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1,700 more Canadians want to leave Beirut

Many had been hoping for ceasefire, they tell soldiers

Jul. 27, 2006. 02:37 PM

CANADIAN PRESS

BEIRUT — Wealthy tourists sporting designer shades mingled with war-weary evacuees with nothing but the clothes on their backs under a baking sun today as a last-minute rush hit the Canadian evacuation centre in Lebanon. More than 1,700 people arrived at the gate at Beirut's harbour to board four ships and embark on a journey to Canada through Turkey and Cyprus, and soldiers organizing the evacuation said they hadn't seen such a rush since the early days of the exodus a week ago. High-heeled women nonchalantly pulled up in Mercedes-Benz sedans and clicked along the asphalt at the waterfront, while bedraggled evacuees from the south clutched a few belongings salvaged from bombed-out homes — most precious among them, their Canadian passports or citizenship cards. "I'm worried. My passport is no longer valid. Do you think that will be a problem for me?" said Ali Tohme, who braved the treacherous road to Beirut after missing the Canadian boat that left the southern city of Tyre on Wednesday with his son and wife. Tohme said he was visiting an aunt before the war, and became separated from his family. His ancestral village is 85 kilometres south of Beirut, but the journey was fraught with danger. "I came with a driver — he's really a hero," Tohme said. "It's scary, very risky. ... People were fleeing. The shelling, the bombing. All the bridges are gone." Many of the last-minute evacuees said they had been clinging to hope that Wednesday's meeting in Rome involving high-profile world leaders might lead to a ceasefire in the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah militants. "I didn't contact the embassy because I thought there might be a ceasefire or something, but (Wednesday) there was no declaration," said Amal Jawhar, a graduate student at Concordia University in Montreal. "We expected this to last a few days, not a few weeks." Today's evacuations brought the number of Canadians who have fled Lebanon to 11,500 out of an estimated 40,000 in the country.
Other countries began winding down their evacuations days ago, with about half their citizens fleeing the war zone. Officials have not explained why Canada's rate of rescue is so much lower. Prime Minister Stephen Harper predicted the bulk of the evacuation would be over by now, with about 10,000 evacuees. Several evacuees said Foreign Affairs officials told them the last ship would leave Friday, although officials would not confirm that plan today. Officials have also said they will not end the process until every Canadian who wants to leave is gone, leaving some officials on the ground to suggest a scaled-down version of the evacuation might continue into next week. Not all of Lebanon is in flames, with the violence mainly concentrated in the southern reaches of the country and a suburb of Beirut. In the rest of the country, business is slow but life carries on. Many Lebanese-Canadians staying behind say they are doing so for a variety of reasons, ranging from medical problems to wanting to keep families together. A woman pulled up to ask Cpl. Jason Forget if she could bring her elderly parents, who are not Canadian citizens. Forget politely told her she could not.
She asked how long the evacuation would go on, and Forget told her she should get her suitcase and get on a boat immediately. The woman complained she didn't have enough time. "Part of this is tough because I wouldn't want to leave my parents behind, either," Forget said later. "On the other hand, part of this is a matter of convenience for the rich. Others are using it to get visas that are often otherwise hard to get." Weissam Eid, an young oilfield worker from Edmonton, married a Lebanese woman last summer and has been working on bringing her to Canada ever since. He came to Lebanon for the summer to be with her at her family's home in Tripoli, an area of Lebanon that is nearly untouched by the war. "Where I live in Tripoli, there's nothing really," he said. ``But I want to take my wife with me. I'd stay, I don't mind the war." "I got married last year, and then I sponsored to bring my wife here. We didn't get the visa until now. It's hard, spending all that time without your wife."

Israel says world backs offensive
The people of Tyre no longer feel they are in a safe haven
Israel says the decision by a summit of world powers not to call for a halt to its Lebanon offensive has given it the green light to continue.
"We received yesterday at the Rome conference permission from the world... to continue the operation," Justice Minister Haim Ramon said.
His comments came before Israeli cabinet ministers decided not to launch a large-scale ground offensive.
Israel has launched fresh air raids, amid ongoing fighting in south Lebanon.
At least 423 Lebanese and 51 Israelis have died in the violence since Hezbollah captured two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid on 12 July.
Following the deaths of four UN observers in an Israeli air strike, Australia has withdrawn 12 UN peacekeepers, describing the prospect of sending an international force to Lebanon right now as a "suicide mission"
UN refugee chief Antonio Guterres says 500,000 people have been displaced within Lebanon by the fighting
A poll of Israelis published by Israel's Maariv daily newspaper suggests 82% back the continuing offensive and 95% say Israel's action is justified
Sustainable truce
Foreign ministers attending emergency talks on the crisis in Rome on Wednesday did not call for an immediate ceasefire, vowing instead to work with the "utmost urgency" for a sustainable truce.
Speaking on Israeli army radio, Mr Ramon - a close confidant of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert - said "everyone understands that a victory for Hezbollah is a victory for world terror".
He said that in order to prevent casualties among Israeli soldiers battling Hezbollah militants in southern Lebanon, villages should be flattened by the Israeli air force before ground troops moved in.
He added that Israel had given the civilians of southern Lebanon ample time to quit the area and therefore anyone still remaining there could be considered a Hezbollah supporter. "All those now in south Lebanon are terrorists who are related in some way to Hezbollah," Mr Ramon said.
At its meeting later, the Israeli cabinet decided not to broaden its military offensive, Israel Radio reported. But ministers also decided to call up thousands of additional reservists to boost the military campaign, the radio said. The chief of Israel's northern command, Maj Gen Udi Adam, has warned that he expects the fighting to "continue for several more weeks". The head of political programmes at Hezbollah's TV station, al-Manar, Ibrahim Moussawi, says the organisation is determined to continue fighting. Israel suffered its worst losses in an ambush in Bint Jbeil "Israel is a mighty army. You're talking about a regional superpower with hi-tech weaponry," Mr Moussawi said.
"But when you talk about resistance and determination and resolve to face and to confront this, yes, Hezbollah has the will and the determination to do it."
"The Israelis have tried this before since 1982, which culminated in the year 2000 with the defeat of the Israelis and their withdrawal from south Lebanon," he added.
Difficult terrain
The BBC Jim Muir in Tyre, in southern Lebanon, says that the progress of Israeli ground troops has not been as fast as expected as they battle through the difficult terrain of southern Lebanon. They still have not managed to capture the Hezbollah stronghold of Bint Jbeil, where they have suffered their worst losses. An Israeli military official told the BBC that Israel had destroyed 50% of Hezbollah's weapons arsenal. I cannot believe the level of force with which Israel has decided to retaliate in Lebanon
Glen, Edinburgh
But the group's ability to inflict damage appears undiminished - on Wednesday they fired some 150 rockets into Israel, more than on any other day of the conflict. Pursuing Mr Olmert's plan of pushing Hezbollah back from border areas, in order to prevent them continuing to fire rockets into Israeli territory, and establishing a "security zone" in the south will take many weeks, our correspondent adds. Meanwhile, Israel's attacks on Lebanon have continued with air strikes on a Lebanese army base and a radio relay station north of Beirut. In Tyre, the bombing of nearby areas, combined with last night's raid on flats near the city centre, has sparked a civilian exodus.

Rice defends U.S. position on cease-fire
KATHERINE SHRADER
Associated Press
Andy Wong, Associated Press
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, left, with Malaysian Foreign Minister Syed Hamid Albar in Kuala Lumpur, July, 27, 2006.
More photosKUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia - As Asian countries expressed concerns about Mideast violence, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Thursday she was willing to return to the region while she defended the U.S. insistence that any cease-fire address deep-seated conflicts there.
Attending the annual meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Rice declared she is "willing and ready to go back to the Middle East at any time" to work for a sustainable peace plan and to smooth the delivery of humanitarian supplies to the people of Lebanon
Even as Rice and representatives of the nations attending the conference were preoccupied with what is happening in the Middle East, they also faced another festering diplomatic problem with North Korea's determination to develop a nuclear weapons program.
Before flying to Malaysia for the long-scheduled ASEAN regional forum, Rice spent three days traveling to Beirut, Jerusalem, the West Bank and Rome, trying to convince world leaders that the Bush administration's insistence that a cease-fire on the Lebanon-Israeli border must come with terms to ensure the violence doesn't flare weeks or months later.
The position isolated her from nearly all U.S. allies, who are seeking a quick end to the fighting that has cost millions of dollars and hundreds of lives. They want to stop the fighting before engaging in complex negotiations about disarming the Lebanon's well-armed Hezbollah militia, strengthening the country's central government and other difficult issues.
As a result, a meeting of senior diplomats in Rome on Wednesday failed to produce an unanimous, concrete course for a cease-fire, falling back to a broad outline aimed at peace.
Briefing reporters on her way to Asia, Rice stressed areas where she found common ground with the 17 other international leaders who gathered in Rome. She acknowledged that many countries called for an immediate cease-fire, but said several did not.
"I thought that a way forward got a big boost today in the consensus around that table," she said, including an agreement on the need for an international force to help stabilize Lebanon, particularly to its south, which is controlled by Shiite militants with Hezbollah.
"Yes, we want a cease-fire urgently," Rice said. "But let's create the conditions for a cease-fire, and create them quickly and urgently that will make the end of violence finally last."
Rice's position effectively gives Israel more time to continue its strikes against the capabilities of Hezbollah. She has said she does not want to dictate to Israel how it should handle its affairs.
At a press conference, French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy said he regretted that the delegates couldn't agree on the precise language calling for a cease-fire. He said the French had wanted to call for an "immediate cessation of hostilities," but Rice successfully pressed for "we will work immediately for the cessation of hostilities."
Lebanon's Prime Minister Fuad Saniora pleaded for more. "The more we delay the cease-fire, the more we are going to witness (that) more are being killed, more destruction, more aggression against the civilians in Lebanon."
Aboard her plane en route to Asia, Rice tried to downplay expectations of a quick fix in the Lebanon or the Middle East. "I am a student of history, so perhaps I have a little bit more patience with the enormous change in the international system and the complete shifting of tectonic plates, and I don't expect it to happen in a few days or even a year," she said.
Rice indicated she plans to stay engaged in the issue, even as she meets with leaders from Asia to discuss how to deal with North Korea at the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.
The opaque regime has pressed ahead with its nuclear program despite international demands and launched seven missiles earlier this month, also angering the world community. The United Nations Security Council responded with an unanimous U.N. resolution to impose limited sanctions on North Korea. It also demanded that the reclusive communist nation suspend its ballistic missile program.
North Korea immediately rejected the resolution and vowed to launch more missiles. North Korean Foreign Minister Paek Nam-Sun was expected to attend the sessions
Rice said she doesn't anticipate any talks with the six nations who have met formally to address the North Korea problem. They haven't met since last November, when Pyongyang began boycotting the talks in November, protesting U.S. sanctions for alleged counterfeiting and money laundering activities.
"I've said anytime people want to talk in the six-party framework, I am ready to do it," Rice said. "But I don't have any indication that the North Koreans intend to take up the call that was there in the resolution, that they should re-engage."Rice skipped the annual conference in Asia last year, drawing criticism from participants afterward. This time, Rice flew in with two fellow diplomats, the European Union's foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, and Canadian Foreign Minister Peter McKay.association of Southeast Asian Nations: https://http://www.aseanregionalforum.org

Bringing Iran and Syria in from the cold
Simon Tisdall -Thursday July 27, 2006
The Guardian -A black day in the Middle East produced one hopeful glimmer: Kofi Annan's insistence, backed by hosts Italy and other Rome conference participants, that lasting peace in Lebanon would require the "constructive engagement" of all regional countries including Syria and Iran. "Looking at the broader picture it is clear we need a new push for comprehensive peace," the UN secretary-general said. "Without this, we are only buying time until the next explosion."Mr Annan's words sound like a statement of the obvious. And Syria and Iran have repeatedly stated that no Lebanon deal can stick without them. But for its own geo-strategic reasons, the US continues to cold-shoulder the two countries it blames for arming and aiding the Lebanese Shia militia. There have been half-hearted contacts with Syria through the US embassy in Damascus. But with Tehran, a founder member of Mr Bush's "axis of evil", nothing at all. Yet good reasons for seeking direct Iranian and Syrian engagement grow by the day as the US and Israel dig themselves into ever deeper trouble. Yesterday's Roman circus again underlined international divisions over how to end the fighting and how subsequently to police the Israel-Lebanon border. None of the participants has any appetite for forcibly disarming Hizbullah.
The wider context - Saudi warnings of regional conflagration, a possible Shia uprising against US and British forces in Iraq, escalating mayhem in Gaza, a big al-Qaida recruiting boost, more suicidal terror attacks in western cities, and further global oil shocks - adds up to a strong case for a change of course.
On top of all that, pro-western Arab regimes of varying degrees of illegitimacy wonder how long they can prevent street-level anger at the destruction inflicted on Lebanon taking an insurrectionary turn. Egypt and Saudi Arabia have been quietly pushing for an opening to Syria, diplomats say.
Recognising the danger, conservative American commentators are urging Mr Bush to make President Bashar al-Assad an offer he cannot refuse: a grand bargain that would accord Syria the regional power status it covets while smashing its alliance with Iran.
In return for cutting its weapons supplies and its political and financial support for Hizbullah, they say, Syria could be offered normalised relations and an end to bilateral sanctions. Other carrots include soft-pedalling on the inquiry into last year's murder of the former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri, and renewed discussion on the Golan Heights, seized by Israel in 1967.
"The big strategic chess move is to try to split Syria off from Iran and bring Damascus back into the Sunni Arab fold. That is the game-changer," said columnist Thomas Friedman. "What would be the Syrian price? It would be worth finding out. After all, Syria hosts Hamas's leadership. It is the land bridge between Hizbullah and Iran. And it is the safe haven for Ba'athist insurgents in Iraq."
Nadim Shehadi, a Middle East expert at Chatham House, said it was possible Mr Bush would turn to Syria as a way out of the crisis but only because all the other choices facing the US and Israelis were even worse. "It would be capitulation, maybe you could call it capitulation light, but capitulation all the same. It would be the end of the American regional agenda," he said. And Syria would never entirely pull the plug on Hizbullah. Nor would it break with Iran. "The idea that it would do so is naive. The only reason Syria is not under attack now is because of its alliance with Iran."
Cutting a deal with Damascus to break the deadlock might be more attractive to Washington than accepting a ceasefire that would be portrayed as a victory for Hizbullah, Mr Shehadi said. And it was better than the other choice, which was "direct confrontation with Iran and Syria that could lead to a world war". The biggest danger, he said, was that Mr Bush might suffer "an Oedipus moment" and, determined to avoid his father's supposed mistake in leaving Saddam Hussein in power after the 1991 Gulf war, would attack Iran before the country went nuclear.
Given that background engaging Iran, as urged by Mr Annan, looks like an even harder sell. Iran's price for collaboration would include compromise over its suspect nuclear programme - a likely deal-breaker for the US. And even then, Iran would not abandon Hizbullah. Former president Muhammad Khatami recently hailed the group as "a shining sun that illuminates and warms the hearts of all Muslims and supporters of freedom in the world". And he is a moderate.

Syria and Iran at Odds
July 27, 2006: While Syria is rather strongly allied with Iran in supporting Hizbollah in Lebanon, this alliance is not so strong when it comes to the complex Iraqi situation. While the Iranians are supporting Shia radicals in Iraq, in the hope of installing a Shia Islamic regime there, Syria, although dominated by a Shia minority, is backing the secularist (Sunni) Baathist insurgents. Naturally, both countries remain hostile to the fundamentalist Sunni oriented terrorists (most notably al Qaeda) in Iraq. There have been clashes between Al Qaeda and some of its associated groups and the radical Shia Jaysh al Mahdi movement.
There appears to be rising concern in some circles that the Turks may intervene in force in northern Iraq against the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). Of late PKK actions in southeastern Turkey, which is heavily Kurdish, have been on the rise. Although there are already some Turkish forces—reportedly under 2,500—manning observation posts slightly inside Iraq, they have not been effective in monitoring PKK cross-border movement. As a result, the Turkish Army has reportedly drawn up plans for a major (as in division-sized or larger) operation against PKK dominated areas in northern Iraq. Intel analysts believe the plans could be put into operation in the even of a particularly spectacular attack by the PKK The political consequences could be significant.
The U.S. is sending several thousand troops into Baghdad's Sunni Arab neighborhoods, to assist in hunting down terrorists. The Sunni Arabs feel more comfortable with American troops around, as the Iraqi army and police are dominated by Kurds and Shia Arabs. This new plan is supposed to take advantage of a greater willingness of Sunni Arabs to provide tips on where the terrorists are hiding. Cell phones, which are very popular and available, make this easier to do. In the last week, several terrorist cells in Baghdad have been taken down because of such tips.
July 26, 2006: Saddam Hussein's trial may seem farcical, but it is being watched with great seriousness by thousands of Saddam's former officers and officials. Like Saddam, these other fellows have blood on their hands, and their names are known to the government. While many have fled to Syria and Jordan, the majority are still in Iraq, and not willing to be taken alive, or at all. These men know how to use weapons, and terror. Intimidation comes easily to them, and the police usually back off when they confront a few dozen of them. While the prisons are full of these war criminals, the government does not want to start a larger round of war crimes trials until it is done with Saddam. That, however, is being delayed purposely by Saddam and his supporters, in order to delay any more such trials. This, in turn, has allowed for several rounds of negotiations between Sunni Arab leaders and the government over who shall have amnesty. Winding up this deal is being delayed by disagreements over letting some people, who ran terrorist operations during the last three years, walk. These guys insist that, either they get a pass, or they go down killing, and Sunni Arab leaders will move to the top of their hit list.
July 25, 2006: The Iraqi army is working on an expansion plan, to recruit and train another 15 infantry battalions, which would bring combat strength up to 128 battalions. The main reason for this is to deal with the Sunni Arab terrorist groups, and potential resistance from Shia militias. The army is considered more reliable, and less corrupt than the Interior Ministry forces (national police and various security organizations). For example, while the police are believed to be involved in some of the kidnapping, it's the army that increasingly rescues kidnap victims. Either alone, or while operating with American troops, the cordon and search operations, and raids, will often come across a kidnapper hiding place, and victims awaiting someone to raise a ransom.

CHRONOLOGY-Messages attributed to al Qaeda
27 Jul 2006 11:21:23 GMT
More July 27 (Reuters) - Al Qaeda's deputy leader Ayman al Zawahri warned that his group would not stand by and watch Israel bombard Lebanon and the Palestinians, in a video aired on Al Jazeera on Thursday. Following is a chronology of major statements attributed to Osama bin Laden, Zawahri or their allies this year. At least 36 messages have been broadcast since Al Jazeera aired the first statement by bin Laden in 2001.
Jan. 6, 2006 - Zawahri says in a video that U.S. President George W. Bush's plans to withdraw troops from Iraq means Washington has been defeated by the Muslims.
-- Jan. 19 - Bin Laden warns that al Qaeda is preparing new attacks inside the United States but says the group is open to a conditional truce with Americans, according to an audiotape.
-- Jan. 30 - Zawahri says he survived a U.S. air strike in Pakistan. The attack struck a village stronghold of pro-Taliban Islamists in Pakistan on Jan. 13.
-- April 23 - Bin Laden says Western efforts to isolate the Palestinian Hamas government and the Darfur crisis in Sudan are examples of the West's "crusader war" against Islam.
-- April 25 - A video of Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi, leader of al Qaeda in Iraq, is posted on the Internet, the first known tape to show an unmasked Zarqawi delivering an extended rallying address. Zarqawi was killed on June 7 in a U.S. air strike.
-- April 29 - Zawahri says in a video that hundreds of suicide bombers have "broken America's back" in Iraq.
-- May 23 - Bin Laden says in an audiotape that Zacarias Moussaoui had nothing to do with the 9/11 operations. The speaker says he personally assigned tasks to the 19 hijackers who staged the attacks.
-- June 1 - Zarqawi calls on fellow Sunnis to reject any reconciliation with "infidel" Shi'ites, in an audiotape.
June 9 - Zawahri urges Palestinians, in a video, to reject a referendum on a statehood proposal that implicitly recognises Israel.
June 22 - Zawahri vows vengeance against the United States for the death of Zarqawi in a U.S. air strike.
June 30 - Bin Laden praises Zarqawi as a "lion of jihad", and vows al Qaeda will continue to fight U.S. forces and their allies "everywhere", according to an Internet audiotape.
July 1 - Bin Laden warns Iraq's Shi'ite majority of retaliation for attacks on Sunni Arabs and says his group will fight the United States anywhere in the world.
July 7 - A year on from the London bombings, al Qaeda issues a video with comments from Zawahri, bin Laden and one bomber. Zawahri says bombers Shehzad Tanweer and Mohammad Sidique Khan had been trained in al Qaeda camps.
July 27 - Zawahri, in video statement titled "The Zionist-crusader war on Lebanon and the Palestinians", calls on Muslims to fight attacks on their countries.

Let It Bleed
Leaders at the Rome summit on the Mideast are ignoring the real bottom line: Hizbullah is winning.
WEB-EXCLUSIVE COMMENTARY
By Christopher Dickey
Newsweek
Updated: 3:57 p.m. ET July 26, 2006
July 26, 2006 - Worthy-sounding meetings of ministers, like the International Conference for Lebanon held in Rome today, rarely get very much done. The participants here were high-powered, to be sure: U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, the prime minister of the country in question, Fouad Siniora, plus a slew of Europeans and Arabs (but no Israelis or Hizbullahis). Instigated by Washington, it was all for show.
The assembled dignitaries expressed their “determination to work immediately to reach with the utmost urgency a ceasefire” in the war that started two weeks ago today when the Hizbullah militia crossed the border to capture two Israeli soldiers, and Israel responded with a massive counterattack the length and breadth of Lebanon. But, at American insistence, the ceasefire would have to be one that’s “lasting, permanent and sustainable.” Which means the flames searing Lebanon, threatening Israel and endangering the most volatile region in the world will go on for weeks, if not months, to come. The consolation prize: a promise of “immediate humanitarian aid.”
Imagine, if you will, that arsonists have set your apartment block on fire. You call 911 and plead for help. The dispatcher tells you of her “determination to work immediately with the utmost urgency” to douse the flames, but only if plans can be agreed on for the new building to be erected when the decrepit old one has gone up in smoke. She’s stalling, hoping the arsonists will be eliminated by the conflagration. And she’s got a great vision for the way that block should look some day. That’s what counts. Not your furniture, or for that matter, your family inside … No wonder Siniora looked distraught as the conference closed.
But as irrational as the politicians who make policy may be, the professionals in their entourages often understand reality quite well. And in the corridors of today’s conference I met several men and women who, on background or off the record (meaning they were afraid of losing their jobs if caught talking too frankly) laid out a picture of the situation in the Middle East right now that was convincing, frightening, and seems to have escaped the notice of Dispatcher Rice altogether.
The bottom line: Hizbullah is winning. That’s the hideous truth about the direction this war is taking, not in spite of the way the Israelis have waged their counterattack, but precisely because of it. As my source Mr. Frankly put it, “Hizbullah is eating their lunch.”
We’re talking about a militia—a small guerrilla army of a few thousand fighters, in fact—that plays all the dirty games that guerrillas always play. It blends in with the local population. It draws fire against innocents. But it’s also fighting like hell against an Israeli military machine that is supposed to be world class. And despite the onslaught of the much-vaunted Tsahal, Hizbullah continues to pepper Israel itself with hundreds of rockets a day.
The United States, following Israel’s lead, does not want an immediate ceasefire precisely because that would hand Hizbullah a classic guerrilla-style victory: it started this fight against a much greater military force—and it’s still standing. In the context of a region where vast Arab armies have been defeated in days, for a militia to hold out one week, two weeks and more, is seen as heroic. Hizbullah is the aggressor, the underdog and the noble survivor, all at once. “It’s that deadly combination of the expectation game, which Hizbullah have won, and the victim game, which they’ve also won,” as my straight-talking friend put it.
Neither U.S. nor Israeli policymakers have taken this dynamic into account. If they had, they’d understand that with each passing day, no matter how many casualties it takes, Hizbullah’s political power grows. Several of my worldly Lebanese and Arab friends here in Rome today—people who loathe Hizbullah—understand this problem well. Privately they say that’s one of the main reasons they are so horrified at the direction this war has taken: they fear not only that Lebanon will be destroyed, but that Hizbullah will wind up planting its banner atop the mountain of rubble.
When I heard Condi talking in pitiless academic pieties today about “strong and robust” mandates and “dedicated and urgent action,” I actually felt sorry for her, for our government, and for Israel. As in Iraq three years ago, the administration has been blinded to the political realities by shock-and-awe military firepower. Clinging to its faith in precision-guided munitions and cluster bombs, it has decided to let Lebanon bleed, as if that’s the way to build the future for peace and democracy. URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14045328/site/newsweek/

When Beirut Comes to Syria
Wednesday, Jul. 26, 2006: On Scene: The sudden influx of cosmopolitan Lebanese refugees into the far more conservative Damascus has made for an odd tableau
By REBECCA SINDERBRAND/DAMASCUS
As Fouad Wehbe sucks on his houka pipe at the Rawda coffee house around the corner from my apartment on Sharia Pakistan in Damascus, the irony of his current plight is not lost on him. Last year, Wehbe, 26, joined thousands of his countrymen on the streets of Beirut to call for an end to Syria's domination of his homeland, and threw a heady, vodka-fueled "Liberation Festival" in his Hamra apartment when they officially withdrew. Then, last Thursday, the graphic designer, his parents and brother paid a cabdriver $2,500 to drive them out of Beirut to the heart of Syria, and safety.
At Rawda, where the men start puffing flavored smoke from their nargilehs soon after the sun rises, Wehbe's unlikely presence is only one of the things that are out of the ordinary. Usually, the only background noise at the coffee house is a low murmur of conversation, and the click of marble pieces on a hundred game boards as men puff on their houkas, finger wooden worry beads and play hours-long backgammon marathons. Now, there's a new addition to that symphony: half a dozen TV monitors tuned to al-Jazeera's coverage of the mayhem in Lebanon.
For Wehbe, anxiously puffing on his pipe this morning as he stole glances at the screen, the contrast with the cosmopolitan city he left behind — and the thought that a return might be years away — was almost as demoralizing as the dire reports themselves. "If I have to stay here another week, I think I'm going to go crazy, that's the honest truth," Wehde moaned. "I need to stop thinking about this, but it's impossible. If there were any girls here, that would help. But there aren't any, not really. The ones there are, they're religious. They won't talk to you." For now, he says, his only plans are to check e-mail once an hour, and spend a lot more time with his houka.
Wehbe's hometown of Beirut was, in many ways, a kind of Middle Eastern New York: a vibrant cultural capital where an educated homegrown populace rubbed elbows with a parade of jet-setting foreigners. By contrast, the far more conservative Damascus gives off an Arab-flavored Soviet vibe, from the paranoid residents and omnipresent secret police to the 30-year-old junkers rolling along the streets. The flow of refugees from Beirut to Damascus, therefore, has made for an odd tableau: the normally dreary city is suddenly teeming with sharply dressed Lebanese and foreigners figuring out their next move.
Indeed, for many of them, Syria's capital is a temporary waystation, a one-horse stopover on the way overseas. Others are determined to ride out the war in the relative safety offered by the Assad regime. The government, eager to bolster its image as a benevolent protector of the Lebanese people, has sponsored refugee relief centers throughout the city. There, Syria's new guests can pick up staples like bedsheets and bottled water, and sign up with the Ministry of Labor for help finding work. (Less lucky are the hundreds of thousands of Syrian migrant workers suddenly back home and jobless — the legion of cheap labor that built the recent wave of pricey new Beirut high-rises, and cleaned the apartments inside.)
The mood in Damascus, home to a major faction of Hizballah's leadership, is undeniably tense. But the full-on panic of last fall — when local commentators seemed to calculate hourly updates on the odds of a U.S. invasion — is, so far, largely absent. The U.S. and Israel seem as anxious as officials here are to avoid open conflict; that relative security makes for a safely defiant atmosphere. Hizballah sympathizers take to the streets with bullhorns, engaging bystanders in an angry, fevered call-and-response drawn from party slogans or the latest news. Motorcycles and cars sport yellow-and-green Hizballah banners. Many store windows feature the most popular new poster in Damascus: a photoshopped grouping of a grinning Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a grim Syrian president Bashar Assad and an inscrutable Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah, surrounded by daffodils, roses, and red tulips (the symbol of Islamic Iran).
Not that everyone here is cheering Nasrallah. Syrian citizens may have granted him sudden rock-star status, but Damascus is increasingly a city of diverse refugees, with the newly-arrived Lebanese joining thousands of Palestinians and Iraqis already waiting out their own ongoing national crises. Many of these temporary residents, particularly the newcomers, don't seem to be spoiling for the fight that Hizballah is engaged in.
That sense of lukewarm support is strongest in places like Al Jidadeh, a short drive outside the city. The big crossing point in the commute between Beirut and Damascus is nearly always crowded. But for the past week, say Syrian relief workers, managing the checkpoint has been like trying to force a sea through a tiny spigot. The recent conflict may have created as many as 700,000 refugees; more than 200,000 of them have journeyed overland to Syria since the fighting began, that number surging over the past few days, as the risk of air and sea travel rises. Not all of them are as lucky as Wehbe, who knows he will spend each night in a comfortable hotel room paid for by his parents. Over the weekend, thousands waited in dazed and nervous clumps just inside Syria, beside the armada of taxis that had carried them over the border. Children slumbered in the backs of cars; groups of head-scarved women sat in silent groups under makeshift tent shelters, waiting for meals of donated pita and canned meat.
A weary-looking woman in a black tracksuit and pink flip-flops said she had made the decision to leave Lebanon early that morning, as Israeli bombers returned to strike her area of Baalbeck. Her fiance was still in Beirut. "I just couldn't handle it anymore. I had to get out." She left behind nearly all her possessions, but managed bring along her wedding dress. "Sometime, we will have the wedding," she said firmly. "If we're both still alive."

No Formula for Lebanon Truce
Updated: July 26, 2006
Prepared by: CFR.org Staff
The crisis talks in Rome between U.S., European, and Arab foreign ministers, joined by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, failed to find a formula for a ceasefire (MSNBC) between Israel and the Lebanon-based militia of Hezbollah. But a broad consensus emerged that a strong international peacekeeping force has to be part of the longer-term solution (al-Jazeera), and most argued over American objections that Syria and Iran had to be part of the discussion. During the subsequent news conference (CNN), Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice emphasized the need to disarm Hezbollah, citing UN Security Council Resolution 1559 and stating "we cannot return to the status quo ante."
In Israel on Tuesday, Rice won conditional support from Prime Minister Ehud Olmert for the idea of a foreign peacekeeping force (LAT), possibly led by NATO, on the southern Lebanese border. But officials in Israel, and American officials in unattributed comments, underscored Washington's support (CSMonitor) for the Israeli aim of degrading Hezbollah militarily, even if there are disagreements on methods. Middle East expert Martin Indyk writes in the Financial Times that the United States should push for a UN-sanctioned ceasefire that forces Hezbollah to recognize the authority of the Lebanese government. But external forces have had a mixed history in the region. This new Backgrounder examines the legacy of multinational intervention in the Middle East.
Haaretz reports Israeli defense forces estimate they have ten days left before a ceasefire is called, and are using the time to push deeper into southern Lebanon. Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni tells Newsweek the military offensive is focused on weakening Hezbollah, and says Israel does not want a wider regional war.
Rice began her Mideast visit in war-torn Beirut as a show of support for Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora (NYT), whose government's weakness is examined in this Backgrounder. Her whirlwind itinerary continued in Israel, where she met with Olmert and Defense Minister Amir Peretz (Haaretz) before taking a motorcade to the West Bank for a meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (AP). Abbas joined Siniora in calling for an immediate ceasefire to halt Israeli attacks on Gaza and Lebanon; Olmert, however, vowed the Israeli offensive would continue until it severely degraded Hezbollah's ability to fire rockets at Israel (BBC). But Rice did win a concession from the Israeli leader, who agreed to allow relief flights to land (NYT) at Beirut's International Airport.
Lebanon's Daily Star points to increasing carnage in Iraq, as well as the continuing battering of Lebanon by Israel, as signs that George W. Bush's vision of democracy in the Middle East is being "engulfed in the flames of the current shortsighted American foreign policy." The Weekly Standard says Bush is just being consistent in his policy of support for Israel, but Judith Kipper writes in Newsday that Washington should use its clout to push not just for a resolution, but a settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. CFR President Richard N. Haass tells the New York Times the Middle East is entering a new era in which decisions made by local actors, from states to militias to individuals, will count for more than those of external powers.
As many look to Iran and Syria—both of which are playing strong roles in the crisis—to help contain the violence, those two countries are facing problems of their own. TIME says many Iranians are angry at Hezbollah, rejecting the militia's attempts to turn the crisis into a regional conflict, and worrying that the violence is threatening Tehran's status in the world.

Israel's New Battle Plan: Grinding It Out
The siege of Bint Jebel shows how Israel has learned that, despite its overwhelming technological superiority, it has to fight Hizballah on its own terms — in prolonged and messy ground battles
Tuesday, Jul. 25, 2006
By TIM MCGIRK/JERUSALEM
In Hebrew, the word 'Merkava' means chariot, and the Israeli tank known as Merkava 4, is a mighty, steel-plated chariot of war. But in the stony hills of southern Lebanon, in battles where stealth is more valued than firepower, the chariot is reduced to being an ambulance, ferrying wounded commandos back across the border. And even then, the tank is proving to be less than invincible.
On Monday, two tanks were dispatched to pick up Israeli soldiers wounded in the siege of Bint Jebeil, a town used by Hizballah Islamic militants to spray the northern corners of Israel with rocket fire. The town also has symbolic value to Hizballah; it was here in 2000 that Hizballah chief Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah proclaimed victory after Israeli troops withdrew from Lebanon. The sheikh' s jeering remarks had riled the Israeli generals, so they didn't need any extra motivation this week when Bint Jebeil, its tunnels and caves stocked with rockets and over 100 Hizballah fighters, turned into a major target of the theirs.
As the two tanks came rumbling back with their wounded cargo, they came under fire. A missile blasted one of the Merkav 4s, killing a soldier and injuring a battalion commander. The second ran over a large explosive device planted by Hizballah that is identical to those used to such devastating effect against U.S. armored forces in Iraq. The force of the blast flipped over the 65 ton tank, killing the vehicle's commander and injuring three other crew. Earlier in the 12-day ground offensive, the Israelis had lost another tank to a hidden mine, killing four men.
Israel may have a technological superiority over Hizballah, but in the hide-and-seek dynamic of a guerrilla war, tanks and air strikes aren' t always enough. Some Israeli military officers are worried that the war is being waged the way the guerrillas want, dragging the Israeli Defense Forces into prolonged and messy battles on alien turf. Early on, the Israeli plan was to launch swift punches on the militants' rocket-launching positions and then to withdraw. But Hizballah began to play the game by their rules, drawing the Israeli troops into lengthy ambushes in places where their vaunted 21st century war machine was of little or no use. Not only were the guerrillas masters of the terrain, but they were equipped with top-of-the line anti-tank missiles. The first hard lesson was dealt to the Israelis in a hilltop village known as Maroun al Ras, just 500 meters from the Israeli border. What was intended as a lightning blow by the Israelis turned into a three-day slugfest.
Early on, the Israelis were reluctant to send lots of troops into the fray; Prime Minister Ehud Olmert wanted to keep down casualties and reassure the international community that Israel had no intention of grabbing real estate in Lebanon. And, according to military sources, the Israelis also lacked on-the ground intelligence, so they under-estimated Hizballah' s strength and its determination to punch it out. Despite the Israeli offensive, Hizballah still managed to sling over 2,000 rockets onto Israel.
But after the toll rose to 23 dead and 80 wounded, the IDF had learned their lesson. When it came to a ground offensive, big was better. No longer would they rely on small bands of commandos to flush Hizballah out of their trenches and underground hideouts. By Tuesday, the third day of the offensive, over 5,000 troops were called in to lay siege to Bint Jebeil, most of whose 30,000 Shi'ite inhabitants had long since fled. Facing that kind of full-scale onslaught, Hizballah's fighters have no choice but to flee by night or fight it out. "There is still fighting going on," an army spokesman told journalists on Tuesday. "I can't say we are in total control of the village yet."
With its large army and its overwhelming firepower, Israel will eventually pry the Hizballah militants off the Lebanese border. The problem is it could take weeks, or longer. In recent days, a note of caution has crept into the soundbites of various Israeli military officers. Gone are the boasts that Hizballah will be hammered into oblivion. Instead, they're urging diplomacy and calling for the presence of a robust international peace-keeping force along the border to halt Hizballah's rocketmen. Meanwhile, as casualties rise, many of Israel' s formidable chariots of war are being pressed into ambulance service.?
- With reporting by Aaron. J Klein/Jerusalem

Hizballah Nation
How the Lebanese militants morphed from guerrilla group to political party and then set off the confrontation that has the world on edge
Monday, Jul. 24, 2006
By CHRISTOPHER ALLBRITTON/BEIRUT, NICHOLAS BLANFORD/TYRE
Nervously eyeing the skies for Israeli warplanes, Hussein Naboulsi, a spokesman for Hizballah, took quick strides as he accompanied foreign journalists through the bombed-out neighborhoods of Beirut's southern suburbs. "Listen to me!" he shouted. "We have to move very fast!" He paused amid the devastation to point out the pulverized office blocks in the Harat Hreik district where Hizballah's headquarters had stood only a week earlier. "Now I have no place to work," said Naboulsi, the son of a prominent Shi'ite Muslim cleric.
But the primary work Hizballah does these days is not in office buildings but on the battlefield, and despite an Israeli onslaught that has targeted the group's top brass and top guns, the organization has proved more resilient than many expected. Across southern Lebanon, Hizballah fighters have manned batteries firing as many as 350 rockets a day at Israeli cities and towns, from an arsenal estimated at 13,000 projectiles. At least 100 of the more than 900 missiles fired at Israel have hit Haifa, the nation's third-largest city, while one radar-guided antiship missile (the C-802), a gift to Hizballah from its Iranian sponsors, struck an Israeli gunboat off the coast of Lebanon. Other Hizballah militants, operating in bands of as many as 50 fighters, have battled Israeli troops at close range, knocking out tanks and even crossing into the Israeli town of Metulla.
After several days of fighting, the familiar assumption that Israel could militarily crush any enemy in the region seemed less certain. Could Hizballah survive the onslaught and remain a potent force in the region? Operating from caves or fortified bunkers are some 600 active-duty Hizballah members joined by many more of the several thousand reserves from around the country ready to fight. A military source in Lebanon told TIME that the fighters are apparently communicating via encrypted short-burst-transmission sets to overcome Israeli jamming and eavesdropping capabilities, enabling Hizballah to maintain an effective chain of command. In the Dahiya, the Shi'ite suburbs of Beirut, Hizballah gunmen wearing vests jammed with ammunition patrol the streets. When not engaged in conflict, they assist some of the 500,000 refugees in Lebanon displaced by the fighting and Israel's bombs.
Having triggered the conflict by capturing two soldiers inside Israel, Hizballah is functioning not just as a state within a state but almost as the state itself. Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah initially held a press conference to outline his terms for a prisoner swap: the soldiers would be returned for Lebanese and Palestinian prisoners in Israel. But Israel answered by bombing the runways at Beirut's international airport. Hizballah then began raining rockets on northern Israel. Although Nasrallah went into hiding along with other Hizballah leaders, he continues to issue statements, telling al-Jazeera TV, for example, that he was not harmed by what Israeli officials described as a 23-ton bomb attack on a suspected Hizballah leadership meeting. Such is the bravado of the Islamic fundamentalist leader, who is hailed throughout the Arab world for fighting Israel while other Arab leaders sit on their hands. He gets credit not only for standing up to Israel right now but also for leading a guerrilla war that was widely seen as driving Israeli forces out of Lebanon in 2000 after a 22-year occupation. Becoming resistance heroes helped Hizballah overcome a dodgy past: it is believed to have launched violent attacks during the 1980s ranging from the kidnapping of Americans in Beirut to the bombing of a U.S. Marine barracks in Lebanon.
Despite its record of violence, Hizballah enjoys broad appeal among Lebanese. It has morphed into a political party--winning 14 seats in Lebanon's 128-member Parliament in May 2005--and operates an effective social-welfare organization. Hizballah runs hospitals and schools throughout downtrodden Shi'ite districts. In the kidnapping gambit, however, Hizballah's normally cautious leaders may have overreached. Some Lebanese political insiders speculate that either the group misjudged the probable Israeli response or Iran or Syria ordered Hizballah to deliberately provoke Israel. "They are a tool in the hands of the Syrian regime and for Iran's regional ambitions," says Walid Jumblatt, veteran leader of Lebanon's Druze community. Iran created Hizballah in 1982 in response to Israel's invasion of Lebanon that year. A Lebanese official told TIME that Iran recently doubled its cash infusions to Hizballah, to about $300 million a year.
Lebanon's various factions have united against Israel's onslaught, and Hizballah can still count on broad support. But many citizens are angry at Hizballah for taking it upon itself to initiate a new conflict with Israel. Some politicians say privately that when the dust settles from the fighting, Hizballah should be held to account and disarmed. That's assuming Hizballah continues to survive Israel's blitz in some recognizable form. As Naboulsi, the spokesman, made his way through the rubble of Harat Hreik, a security man with a walkie-talkie suddenly shouted, "Evacuate! Evacuate!" Naboulsi started running down the street: the Israelis, he said, were coming back.

Condi in Diplomatic Disneyland
Viewpoint: The Secretary of State tells the Lebanese that the blood they're seeing represents the birth a brave new order. She's convincing nobody
Wednesday, Jul. 26, 2006By TONY KARON
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice faced a thankless, all but impossible task in trying to sell the Arab world on the U.S. policy of delaying a cease-fire so that the Israeli military can continue its anti-Hizballah campaign. But her case was hardly helped when she explained that the violence that has already killed more than 400 Lebanese and turned more than a half million into refugees represents the "birth pangs of a new Middle East." Phrases like that — and her rejection of the call for an immediate cease-fire on the grounds that "whatever we do, we have to be certain that we're pushing forward to the new Middle East, not going back to the old Middle East" — carry a revolutionary ring that scares the hell out of America's allies in the region. It was revolutionaries like Lenin and Mao, after all, who rationalized violence and suffering as the wages of progress, in the way a doctor might rationalize surgery — painful, bloody, even risking the life of the patient, but ultimately necessary. Social engineering is not surgery, however, and its victims find little comfort in the homilies of its authors.
Arab leaders, moreover, have learned to be suspicious of Rice's revolutionary ambitions — just a year ago, she spoke of spreading "creative chaos" in the region. Iraq, after all, is Exhibit A of the Bush Administration's "New Middle East," and it's a bloody mess that is growing worse by the day. Now, for Act 2, the Arabs are being told to sit quietly while Israel tears Lebanon apart, after months of watching it slowly throttle Gaza through a U.S.-backed economic blockade, and then bomb it for weeks on end. Hardly surprising that the Arabs — from the U.S.-backed autocrats to the beleaguered liberal democrats and the rising Islamists — see little to cheer in the Bush Administration's "new Middle East."
Rice's midguided revolutionary rhetoric is only one of the mistakes the Secretary of State made on her ill-fated mission to the MIdeast. Some other lessons the Administration will need to absorb quickly from its crash course in Middle East diplomacy:
Diplomacy means not only talking about your adversaries, but also talking to them
Critics have long warned that by refusing on principle to talk to the likes of Iran, Syria, Hamas and Hizballah, the U.S. is restricting its own ability to influence events in a region where those regimes and organizations represent a significant force. As Rami Khouri, editor at large of Beirut's Daily Star, so tartly put it: "Washington is engaged almost exclusively with Arab governments whose influence with Syria is virtually nonexistent, whose credibility with Arab public opinion is zero, whose own legitimacy at home is increasingly challenged, and whose pro-U.S. policies tend to promote the growth of those militant Islamist movements that now lead the battle against American and Israeli policies. Is Rice traveling to a new Middle East, or to a diplomatic Disneyland of her own imagination?"
The problem with boycotting regimes you deem unacceptable is that if they are able to influence events, you're forced to respond to their initiatives, often in dangerous crisis moments. The U.S. and the Soviet Union were implacable foes who knew they could not resolve their differences, yet they maintained communication and developed understandings that allowed them to manage those differences in the interests of global stability. It is time for Bush the Younger to grow up.
Sometimes listening is as important as talking
Last week, Administration officials spinning Rice's mission boasted that "she's not going to come home with a ceasefire, but with stronger ties to the Arab world... What we want is our Arab allies standing against Hizballah and against Iran, since there is no one who doesn't think Iran is behind this."
So the Bush Administration expected that while Lebanon and Gaza are under Israeli assault, the very Arab autocrats the Bush administration in a giddier moment had threatened with a fatal dose of democracy — and whose citizens are backing Hizballah — are going to give diplomatic support to Israel and the U.S. offensive against Hizballah? You have to wonder what these guys are smoking.
Plainly, every Arab leader they've spoken to since has insisted that stopping the bombardment is an absolute priority. Even the Iraqi government, ostensible poster child of the "new Middle East," has differed sharply with the Bush administration's stance. What the Arabs are telling Washington is this: Not only will the Israeli bombardment probably strengthen Hizballah in Lebanon, but its continuation with U.S. blessing will imperil other U.S. interests in the region
In the Middle East, you're judged by your position on Israel and the Palestinians
The Administration is correct that Hizballah and Iran represent a major challenge to the pro-U.S. Arab regimes such as Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia. They're so dangerous precisely because they are able to capitalize on the popular mood in those countries that seeks redress for the Palestinians — an issue on which the moderates have precious little to show for their cooperation with Washington. The political momentum in the not-yet-new Middle East is increasingly with forces hostile to the U.S.
Getting anything done diplomatically in the region will require a lot more than talking about President Bush's "vision" of a Palestinian state and a "road map" that is the functional equivalent of the old Beach Boys song "Wouldn't It Be Nice" — there is no active process associated with it, nor is there likely to be for the foreseeable future. Without revisiting the kind of peace process that the current Israeli government has sought to avoid, the "birth pangs of the new Middle East" may be interminable.
Enlightened self-interest will determine Syria's actions
Recognizing that Syria could play a decisive role in curbing Hizballah's capacity for violence, Administration officials have been talking up plans to "peel Syria away" from its ties to Iran, although its refusal to talk directly to Damascus means it has to outsource the job to Arab allies viewed by Syria with contempt. And unless they're offering a credible incentive, they're probably wasting their breath: Syria has withstood years of pressure and harangues from the U.S. — perhaps aware that the U.S. and Israel, knowing that the most likely alternative is the Muslim Brotherhood, actually want to keep the Ba'ath regime in place. Syria will refrain from confronting its more powerful enemies, but is unlikely to lift a finger to help them unless it can see in that course a road to end its isolation, and to a resumption of talks aimed at returning the Golan Heights, captured by Israel in 1967, to Syrian control.
Develop a Plan B
The current U.S. position is based on the assumption that Israel's military campaign will, if not destroy Hizballah's military capability, badly bloody the organization and force it to accept what it might deem as a surrender. The "cease-fire" that would eventually be agreed would then amount a mopping up operation. But it's growing increasingly unlikely that those battlefield objectives can be realized, and if not, any cease-fire would probably not be on the terms the Administration is seeking. More often than not, diplomacy results in second-best solutions. And if Hizballah survives the Israeli offensive as a fighting force, preventing a recurrence of the crisis would require engagement with the movement's external backers.

How the U.S. Hopes to End the Lebanon Crisis
Tuesday, Jul. 25, 2006
Arab officials say the White House is promoting a four-point proposal to end the fighting, but implementing it won't be easy
By SCOTT MACLEOD
The Bush administration is finalizing what amounts to a four-point plan to end the fighting in Lebanon in a manner that prevents further violence between Hizballah and Israel, Arab sources tell TIME. "The Administration wants a complete solution,"? says one source. Washington's thinking is bold, they say, and includes a recipe both for ending the current fighting and preventing any resurgence. But there may be potent resistance to elements of the plan from Hizballah and Iran.
Cease-fire and international intervention
The U.S. goal is a cease-fire that would halt Israeli air, naval and ground operations in Lebanon. But getting there requires the fulfillment of several preconditions, including an agreement by Lebanon, Israel and — apparently — Syria as well as European nations agreeing to the deployment of a NATO intervention force in Lebanese territory along the Israeli-Lebanese border. Unlike the present UNIFIL peacekeeping mission, which in practice does little more than monitor events, the new force would be empowered under Chapter VII of the United Nations charter to intervene against "threats to the peace, breaches of the peace and acts of aggression."
Prisoner exchange?
U.S. officials say they're also demanding the unconditional release of the two Israeli soldiers held by Hizballah as a precondition for a truce. But according to Arab sources, the U.S. quest for a comprehensive solution will see the proposal also implicitly addresses Hizballah's stated reason for seizing soldiers on July 12, by accepting an exchange of prisoners between Israel and the Lebanese government. U.S. officials say although this idea has been raised by Arab governments, Washington has not yet accepted it.
Lebanon in control
Finally, and most importantly, the administration seeks a process under which the Lebanese army would take full control of security in southern Lebanon, where Hizballah currently runs a state within a state. This would be a key step towards Hizballah eventually disarming, and limiting its role to that of a political party. According to one Arab source, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's surprise visit to Beirut Monday was intended to send a signal of strong support to the Lebanese government of Prime Minister Fuad Siniora, who would have to request the deployment of the NATO force — and persuade Hizballah, which is also part of the government, to accept it.
Arab governments are said to be studying the proposal, and to have responded positively to most of its elements. It is expected to be refined in discussions in Rome on Wednesday between Secretary Rice and Arab, UN and European diplomats.
Despite the positive response, many obstacles lie in the path of such a plan. While the cease-fire proposal would be welcomed by all Arab parties — probably including Hizballah — Israel will be reluctant to agree until it is assured of peace on its northern border. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's government has thus far refused to negotiate for the return of the captured soldiers, and has vowed to reject any return to the pre-July 12 status quo on the Lebanese border. Instead, the Administration's proposal establishes a credible security plan for Israel's northern border, which Arab sources say would take the form of a robust NATO force mandated to act firmly to maintain stability in southern Lebanon and would pave the way for the Lebanese army to take control of the border. That option also had the advantage, for Israel, of avoiding another long-term deployment of Israeli troops in Lebanon, an option of which the Israeli public remains wary given its traumatic 22-year occupation that ended in 2000.
Who'd go to Lebanon?
Assembling the NATO mission may yet prove problematic, given the tragic history of previous foreign peacekeeping interventions in Lebanon. A multinational force led by the U.S. and including France, Britain and Italy landed in Beirut following Israel's invasion of Lebanon in 1982, but effectively became a party to the conflict as Lebanon descended into civil war. President Reagan ordered the withdrawal of the U.S. contingent after suspected Hizballah suicide bombers killed 241 Marines and more than 50 French paratroopers in simultaneous attacks on their Beirut bases.
Hizballah's threat to Israel would be neutralized if the country's border with Israel was controlled by the Lebanese army rather than by the Shi'ite militia.? That's the arrangement called for in the Taif agreement that ended the 1975-90 civil war, as well as in U.N. Resolution 1559. But getting Hizballah to comply will be difficult.
Iran casts a shadow
Hizballah's influence in Lebanese affairs is considerably amplified by the fact that as even as a relatively small armed force, it is more than a match for the national army. Having been designated a terrorist organization by Israel and the U.S., its leaders will understandably fear pursuit and arrest if it is disarmed. And Hizballah's capacity to resist resides not only in its military capabilities, but in the people-power potential of its mass support among Lebanon's Shi'ites. In a show of strength during last year's "Cedar Revolution" protests, Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah brought hundreds of thousands of supporters into the streets of the capital. Iran, Hizballah's chief international patron, will also not be pleased to see Hizballah's wings clipped — Tehran is under fire at the U.N. over its nuclear ambitions, and needs to flex all the strategic muscle it can muster.
Will Syria play ball?
One way to help facilitate the Bush plan, says an Arab source, is to settle the fate of the territory known as Shebaa Farms, wedged between Lebanon and Syria and occupied by Israel since the 1967 war. Although the territory had been part of Syria at that time, both the Syrian and Lebanese governments insist it belongs to Lebanon (although the United Nations disagrees), and that gives Hizballah a pretext to continue bearing arms against Israel on the grounds it is trying to liberate occupied Lebanese land. Arab officials are suggesting that if the U.S. package deal were to return the Shebaa Farms to Lebanon, perhaps to be used for the base of the NATO force, that would allow the Lebanese government to demand the deployment of the army to replace Hizballah guerrillas, and blame Hizballah — and Iran — for blocking a solution to the crisis. Hizballah would also be able to save face by proclaiming Shebaa liberated by its efforts.
The wild card is Syria, which has a strategic alliance with Iran, backs Hizballah, and serves as the logistical bridge between Tehran and the Lebanese group. Syria is in a position to put considerable pressure on Hizballah to cooperate. But unless Syria is either put under unbearable pressure, or is offered the carrot of a resumption of negotiations aimed at the return to Syria of the Golan Heights, occupied by Israel since 1967, President Bashar Assad is unlikely to make a deal with Washington, especially at the expense of Hizballah and Iran.
So, while the framework of a deal may be emerging, getting all the principal players on board to close it will be one of the major diplomatic challenges of our time.
-- With reporting by Elaine Shannon/With the Secretary of State

The Message Behind Rice's Surprise Visit to Beirut
Analysis: After rejecting earlier calls for the ceasefire, the U.S. changes signals because of growing concern over Lebanon's perilous state
Monday, Jul. 24, 2006- By ELAINE SHANNON/BEIRUT
Ever since hostilities between Israel and Hizballah ignited July 12, President Bush and his advisors have refused to consider growing international pressure to back an immediate ceasefire. They painted the word ceasefire as defeatist and short-sighted, and they coined their own term of art, "cessation of violence," to mean a future without an armed Hizballah entrenched in southern Lebanon.
Today, that message took on a notably different focus, one of concern for the future of Lebanon. Short-term, the Bush Administration is worried about a growing humanitarian crisis. Long-term, it fears that unchecked damage done to Lebanon could create a failed state that would pose even more of a threat to Israel.
That was the emphasis of secretary of state Condoleezza Rice's surprise stop in Beirut today, as she sought to make a dramatic show of support for Lebanese leaders staggering under the Israeli bombardment and siege. Rice had planned to fly to Jerusalem, but she diverted to Cyprus at about noon local time, boarded a Chinook helicopter manned by the U.S. Marine Expeditionary Unit 24, the same unit that was the target of the Marine barracks bombing in 1983. Rice's chopper, armed with tripod-mounted machine guns, landed on U.S. embassy grounds in Beirut at about 1 p.m. local time. She was driven in an armored SUV to the office of Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora. Afterwards, another fast, bumpy ride took her to the home of the speaker of the parliament, Nabih Berri, a Shia leader. Outside Berri's residential office, Rice said, "I'm deeply concerned about the Lebanese people and what they are enduring. I'm concerned about the humanitarian situation. President Bush wanted me to make this the first stop."
Rice's appearance here in Beirut was aimed as much to send a signal to Israel as one to Lebanon. Although Rice has never wavered from the Administration's position that the U.S. supports Israel's right to defend itself, her rhetoric has taken on a cooler edge as Israel has continued to bombard Lebanon's infrastructure and has blockaded land and sea routes into the country.
Now there is concern among U.S. officials that the situation in Lebanon will further inflame anger toward the U.S. in the Arab world, coming on top of the chaos and violence in Iraq. These officials say that the loss of goodwill because of Iraq's instability, coupled with the unstinting support for Israel, have moved many Arabsto admire Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah as a David confronting a western Goliath. This movement in Arab popular opinion, American officials say, has not been lost on the leaders of Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan, who are now said to be deeply concerned about the growing opposition movement fired with a combustible mix of extremist religion, rabid nationalism and class and sectarian divisions.
Rice's immediate mission is to discuss with Lebanese, European and moderate Arab leaders, as well as Israeli officials, the creation of a multinational force to hold a "buffer zone" in southern Lebanon. But U.S. officials acknowledge that disarming Hizballah is not going to be done soon or maybe ever. It is one thing to take out rocket launcher emplacements. It is another to stop the inflow of new fighters. Hizballah's recruiting posters are taken from the stream of horrific images showing constantly on cable news around the world.
The Bush Administration's message went through a dramatic evolution over the weekend. Last Friday, describing her upcoming mission to the Middle East, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said dismissively, "I can guarantee you, if you simply look for a ceasefire that acknowledges and freezes the status quo ante, we will be back here in six months again or in five months or in nine months or in a year, trying to get another ceasefire because HIzballah will have decided yet again to try and to use southern Lebanon as a sanctuary to fire against Israel."
But on Sunday, as Rice's U.S .Air Force 757 headed for the Middle East, she told reporters, "We believe that a ceasefire is urgent."
So what changed? Officially nothing, most notably the U.S. position. Rice said that her own idea of a ceasefire involved "a cessation of hostilities that is going to last...The south [of Lebanon] can't be a kind of haven for [Hizballah] to launch attacks."
But every word in diplomacy is carefully chosen, so there may be more to Rice's surprising statement than anyone will admit. Perhaps Rice's willingness to talk about ceasefire had to do with the Sunday afternoon meeting between President Bush, national security advisor Stephen Hadley, Rice and Prince Saud Al Faisal, the Saudi foreign minister, Prince Bandar, the regime's top national security official and Prince Turki, the Saudi Ambassador to the U.S. The trio delivered a letter from Saudi King Abdullah to Bush. And though its content has not been made public, the Saudi government has made no secret of its alarm at Israel's relentless bombardment of Lebanon and at the burgeoning humanitarian crisis in Lebanon and Gaza. Still, the Saudis are expected to join delegations from Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon in Rome, as well as European envoys and World Bank officials, who will help come up with a reconstruction plan for Lebanon.
Rice seems well aware that the death and destruction wreaked by the Israeli bombardment and blockade of Lebanon is causing great anguish in the Arab world — and that U.S. support for Israel is endangering U.S. relations with moderate Arab leaders. So she is making a point of claiming that the U.S. hasn't sat by passively as the region's misery deepens.
"Most of my conversations with the Israelis in recent hours have been about humanitarian assistance," she said shortly after her airplane took off. "We've been working really hard—with the Israelis, with the Lebanese, with others on the humanitarian situation—in trying to establish corridors in and out of Lebanon, as well as corridors within Lebanon that might make it possible to get humanitarian assistance to the Lebanese people. And that work is going to continue while I'm here."
When she meets with Israeli officials, Rice will have another message: "We fully understand the need of Israel to defend itself," she said. "We also understand that the means of its defense will be to have a strong and sovereign Lebanese government on its border that is democratic and friendly to Israel in the long run." So, she said, the U.S. wants Israel "to use restraint and to be concerned about civilian populations, innocent civilians and civilian infrastructure but also to be concerned about the effects on the Siniora government."
Translation: it's not in Israel's interest to topple the fledgling Lebanese government and transform the country into a failed state. If that happens, Hizballah and other militant groups will have even more free rein to make trouble, with Iran and Syria able to exploit the chaos for their own ends.
"I'm fully prepared to return to the region if that would be necessary and helpful," Rice said while traveling to the region Sunday night. But that's a big if, and her schedule is open-ended for a reason. Nobody knows for sure whether anything the U.S. does over the next week can make much difference at all.

Syrian reporter: In Syria there is atmosphere of eve of war
Exclusive: In conversation in Damascus, senior Syrian journalist tells about sentiments in Syria ('as if there will be war any moment'); talks about military preparations in his country ('identifying your reinforcements in Golan Heights'); and estimates that Israeli pounding in Lebanon to intensify grassroots support of Nasrallah and his organization. Also in Syria, he says, Nasrallah more popular than ever
Ali Waked
As the conflict with Hizbullah in Lebanon escalates by the day, the question of Syria's involvement in the conflict becomes increasingly more relevant.
"The atmosphere in Syria is in every way an atmosphere of war, or at least of the eve of war. Syrian television for the first time since
the '80's has started broadcasting Syrian military marches and nationalistic songs. There is not difference between Syrian television broadcasts and Al-Manar broadcasts of the Hizbullah. The broadcasts are in preparation for war, as if Syria is involved in this war, or is going to be involved at any moment. The local newspapers and the television are conducting themselves as if they are preparing the Syrian public for war."
These comments were made by a senior Syrian journalist in a telephone interview from Damascus. It isn't easy these days of war that they don't have there, to convince a Syrian to accept an interview with the Israeli media, even when we're not there. One must remember that each side has his messages to transmit. And yet, the picture sketched by this senior journalist reveals the great concern in Damascus about the operations of Israel – and definitively paints a picture of preparedness for war. A conversation with an interviewee beyond the Golan.
In Israel there is talk that Syria and her army have considerably raised their alert since the start of fighting in Lebanon. Is this indeed the reality there?
"This, in my opinion, is the reality where you are. The Syrian army has identified intensive activity of the Israeli army on the Golan Heights. At first they identified lights on some of the bases at night in Syria. We have noticed a rehabilitation and revival of the Israeli military bases on the Golan on which no one has set foot for more than ten years. We see Israeli soldiers rehabilitating these bases and equipping them."
Paranthetically, it should be mentioned in this article that from the beginning of IDF operations in Lebanon, the level of preparedness on the Golan Heights has been raised noticeably along the border between Syria and Israel. The IDF estimated that the Hizbullah has an interest of bringing Syria into the confrontation, and that the organization would not be loathe to launching Katyushas at the Golan Heights. However, Israel has openly declared that Damascus is out of the game at this point and that there is no intention to confront Syria. With this, the IDF heightened its intelligence alertness along the border, including a larger-than-usual military presence meant to respond to any development in the region.
Beyond the pre-war atmosphere that you described, is there deployment for war or concrete steps of the government and army towards the possibility that Syria will become part of the war?
"I can't say if the army is taking practical steps to prepare for such an option, but what is certain is that Syria has consolidated once and for all the stance that the current situation, especially the occupation of the Golan, needs to stop. If there will be a solution to the current war in Lebanon, we must be part of this solution. And that means negotiation and returning the Golan to the Syrians. And if there won't be a solution, the stance is that we must prepare to liberate the Golan through different means – there aren't many other ways."
How does the Syrian government respond to the accusations of sources in the IDF and in Israel that Syria isn't only aiding the Iranians to transfer weapons to the Hizbullah, but is contributing herself to the arming of Hizbullah with Syrian rockets?
"All the senior and official representatives who have been asked to respond to these accusations have stridently denied them. The official stance, and this is the truth, is that the trucks passing through that the Israeli army is bombing, are trucks for humanitarian aid, carrying food, equipment, and donations that the Syrian people raised or aid from other countries that arrives through Syria. For instance, one of the convoys that was bombed was a convoy of ambulances from the Emirates in the Gulf that was designated for the Lebanese people."
The Syrian journalist also claims that the nature of the explosions testify to the fact that the trucks were not carrying rockets, ammunition, or explosives. "True, there was one time that the explosion was different than the regular ones. This happened when Israeli planes bombed trucks carrying car oil. Then the explosion was different. Syrian television was the first to photograph this explosion. Would they have photographed if Syria had something to hide?
Is Syria ready for a script in which it assists the US to stop the Hizbullah in exchange for a return of Syrian influence in Lebanon and cancellation of anti-Syrian sanctions?
"Whoever has followed the mood in the government and in the Syrian street after the completion of the withdrawal from Lebanon, understands that the emphasis today from the perspective of the government and the Syrian people is on the Golan and the need to return it to Syria – and less on Lebanon."
So, how do you explain that many in Israel and in the world see Syria as a key to solving the current conflict?
"That is because of the special relationship between Syria and the Hizbullah. These are excellent relations, but Syria today doesn't enjoy the same influence over them that they did in the past."
As an example of the great fondness of Syrians for the Hizbullah, the Syrian journalist brings the following story: "In Syria, it is customary in homes, businesses, and shops to hang pictures of the president's family. A picture of the late president Hafez Assad in the center, to the left a picture of the current president, Dr. Bashar, and to the right a picture of the slain son Bassal, the president's brother, whom the Syrian people loved very much.
"But today, especially since the outbreak of fighting, the phenomenon gaining momentum is to swap the picture of the beloved Bassal with a picture of Hassan Nasrallah. This is to express how much we in Syria love and appreciate what Nasrallah has done for the Arab nation. Not for a specific community, not for his country, but for the entire Arab nation."
In Israel there is talk that the current war is a war of the home front and of the patience of the simple people for a continuation of the war situation. We hope that the rest of the war, especially the crushing air strikes and the destruction they wreak, will bring about an uprising of the Lebanese public against Hizbullah that will compel them to stop firing.
"Whoever says that doesn't know Lebanon and her population and hasn't been following the political developments in the period before the war. The Hizbullah's Shiite community is the largest community in Lebanon. Many Sunnis also support Hizbullah. Also, Hizbullah enjoys broad support in the most important section of the Christian population, that which is represented by the general, Michel Aoun, who won the majority of the Christian votes in parliamentary elections."
"We see, for example, Walid Junblatt, who severely criticized the events of the first few days, is the one who today provides cover and aid for thousands of refugees in his area of Mount Lebanon. He does this not only out of humanitarian motives, but also to improve his image a little in Lebanon.
"Even Hariri's representatives and their supporters adopting a similar approach and are dealing with humanitarian aid in order to weaken the criticism they gave at first. At the current time, the social fabric in Lebanon is rallying more and more around support for Hizbullah, giving them the necessary strength to continue this fight."
*Hanan Greenberg contributed to the report