LCCC NEWS BULLETIN
JULY  18/2006

Latest News FromThe Daily Star 18/07/06
World moves slowly to defuse crisis-By Nada Bakri
Mottaki visits Damascus, calls for truce and prisoner swap
World moves slowly to defuse crisis
By the numbers: heavy damage to infrastructure
Olmert vows to continue assault as Lebanese death toll passes 200
Protesters worldwide condemn Israeli onslaughts
Humanitarian groups rush to Lebanon's aid amid blockade
Leaders scramble to win support
Israelis use blogs to vent anger, fear over rocket strikes
Assault on Lebanon makes mockery of Geneva Conventions
Humanitarian crisis looms as number of displaced swells
Bombardment keeps extracting highest price from civilians
Exodus picks up pace as foreigners start evacuating
The art of war: as bombs fall on a new national tragedy, Lebanese find themselves actors and audience both
Experts: Oil can surpass $100 if Middle East unrest persists
Ministry touts war-time deals for land lines, cellular phones
Syrian hospitality sector stretches to accommodate traffic from Lebanon
Israel hits Lebanon, but thinks Iran -By Augustus Richard Norton
Bush, Putin try to put up united front on Iran
Latest News From miscellaneous sources 18/07/06
Lebanon Fears Ground Invasion-Free Internet Press
Israel softens conditions for cease-fire-AP
World leaders step up Mideast diplomacy AP
Death toll in Indonesia tsunami at 86-AP
G-8 leaders consider Mideast peacekeepers AP
Israel seeks security belt in south Lebanon-United Press International - USA
Israel Widens Airstrikes; 140 Civilians Dead since Weds-Bay Area Indymedia
'If Our Prime Minister Is Crying, What Are We To Do?'CounterCurrents.org
Attacks cost Lebanon billions: PM-Daily Telegraph -
Latest News From miscellaneous sources 17/07/06
Bush curses Hezbollah during G8 luncheon -AP
Thousands of foreigners evacuate Lebanon AP
U.N. envoy to relay 'concrete ideas' AP
Splits Emerge Among Arab Gov'ts Over Hizballah-CNSNews.com
Lebanese PM calls for immediate ceasefire-ABC Online
Hezbollah Fighters At 'Full Strength'CBS News - USA
Lebanese watch as a war unfolds on their territory-USA Today - USA
G8 Mideast statement targets Iran, Syria: US-NCR-Iran.org - London,UK
Iranian foreign minister arrives in Syria-Houston Chronicle - United States
Iran and Syria 'to blame' for Middle East crisis-Politics.co.uk - London,UK
Death toll mounts as Israel targets north Lebanon-Telegraph.co.uk - United Kingdom
Lebanon is made to pay -The Guardian (UK)
Last minute talks in Lebanon amid fears of ground invasion-Guardian Unlimited
Hezbollah appears in control of Lebanon AP
Israel jets blast Lebanon Reuters, 47 minutes
Foreigners flee Lebanon Reuters
Italy asks Iran to take 'active role' to help solve Middle EastHa'aretz
UN envoy voices support for Lebanese gov't call for ceasefire-People's Daily Online
Rice Says No Ceasefire With Armed Hezbollah-Voice of America
Hezbollah Rockets Hit Nazareth-The Conservative Voice
Hezbollah gives Israel's PM time, consensus and clout-The Age
Chirac Agrees with Bush on Disarming Hezbollah-Zaman Online
Israel batters Hezbollah HQ, wipes out radar sites-Chicago Tribune
Chirac Agrees with Bush on Disarming Hezbollah-Zaman Online

Israel softens conditions for cease-fire
By RAVI NESSMAN, Associated Press Writer
JERUSALEM - Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Monday that the fighting in Lebanon would end when two Israeli soldiers were freed, rocket attacks stopped and the Lebanese army deployed along the border. But he appeared to scale back from previous demands for Hezbollah to be dismantled.
Delivering an impassioned speech to Israel's parliament after six days of fierce fighting, Olmert said Israel would have no mercy on militants who attacked its cities with rockets."We shall seek out every installation, hit every terrorist helping to attack Israeli citizens, destroy all the terrorist infrastructure, in every place. We shall continue this until Hezbollah does the basic and fair things required of it by every civilized person," he said. "Israel will not agree to live in the shadow of the threat of missiles or rockets against its residents." Israeli officials have said publicly that Israel would not stop fighting until Hezbollah, a Shiite militia that controls much of south Lebanon, is dismantled. On Monday, Olmert said Hezbollah should be moved away from the border. His comments seemed to be a softening of Israel's earlier position, which could increase chances of a cease-fire.
"We shall struggle for the implementation of the conditions laid down by the international community ... the return of the hostages Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, a total cease-fire, the deployment of the Lebanese army in all of south Lebanon and the removal of Hezbollah from the region," he said.
Israeli officials said earlier Monday that Olmert had conveyed Israel's position to Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi, who is attempting to broker the cease-fire deal. As he spoke, a U.N. delegation also trying to mediate an end to the fighting arrived in Israel from Beirut.
"We hope that we will be able to see our way toward ... a de-escalation of the crisis," said Vijay Nambiar, head of the delegation. He said he would pass on information gathered in the Lebanese capital to Israeli officials, but declined to elaborate. The fighting began when Hezbollah kidnapped the soldiers in a cross-border raid. Since then, Israel has pounded Lebanon with airstrikes and Hezbollah has fired barrages of rockets and missiles into Israeli towns and cities.
"We are not looking for war or direct conflict, but if necessary, we will not be frightened by it," Olmert said. He also praised the Israeli people for being strong and united in the face of the rocket bombardment that has sent about half a million Israelis into bomb shelters. He recited a Jewish prayer for the soldiers and said he had pictures of the three captured soldiers — the two in Lebanon and another held by militants in Gaza — in his office. "We shall do everything with all our might to bring them home," he said, but added that Israel could not make a deal that would lead to further kidnappings.
The lengthy speech was Olmert's first major address since the fighting in Lebanon began last week. He spoke at length about many of those killed and said that Israel was fighting for them. "When missiles are launched at our residents and our towns, our answer will be war waged at full strength, with all determination, courage and sacrifice," he said. Meanwhile, an Israeli airstrike in Lebanon on Monday destroyed at least one long-range Iranian missile capable of hitting Tel Aviv, military officials said. Israeli aircraft targeted a truck carrying the weapons before they could be launched, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of military regulations. The force of the blast sent at least one missile flying into the air, but it fell nearby.
During nearly a week of fighting, Hezbollah militants have fired missiles up to 25 miles into Israel. But officials have raised concerns the guerrilla group could strike Tel Aviv, about 80 miles south of the border with Lebanon. President Bush bluntly expressed his frustrations with Hezbollah's actions, suggesting Syria could use its influence with the guerrillas. Annan and British Prime Minister Tony Blair called for sending international forces to southern Lebanon. Russian President Vladimir Putin said Moscow would consider dispatching troops, and the European Union announced it was considering a peacekeeping force as well.
Overnight attacks by Israeli warplanes and big guns killed 17 people and wounded at least 53, Lebanese security officials said. The death toll since fighting began July 12 after Hezbollah captured the Israeli soldiers has climbed above 200 — 209 in Lebanon, 24 in Israel. Israeli government spokesman Asaf Shariv said ground troops entered southern Lebanon, attacked Hezbollah bases near the border and quickly returned inside Israel.
A large explosion was heard Monday evening across Beirut in the heavily hit southern suburbs where Hezbollah's headquarters is located. In the south, nine civilians were killed, including two children, when an afternoon strike hit a bridge at the entrance to the southern port city of Sidon, Lebanese security officials said.
An Israeli missile also targeted a building housing the offices of Al-Manar, Hezbollah television, in the southern market town of Nabatiyeh, wounding seven people.
Hezbollah Katyusha rockets landed in the Israeli town of Atlit, about 35 miles south of the border and six miles south of the port of Haifa. Nobody was hurt. Later, guerrillas fired three rocket barrages into Haifa, destroying a three-story building and wounding at least three people, Israeli medics said. Guerrilla rockets killed eight Israelis in an attack on Haifa Sunday in what was believed to be Hezbollah's deadliest single attack on Israel. A Lebanese TV station showed video of an object falling to the ground in the Jamjour district near the Hezbollah stronghold of southern Beirut, but the Israeli army said reports that it was an Israeli aircraft were false. A Lebanese security official said the object was a fuel tank dropped by an Israeli aircraft over Kfar Chima, a town near southern Beirut. After it dropped the fuel tank, the aircraft fired two missiles at three cargo trucks in the area, killing four people and wounding two others, he added, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
Israel said its planes and artillery struck 60 targets in Lebanon overnight in retaliation for Sunday's 20-rocket barrage on Haifa, Israel's third-largest city and one that had not been hit before the latest fighting. Israel also kept up pressure in the Gaza Strip as it searched for a kidnapped soldier, bombing the empty Palestinian Foreign Ministry building for the second time in less than a week in what it said was a warning to the ruling Hamas party. Israel launched the offensive on June 25 after Hamas-linked militants carried out a cross-border attack on a military outpost, killing two soldiers and capturing one. Lebanon's Hezbollah guerrillas joined the fray last week, attacking a military patrol in northern Israel, killing eight soldiers and capturing two. Israeli officials accused Syria and Iran of providing Lebanese guerrillas with sophisticated weapons, saying the missiles that hit Haifa had greater range and heavier warheads than those Hezbollah had fired before.
Speaking on the margin of the Group of Eight summit in St. Petersburg, Russia, Blair said the fighting would not stop until the conditions for a cease-fire were created. "The only way is if we have a deployment of international forces that can stop bombardment coming into Israel," he said. Annan appealed to Israel to spare civilian lives and infrastructure. The G-8 nations, who had struggled to reach a consensus on the escalating warfare between Israel and Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon, have expressed concern on the "rising civilian casualties" and urged both sides to stop the violence. Bush cursed Hezbollah's actions in a discussion with Blair before the G-8 leaders began their final lunch. "See the irony is that what they need to do is get Syria to get Hezbollah to stop doing this s--- and it's over," Bush said. He also suggested that Annan call Syrian President Bashar Assad to "make something happen."

Israel answers attack with lethal blows
By HAMZA HENDAWI and LEE KEATH, Associated Press Writers
BEIRUT, Lebanon - Hezbollah and Israel traded rocket and missile barrages without letup for a fifth day Sunday, as the war that has suddenly flared in the Middle East showed no sign of easing. Hezbollah rockets struck deep inside Israel, killing eight people in the northern city of Haifa, and Israel answered with even more lethal blows across Lebanon and into the Bekaa Valley near Syria.
The toll on both sides rose to at least 178, including three Lebanese soldiers and many civilians, as strikes continued into Monday. In addition to the Israeli victims at a rail repair facility in Haifa, eight Canadians vacationing at their family village in Lebanon died in an Israeli raid, and a sea-launched missile killed at least nine people at a civil defense building in the southern Lebanese port of Tyre.
Israel warned of massive retaliation after the Haifa attack, and accused Iran and Syria of providing the weaponry used. Military officials said the missiles were more advanced — with longer range and heavier warheads — than the hundreds of rockets the guerrillas had rained on northern Israel earlier.
With the violence rising, foreigners began to flee by the hundreds and several nations drew up plans to get their citizens out. U.S. planners arrived to organize evacuation for any of the 25,000 Americans trying to leave. Italian military flights rushed out some 350 people, mostly Europeans, and two Marine helicopters ferried 21 U.S. citizens, most with medical conditions, to Cyprus.
In the early hours of Monday, witnesses reported that waves of Israeli airstrikes had hit the Lebanese city of Tripoli and Hezbollah strongholds in eastern town of Baalbek. Barrages from gunboats killed four in a village south of Beirut. Three Lebanese army soldiers were killed and seven missing after an Israeli airstrike in the fishing village of Abdeh in northernmost Lebanon.
With violence spiraling, world leaders meeting in St. Petersburg produced for the first time a draft framework to end the crisis and a U.N. envoy landed in Beirut. The Group of Eight most industrialized nations expressed concern over "rising civilian casualties on all sides" and urged both sides to stop their attacks.
"These extremist elements and those that support them cannot be allowed to plunge the Middle East into chaos and provoke a wider conflict," the G-8 leaders said in a statement. "The extremists must immediately halt their attacks."
The United Nations, the European Union and Italy also pushed ahead with separate efforts Sunday to try to end the fighting.
But both Israel and Hezbollah signaled that their attacks would only intensify in an already brutal battle that has killed at least 152 in Lebanon and 23 in Israel.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert vowed "far-reaching consequences" for the Haifa attack, Hezbollah's deadliest strike ever on Israel. The morning barrage of 20 rockets came after Israeli warplanes unleashed their heaviest strikes yet on Beirut, flattening apartment buildings and blowing up a power station to cut electricity to swaths of the capital.
The Israeli military warned residents of south Lebanon to flee, promising heavy retaliation after the Haifa assault. "Nothing will deter us," Olmert said.
Along with the Lebanon attacks, Israel attacked along the second front where Israel is fighting, in Gaza. Fighter jets bombed the Palestinian Foreign Ministry in Gaza City, and clouds of smoke rose from the building, which has been hit before.
Hezbollah's leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, said that despite the barrage, the guerrillas were "in their full strength and power" and that their "missile stockpiles are still full."
"When the Zionists behave like there are no rules and no red lines and no limits to the confrontation, it is our right to behave in the same way," a tired-looking but defiant Nasrallah said in a televised address. He said Hezbollah hit Haifa because of Israel's strikes on Lebanese civilians.
Nasrallah tried to rally the Arab world around Hezbollah, saying the battle was an opportunity to deal Israel a "historic defeat." Iran and Syria are prime supporters of Hezbollah and Hamas, raising fears the sides could be drawn into a regional war.
Still, they denied Israel's claim that they had provided advanced missile technology to Hezbollah.
Smoke rose over Haifa and air raid sirens wailed as the dead and wounded were evacuated from a train station warehouse full of workers that took a direct hit in the strike, just one hour into the new work week. Orthodox rescue crews worked their way through the debris gathering pieces of flesh amid pools of blood.
In an initial response soon after, warplanes hit south Beirut around Hezbollah's headquarters, already reduced to rubble. In the southern port of Tyre, an Israeli missile tore of the top of a 12-story building, killing at least nine. Rescue workers pulled bodies from the crushed concrete.
Eight Canadians of Lebanese origin, all members of the same family, were killed by an Israeli strike on their village in the south where they'd come for a summer visit. Canada said it was sending commercial ships to evacuate its citizens.
After nightfall, Israeli missiles destroyed fuel depots at Beirut's airport. Hezbollah retaliated with rockets that exploded in the Israeli town of Afula and Upper Nazareth, showing a longer range than previous barrages. There were no immediate reports of casualties.
Another series of airstrikes followed that, hitting on the Mediterranean coast near Beirut and in the northern port of Tripoli, as well as in the eastern town of Baalbek, police and witnesses said. At least four people were killed.
Western nations clearly expected a drawn-out fight even as diplomatic efforts began in earnest.
In Beirut, Vijay Nambiar, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan's special political adviser, met the Lebanese prime minister. "Enough innocent lives have been lost and property infrastructure has been damaged," Nambiar said.
Syria warned on Sunday that any aggression against it "will be met with a firm and direct response whose timing and methods are unlimited." Hundreds of cars drove through Damascus on Sunday night with drivers and passengers waving Syrian and Hezbollah flags and honking horns.
Iran threatened "unimaginable damage" to Israel if Syria were attacked, and its supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Hezbollah was winning its fight against Israel and would not disarm. Iran's foreign minister headed to Damascus late Sunday for talks.
The damage in southern Beirut — a teeming Shiite district where Hezbollah's main headquarters are located — was colossal after Israel unleashed its worst bombardment yet, before the Haifa strike. A series of 18 explosions rocked the city before sunrise.
The Jiyeh power plant, on Beirut's southern outskirts, was in flames after it was hit, cutting electricity to many areas in the capital and south Lebanon. Firefighters pleaded for help from residents after saying they didn't have enough water to put out the blaze.
Large swaths of Beirut were covered with dust, and the city of 1.5 million people was emptying as residents fled to the relative safety of the mountains and the eastern Bekaa Valley.
Some residents of Beirut's southern Shiite neighborhood, Dahiyah, ventured out of shelters to collect belongings from their shattered city blocks, where buildings were collapsed on their sides, missing top floors or reduced to pancaked concrete. Many emerged from their destroyed apartments with bulging shopping bags or suitcases as young Hezbollah gunmen urged them to leave quickly. "We want to sleep on our own pillows in the shelter," Mariam Shihabiyah, a 39-year-old mother of five said as she emerged from her home with an armful of pillows and clothes. "Can you believe what happened to Dahiyah?" Furniture pieces, blankets, mattresses, clothes and soft toys were scattered on the streets. A copy of the Quran, Islam's holy book, lay in the street with its dusty pages fluttering until a Hezbollah gunman reverently lifted it and kissed it. In Israel, Haifa — a bustling port city of 270,000 people — was brought to a standstill. The streets were eerily quiet as residents huddled in bomb shelters or stocked up on milk, bread and other staples. "It's a war, it's an emergency situation and it will get worse," said Sharon Goldstein, a 34-year-old security guard.

Liste de diffusion du Mouvement SOLIDA" <liste@solida.org
Subject: SOLIDA PRESS RELEASE
Date: Mon, 17 Jul 2006 13:31:01 +0200
Although it is not in its mandate, SOLIDA team could not ignore the fate of the thousands of homeless Lebanese families, including small kids
and pregnant women, who are left in the streets and schools of Beirut without real assistance from the state. SOLIDA staff joined a group of
volunteers from the civil society and is trying to provide some help to the families. These families need food, medicines, mattress, infant
milk… it is a true humanitarian emergency…
WE THEREFORE APPEAL ALL THE PEOPLE WHO CAN HELP FINANCIALLY TO REPLY TO
THIS E MAIL, and we will give them all information to send money. The persons receiving this email who are living in Lebanon and wish to
provide material help are kindly invited to call me on my phone (number  below).
Thank you very much in advance.
Marie DAUNAY
SOLIDA
Tel : 03 887 108 (de l'étranger : 00 961 3 887 108)
Bien que cela ne soit pas dans son mandat, SOLIDA ne pouvait rester insensible au sort des milliers de familles libanaises sans abri, parmi
lesquelles de petits enfants et des femmes enceintes, qui errent dans les rues et les écoles de Beyrouth, sans assistance réelle de l'Etat. Le
personnel de SOLIDA a rejoint un groupe de volontaires de la société civile libanaise et essaye, autant que possible d'aider ces familles. Elles
ont besoin de nourriture, de médicaments, de matelas, de lait infantile… Il s'agit d'une réelle urgence humanitaire…C'EST POURQUOI NOUS APPELONS TOUTES LES PERSONNES QUI PEUVENT AIDER FINANCIEREMENT A REPONDRE A CE MAIL, et nous leur donnerons la marche à
suivre pour envoyer de l'argent.Les personnes résidant au Liban qui souhaitent apporter une aide en donnant du matériel de première nécessité sont invités à me contacter sur mon mobile (le numéro figure ci-dessous).En vous remerciant d'avance,
Marie DAUNAY
SOLIDA
Tel : 03 887 108 (de l'étranger : 00 961 3 887 108)
PRESS RELEASE
Hostage-taking, Lebanese Detainees in Israel and Israeli Strikes Against Lebanon
For more than a decade, SOLIDA (Support for Lebanese Detained Arbitrarily) has drawn the attention of the international community to the need of finding a humane and fair resolution to the problem of enforced disappearances and arbitrary detention in Lebanon and the region. The tragic evolution of the situation on the ground in the Middle East over the past few days, as well as the innocent lives that are being lost as a result, are the consequence of the lack of action by the
international community on this issue of the utmost importance.
Israel has detained, tortured and kidnapped several Lebanese nationals with impunity, and this untenable situation is the direct cause of the ongoing violence. SOLIDA urges all parties to act with the strictest respect for international treaties and to immediately undertake negotiations leading to the release of all detainees who are held arbitrarily and to uncovering the fate of all the missing in this part of the world.
We particularly call on Hezbollah to uphold the rights of the two Israeli detainees for a humane and non-degrading treatment, by adhering to all applicable international norms and by refraining from practicing any torture or violence whatsoever against them. Moreover, we urge Hezbollah to allow the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) or other impartial observers to examine and monitor the health of the prisoners.
We furthermore call on the Israeli government to immediately cease all acts of reprisals against civilians, and we draw its attention to the fact that the indiscriminate shelling of populated areas may be classified as a crime against humanity and is therefore illegal. We request the Israeli government provide the ICRC with all the information it has on Lebanese nationals that are detained or buried on Israeli soil.
Finally, we request the United Nations, and particularly the Security Council of the United Nations to take all necessary measures to establish an International Commission mandated with the task of investigating the sensitive issue of Enforced Disappearances in the region.
Beirut, 15 July, 2006
COMMUNIQUE DE PRESSE
Prise d'otages, détenus libanais en Israël et frappes israéliennes sur le Liban Depuis une dizaine d'années le mouvement SOLIDA (Soutien aux Libanais
Détenus Arbitrairement) attire l'attention de la communauté internationale sur la nécessité de trouver une issue humaine et juste au problème
des disparitions forcées et de la détention arbitraire au Liban et dans la région. L'évolution dramatique de la situation que connaît la région depuis
quelques jours, et les dizaines de morts innocentes qui en résultent sont la conséquence de l'absence d'action de la communauté internationale
sur ce sujet primordial. Israël a détenu, torturé et fait disparaître de nombreux Libanais, en toute impunité. De cette situation intenable résulte la violence
actuelle.
Le mouvement SOLIDA appelle les parties à agir dans le respect des conventions internationales, et à engager de suite des négociations qui
devraient aboutir à la libération de tous les détenus arbitraires et à l'éclaircissement du sort des disparus dans cette région.
Nous appelons spécialement aujourd'hui le Hezbollah à respecter le droit des deux détenus israéliens à un traitement humain et non dégradant,
en respectant les normes internationales en vigueur et en s'abstenant de toute torture ou violence à leur égard. En plus nous l'appelons à
autoriser le CICR ou des observateurs indépendants à examiner et suivre l'état de santé des prisonniers.
D'autre part, nous demandons au gouvernement israélien d'arrêter immédiatement ses opérations de représailles contre les civils et attirons
son attention que le bombardement aveugle de zones habitées peut être qualifié de crime contre l'Humanité et devenir ainsi imprescriptible. Nous
leur demandons aussi de livrer au CICR toutes les informations qu'il détient sur les Libanais détenus ou enterrés sur le territoire israélien.
Enfin nous demandons aux Nations Unies et en particulier au Conseil de Sécurité de l'ONU de prendre les mesures nécessaires pour la mise en
place d'une commission internationale chargée du dossier épineux des disparitions forcées dans la région.
Beyrouth, 15 Juillet 2006"amir ibn" <himyarita@yahoo.com

Bush curses Hezbollah during G8 luncheon
By JEANNINE AVERSA, AP Economics Writer
ST. PETERSBURG, Russia - It wasn't meant to be overheard. Private luncheon conversations among world leaders, picked up by a microphone, provided a rare window into both banter and substance — including President Bush cursing Hezbollah's attacks against Israel.
Bush expressed his frustration with the United Nations and his disgust with the militant Islamic group and its backers in Syria as he talked to British Prime Minister Tony Blair during the closing lunch at the Group of Eight summit.
"See the irony is that what they need to do is get Syria to get Hezbollah to stop doing this (expletive) and it's over," Bush told Blair as he chewed on a buttered roll.
He told Blair he felt like telling U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who visited the gathered leaders, to get on the phone with Syrian President Bashar Assad to "make something happen." He suggested Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice might visit the region soon.
The unscripted comments came during a photo opportunity at the lunch. The leaders clearly did not realize that a live microphone was picking up their discussion.
Bush also spoke to other leaders, and his unscripted comments ranged from the serious topic of escalating violence in the Mideast to light banter about his preference for Diet Coke and a gift he received from another leader.
Blair, whose remarks were not as clearly heard, appeared to be pressing Bush about the importance of getting international peacekeepers into the region.
As he chats with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Bush expresses amazement that it will take Putin and an unidentified leader just as long to fly home to Moscow as it will take him to fly back to Washington. Putin's reply could not be heard.
"You eight hours? Me too. Russia's a big country and you're a big country. Takes him eight hours to fly home. Not Coke, diet Coke. ... Russia's big and so is China. Yo Blair, what're you doing? Are you leaving," Bush said. Bush thanked Blair for a gift of a sweater and joked that he knew Blair had picked it out personally. "Absolutely," Blair responded, with a laugh. Bush, a stickler for keeping to his schedule, could also be heard telling Putin, "We've got to keep this thing moving. I have to leave at 2:15. They want me out of town so to free up your security forces."Bush also remarked that some of the speakers at the meeting had the tendency to talk too long.

Pocalyptic Muslim Jew-hatred
Andrew G. Bostom is the author of The Legacy of Jihad, and a frequent contributor to The American Thinker.
July 17th, 2006
There are short-term reasons behind the attacks on Israel by Hezbollah and Hamas. But underlying all the geo-strategy is a solid foundation of fanatical Jew-hatred, dating back to the founding of Islam. There is literally nothing Israel or Jews can do to appease those who seek to annihilate them.
Dr. Walid Phares, a perspicacious expert on modern jihad terrorism, has elucidated the practical, short-term considerations that likely motivated Hizbollah’s aggressive actions across Israel’s internationally recognized northern border with Lebanon (kidnapping of Israeli soldiers; katyusha rocket attacks on Israeli civilian populations), which precipitated the ongoing conflagration:
• Iran is concerned about the nuclear crisis and wants to distract attention from the issue
• Syria is concerned about the Hariri murder investigation and wishes to postpone its results.
• Hizbollah is concerned about the call for disarming its militias and therefore decided to flare up the conflict with Israel.
• Finally, Hamas, whose own kidnapping and rocketing exploits lead to a retaliatory Israeli invasion of Gaza (albeit of limited scope), was also embroiled in a critical confrontation with their Palestinian rivals, Mahmoud Abbas and Fatah.
Phares argues that Hizbollah’s strategic solution was, not surprisingly, open resumption of the jihad against Israel. Ultimately, this chronic, annihilationist jihad being waged against Israel by both Hizbollah and Hamas, is driven by orthodox Islamic theology, and eschatology.
Georges Vajda —in a seminal 1937 essay [1] (long before the establishment of the State of Israel)—provides an overall assessment of the portrayal of the Jews in the hadith collections (the putative words and deeds of the Muslim prophet Muhammad, as recorded by pious transmitters), complemented by Koranic verses, and observations from the earliest Muslim biographies [or “sira”] of Muhammad.
Vajda’s research demonstrates how Muslim eschatology emphasizes the Jews’ supreme hostility to Islam. Jews are described as adherents of the Dajjāl—the Muslim equivalent of the Anti-Christ—and as per another tradition, the Dajjāl is in fact Jewish. At his appearance, other traditions state that the Dajjāl will be accompanied by 70,000 Jews from Isfahan wrapped in their robes, and armed with polished sabers, their heads covered with a sort of veil. When the Dajjāl is defeated, his Jewish companions will be slaughtered— everything will deliver them up except for the so-called gharkad tree. Thus, according to a canonical hadith (Sahih Muslim, Book 40, Number 6985), if a Jew seeks refuge under a tree or a stone, these objects will be able to speak to tell a Muslim: “There is a Jew behind me; come and kill him!”
As Vajda observes,
Not only are the Jews vanquished in the eschatological war, but they will serve as ransom for the Muslims in the fires of hell. The sins of certain Muslims will weigh on them like mountains, but on the day of resurrection, these sins will be lifted and laid upon the Jews.
But it is the Jews stubborn malevolence, Vajda further notes, that is their defining worldly characteristic:
Jews are represented in the darkest colors [i.e., in the Koran, hadith, and sira]. Convinced by the clear testimony of their books that Mohammed was the true prophet, they refused to convert, out of envy, jealousy and national particularism, even out of private interest. They have falsified their sacred books and do not apply the laws of God; nevertheless, they pursued Mohammed with their raillery and their oaths, and harassed him with questions, an enterprise that turned to their own confusion and merely corroborated the authenticity of the supernatural science of the prophet. From words they moved to action: sorcery, poisoning, assassination held no scruples for them.
Examples of this archetypal Jew hatred from the sacred Islamic texts, sira, and main early Sunni historiographical accounts, include:
- Koranic verses labeling Jews as malevolent enemies of Islam (5:82);
- disobedient slayers of their own prophets who suffered justifiable abasement (2:61), including, for some, transformation into apes and swine (5:60);
- the more profoundly hateful narratives (in the hadith, sira, and early histories, for example by Tabari) which maintain that the perfidious Jews fomented sectarian strife in early Islam by promoting heresies—including Shi’ism itself—that threatened the unity of the Muslim community (umma);
- and the canonical hadith (Sahih Muslim Book 026, Number 5431) that the Jews caused Muhammad’s protracted, excruciating death from poisoning:
“The Jews discussed about poisons and became united in one poison. She [a Khaybar Jewess, Zaynab Bint al-Harith] poisoned the goat putting more poison in the forelegs..The Apostle of Allah took the foreleg, a piece of which he put into his mouth…The Apostle of Allah sent for Zaynab Bint al-Harith [and]…handed her over to [those] who put her to death…The Apostle of Allah lived after this three years, till in consequence of his pain he passed away. During his illness he used to say: I did not cease to find the effect of the poisoned morsel I took at Khaybar…” [2].
Vajda’s analysis indicates that all these archetypes in turn justify Muslim animus towards the Jews, and the admonition to, at best, “subject [the Jews] to Muslim domination”, as dhimmis, treated “with contempt”, under “humiliating arrangements”.
Hizbollah and Hamas have constructed core ideologies based upon this Islamic theology of Jew hatred, which one can glean readily from their foundational documents, and subsequent pronouncements, made ad nauseum. Hamas further demonstrates openly its adherence to a central motif of Jew-hatred in Muslim eschatology—Article 7 of the Hamas Charter concludes with a verbatim reiteration of the apocalyptic hadith alluded to earlier:
“The Last Hour would not come unless the Muslims will fight against the Jews and the Muslims would kill them until the Jews would hide themselves behind a stone or a tree and a stone or a tree would say: `Muslim, or the servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me; come and kill him’; but the tree Gharkad would not say, for it is the tree of the Jews.” (Sahih Muslim, Book 40, Number 6985).
Both jihadist terror organizations believe they can now take advantage of their political gains in Lebanon (Hizbollah), and the Palestinian controlled areas of Gaza and the West Bank (Hamas), and succeed in their goal to destroy Israel—motivated by a primordial hatred of Jews, sanctioned in Muslim theology and eschatology.
Hizbollah’s name, “The Party of Allah” derives from Koran 5:56:
“And whoever takes Allah and His messenger and those who believe for a guardian, then surely the party of Allah are they that shall be triumphant.”
In a public statement issued February 15, 1986, Hizbollah conceived of itself as a “nation” linked to Muslims worldwide by “…a strong ideological and political bond, namely Islam.” Expressed in the political language of the Koran, Hizbollah’s ideology encompasses, triumphally (as per the slogan adorning the party emblem, “The Party of Allah is Sure to Triumph”) at least three major objectives: transforming Lebanon into a Shari’a state; destroying Israel; establishing regional, followed by international Islamic hegemony, i.e., bringing the region, then the world under Shari’a law.
Demonizing Israel and Jews—via motifs in the Koran and hadith—Hizbollah views the jihad against the “Zionist entity” as an annihilationist war intrinsic to broader conflicts: the struggle between the Islamic world and the non-Muslim world, and the historical struggle between Islam and Judaism. The most senior clerical authority for Hizbollah, Husayn Fadlalah has stated,
“We find in the Koran that the Jews are the most aggressive towards the Muslims…because of their aggressive resistance to the unity of the faith.”
Fadlallah repeatedly refers to anti-Jewish archetypes in the Koran and the hadith: the corrupt, treacherous and aggressive nature of the Jews; their reputation as killers of prophets, who spread corruption on earth; and the notion that the Jews engaged in conspiratorial efforts against the Muslim prophet Muhammad. Fadlallah argues, ultimately,
“Either we destroy Israel or Israel destroys us.”
Hizbollah is viscerally opposed to Judaism and the existence of Israel, stressing the eternal conflict between the Jews and Islam. Eradicating Israel represents an early stage of Hizballah’s Pan-Islamic ambitions, and its jihad against the rest of the non-Muslim world.
Since 1989, historian David Littman has made repeated appeals to the UN Human Rights Commission alerting its members to the dangers inherent in the binding Hamas Charter (circa 1988). Recently Littman elucidated some of key the motifs of Islamic Jew-hatred contained in this document which amount to no less than a “direct and public incitement to commit genocide,” punishable under article 4 of the 1948 Genocide Convention.
Article 7 of the Hamas Charter contains the apocalyptic hadith (Sahih Muslim, Book 40, Number 6985) referred to earlier—reflecting the annihilationist Jew hatred of Islamic eschatology. As Littman observes, Article 8, “…a blueprint for jihadist terrorism,” is the slogan of the Islamic Resistance Movement – Hamas:
“Allah is its target, the Prophet is its model, the Koran its Constitution; Jihad is its path, and death for the sake of Allah is the loftiest of its wishes.”
Article 28 targets all Jews:
“Israel, Judaism and Jews challenge Islam and the Muslim people: ‘May the cowards never sleep.’”
The Charter in its preface quotes Hassan al-Banna, founder of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, as saying:
“Israel will exist and continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it.”
The conclusion has a subheading: The Islamic Resistance Movement is Composed of Soldiers stating that the Islamic Resistance Movement
“will only serve as a support for all groupings and organizations operating against the Zionist enemy and its lackeys (…) The Islamic Resistance Movement adopts Islam as its way of life. Islam is its creed and religion. Whoever takes Islam as his way of life, be it an organization, a grouping, a country or any other body, the Islamic Resistance Movement considers itself as their soldiers and nothing more.”
Finally, this transcript from the June 22, 2006 pronouncement by Yasser Ghalban, a Hamas terrorist leader makes clear how, as with Hizbollah, the liquidation of Jews in Israel by jihad is linked to Hamas’ own universal ambitions:
“The Jihad for Allah… is the way of Truth and the way for Salvation and the way which will lead us to crush the Jews and expel them from our country Palestine. Just as the Jews ran from Gaza, the Americans will run from Iraq and Afghanistan and the Russians will run from Chechnya, and the Indian will run from Kashmir.”
Unfortunately, the orthodox Islamic archetypes of Jew-hatred promulgated by Hizbollah and Hamas, are also being disseminated by the most respected, mainstream Islamic institutions. For example, Muhammad Sayyid Tantawi wrote these words in his 700 page treatise rationalizing Muslim Jew hatred, Banu Isra’il fi al-Qur’an wa al-Sunna [Jews in the Koran and the Traditions], originally published in the 1970s, and then re-issued in 1986:
[The] Koran describes the Jews with their own particular degenerate characteristics, i.e. killing the prophets of Allah, corrupting His words by putting them in the wrong places, consuming the people’s wealth frivolously, refusal to distance themselves from the evil they do, and other ugly characteristics caused by their deep-rooted lasciviousness…only a minority of the Jews keep their word….[A]ll Jews are not the same. The good ones become Muslims, the bad ones do not. [3]
Tantawi was apparently rewarded for this scholarly effort by being named Grand Imam of Al-Azhar University in 1996, a position he still holds. These are the expressed, “carefully researched” views on Jews held by the nearest Muslim equivalent to a Pope—the head of the most prestigious center of Muslim learning in Sunni Islam, which represents 90% of the world’s Muslims. And Sheikh Tantawi has not mollified such hatemongering beliefs since becoming the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar as his statements on the Jews as “enemies of Allah, descendants of apes and pigs”, the legitimacy of homicide bombing of Jews, or “dialogue” with Jews (just below), make clear.
…anyone who avoids meeting with the enemies in order to counter their dubious claims and stick fingers into their eyes, is a coward. My stance stems from Allah’s book [the Koran], more than one-third of which deals with the Jews…[I] wrote a dissertation dealing with them [the Jews], all their false claims and their punishment by Allah. I still believe in everything written in that dissertation. [see above, and citation 3]
Tantawi’s case illustrates the prevalence and depth of sacralized, “normative” Jew hatred in the contemporary Muslim world which can no longer be ignored.
The neutered compromise statement of the G-8 Summit leaders on “Middle East violence”, despite being a far better pronouncement than the predictably craven dhimmitude of Spanish Prime Minister Zapatero, or the miserable immoral equivalence of official Vatican spokesman Cardinal Angelo Sodano, is a poor substitute for the moral clarity desperately needed now. Although this memorable December 2002 jeremiad by Oriana Fallaci “I Stand With Israel. I Stand With The Jews” surely fits the bill, never could such words be uttered in public by the current generation of rather dull-witted, and fortitude-challenged world leaders, Western and Eastern alike.
Until such a moral awakening occurs (if ever), perhaps it is best for Israel to heed the existential, street-wise advice of songwriter extraordinaire Bob Dylan:
Well, he’s surrounded by pacifists who all want peace,
They pray for it nightly that the bloodshed must cease.
Now, they wouldn’t hurt a fly.
To hurt one they would weep.
They lay and they wait for this bully to fall asleep.
He’s the neighborhood bully…
Well, he knocked out a lynch mob, he was criticized,
Old women condemned him, said he should apologize.
Then he destroyed a bomb factory, nobody was glad.
The bombs were meant for him.
He was supposed to feel bad.
He’s the neighborhood bully.
Well, the chances are against it and the odds are slim
That he’ll live by the rules that the world makes for him,
‘Cause there’s a noose at his neck and a gun at his back
And a license to kill him is given out to every maniac.
He’s the neighborhood bully.
Notes
[1] Georges Vajda. Juifs et Musulmans selon le hadit [Jews and Muslims according to the hadith]. Journal Asiatique, 1937, Vol. 229, pp. 57-129. English translation by Susan Emanuel.
[2] Ibn Sa’d. Kitab Al-Tabaqat Al-Kabir. Volume 2, New Delhi, 1993; pp. 249-252. English translation by S. Moinul Haq and H.K. Ghazanfar
3. Banu Isra’il fi al-Qur’an wa al-Sunna [Jews in the Koran and the Traditions], 1986. English translation by Dr. Michael Schub
**Andrew G. Bostom is the author of The Legacy of Jihad, and a frequent contributor to The American Thinker.
Andrew G. Bostom