hundreds of years of war will be defined in Palestinian land," he said. He unashamedly reiterated position of leader Ayatollah Khomeini. "As the Imam said, Israel must be wiped off the map," although soon after his foreign minister Manouchehr Mottaki, tried to undo the damage by suggesting that: "Nobody can remove a country from the map." Mottaki said that comments from Ahmadinejad made in October referred to the current Israeli regime which Tehran does not "recognize legally".
Iran and Syrian have woken up to the new realities in a post cease fire world the political damage that they have suffered from the adventures in Lebanon is immense. The indiscriminate destruction of Lebanon infrastructure irrespective of its location in Hezbollah dominated areas have made the cross section of the secular Lebanon politicians and militia realize on the necessity to supervise the 'God Fatherly' control of the Hezbollah of their government. As their opponents proxies lay heavily damaged; the overplaying of terror card in Lebanon has revived the unity of diverse political and militia forces. Lebanon's most virulent anti-Syrian politician, the head of the Lebanese Forces and Hariri-ally, Samir Jaja , Waleed Junblaat, Nasrallah Cardinal Sfeir, leader of the Maronite Church and Saad Hariri are on a common platform, a platform of Lebanese nationalism. Michel Aoun the only serious player so far aligned with Hezbollah is in untenable potion in faces of UN forces being installed in the south. To save Lebanon from the horrors of the war the radical Hezbollah and their sponsors aims have to be curtailed this is the new ground reality, it is this reality that gave birth to the famous statement that anyone who uses the Lebanese territory for aggression is a Lebanese traitor, no one lese was the aim of this brave statement but the Hezbollah.
It is the worry of Natanz, Arak, and Bushehr destruction in a pre-emptive strike that worries the President the most, after seeing shock and awe and accuracy of the weapons in Lebanon is not the loss of the innocents civilians in basements and caves that disturbs it is the possibility of usage of these weapons against his own clandestine programme that worries him more.
He had only one way to climb down. The Natanz upon completion, will house approximately 1,000 P-1 gas centrifuges, he only requires running of 750 gas centrifuges for one year to enrich enough HEU to make one nuclear bomb. This may be strategy of 'Dissimulation,' he is well aware of the abilities of Israeli air force and remembers that Israel launched an air raid on the French-built, Tamuz [July] nuclear reactor in Iraq in June 1981 almost one year after the onset of the Iran-Iraq War. Iranians are also conscious of the fact that as early as 1995 General Uzi Dayan, Israel's chief of the Planning Branch in the Israeli army highlighted that "if no other power is able to prevent the Islamic Republic from acquiring nuclear weapons." In a lecture he delivered in Tel Aviv University's Moshe Dayan Center for Strategic Studies and the Middle East. Since 1995, the shock and awe campaign and accuracy of Israeli weapons in recent Lebanon destruction has send the President back to his drawing board. Iran needs to buy time and this statement should be seen in that light.
Syria and Iran are the principal agents of aggression in making Lebanon a hostage nation. With strategic initiative seized by boxing Hezbollah along the northern borders the dream of self governance now looks a reality if Lebanese Army is allowed to exercise its authority the strategic balance in the Middle East will deeply alter.
Removal of Saddam Hussein from Iraq had already weakened Syria's regional ambitions. Iran with all its ideological affinity with Iraq is at poles apart with Iraq's Sistani. He holds papal authority over his fold. The Iranian-born ayatollah adheres to the Shi'ite ritual known as quietism, which holds that though clerics can articulate at moments of national crisis, they must not take part directly in politics. Sistani's quietism conflicts directly with the theocratic ideology of Shi'ite Iran. When Sistani speaks out on political matters, his words carry colossal weight among Iraqi Shi'ites, about 60 percent of the country's population. He rarely mentions religion in his political pronouncements. "Not a word he's written couldn't have been written by a member of the political theory faculty at Harvard," remarked Noah Feldman, professor of law at New York University and former senior constitutional adviser to the Coalition Provisional Authority. Middle East is going through a huge realignment and transformation, like fall out from Yugoslavia which was bloody and painful in early nineties in backyard of Europe the new realities are emerging fast and will settle in time. The wound and hatred of centuries is being covered life and broadcasted in our living areas , instant gratification demands that every things is settled in quick time, but slowly and surely things are falling in place, wars are futile and peaceful coexistence the only way.
Sistani detachment in this 'Shiite war' in Lebanon was remarkable. It is he who reigns supreme in Iraq and not Iran and the Iranians know it well. Bashar feels strategically quite orphaned to handle Israel on its own; with the help of Iran and Hezbollah he sees his role as a spoiler but in doing so have dropped the political support of Saudis and Sunni Arab hinterland and street. The core of the Arab leadership like Ghaddafi and Mubarak seldom raised their voice in favour of Hezbollah or Iranian- Syrian axis. They practically deserted them. The recent war has re-established the principle of pre-emption.
The reconciliatory statement of Ahmdeinejad has to be seen in this context.
It is not easy to stand up against Hezbollah or the Iran-Syrian axis, one does it at his own peril, one does not need to be reminded of Hariri's callous murder and 2005 bombing of An-Nahar's publisher Gibran Tueini, MP, the voices of Lebanon dissent and nationalism are quietened with extreme response. The weakest and smallest of the Arab nation is being use as a proxy to further their own evil games of freeing Golan heights which they cannot and a bomb that Iranians find difficult to hide unless bigger Middle eastern conflict camouflages the real intentions. Behind the freedom of farms lie bigger objectives. Lebanon is mosaic of ideologies and a secular country and it is abode for every strain of mankind, orthodoxy and proxy wars have no place in Lebanon. Iran and Syria should realize it for their own good. May be a dose of Ibn al-Arabi vision will bring some senses to Bashar and Ahmadinejad.
"My heart has become capable of every form; it is a pasture for gazelles and a convent for Christian monks, and a temple for idols and the pilgrim's Ka'ba, and the tablets of the Torah and the book of the Koran. I follow the religion of Love: whatever way Love's camels take, that is my religion and my faith."