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Losing its Morals and Marbles: Israel's Fight for Lebanon

Remi Kanazi 19 August 2006


If Hezbollah were a military, given Western standards, it would certainly be the most moral in the world. During Israel’s five week offensive, Hezbollah killed 118 Israeli soldiers and 41 Israeli civilians (18 of which were Israeli Palestinians). Hezbollah killed three Israeli soldiers for every one Israeli civilian. In contrast, Israeli forces killed more than 1000 Lebanese civilians during the onslaught (more bodies are expected to be discovered during the current period of “calm”). Robert Fisk, based in Lebanon, reported, “They are digging them [Lebanese bodies] up by the hour.” 

After Worldpride: Notes and Ideas from Jerusalem and Beyond

19 August 2006


Members of the international LGBT community persevered in their vision, making WorldPride a successful model of peaceful discussion and debate. Attendees traveled to Jerusalem from across the globe, despite strong opposition and threats of violence from Christian, Jewish and Muslim religious conservatives. The escalating situation in the Lebanon also created concern. The threats of violence from religious extremists proved to be unfounded; only a handful of antigay protesters made an appearance. This release contains a summary of major WorldPride events as they happened last week. 

Draft Your Own UN Resolution on Lebanon

19 August 2006


If you are confused and puzzled by the recent scramble by the United States and the UN to bring peace to Lebanon, perhaps we can help a little bit with a short read of what we think this all means. In fact, you may be able to write your own resolution, which may make more sense and have more real wisdom than UN Security Council Resolution 1701, passed a week ago. There is a story going around Washington, DC, that three wise men approached the President a fortnight ago with a very strong message that he had to move to a ceasefire as quickly as possible. American interests were being undermined throughout the world. 

Lessons for Palestinian School Children

Rima Merriman 25 August 2006


In a couple of weeks, Palestinian children will start the school year - maybe. The Palestinian Authority (PA) Minister of Education, Dr. Nasser Al Shaer, was abducted by the Israeli army a few days ago and is in prison. Teachers and administrators have not been paid for months as a result of Israel’s withholding of tax revenues. As many as five PA ministers are in Israeli prisons currently, as is a third of the members of the Palestinian Legislative Council, including its speaker. The Palestinian population in the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt) is now thoroughly besieged, contained, infiltrated, sectioned off, isolated, locked up, controlled and manipulated by Israel. 

Political and sexual abuse

Robert Rosenberg 19 August 2006


There is almost nobody in the public arena right now who objects to the view that the last month of fighting against Hizbollah was interrupted and that sooner or later, whether next month or next year, another round will erupt. Nobody disputes that such another round is inevitable, and very few are suggesting any steps to take to prevent that war from breaking out by trying diplomacy with the Lebanese leadership or even engaging the Syrians. And of course, the main issue on the Israeli agenda is the demand for ‘investigations’ into why Israel ‘lost’ the war, with accompanying demands for soul-searching by politicians. 

Lebanese return as Beirut airport opens for business

19 August 2006


UNHCR reports that they expect some 120,000 people to have returned to Lebanon from Syria by midnight tonight with collective centers at Aleppo, Homs and Tartus virtually empty. WFP estimates that only 1,850 people are left in shelters in Damascus. The UK’s Mine Action Group (MAG) warns that UXO clearance of some villages on the Nabatiye area alone will take weeks. Clearance of UXOs near civilian residences is a priority with the rush to return. MAG suggests that the UXO contamination in Lebanon is on a far higher scale than that identified in Iraq after the end of the war in 2003. 

ICJ to inquire into human rights violations in Lebanon

19 August 2006


The International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) has established an Expert Legal Inquiry to investigate whether and to what extent the Israeli Defence Forces and Hezbollah violated international humanitarian law and human rights law during the conflict in Lebanon. The ICJ Expert Legal Inquiry will consist of eminent legal experts in international humanitarian law and senior military officers with operational experience. The Inquiry will seek to travel to Lebanon and Israel and investigate the facts and law. It will focus initially on particular means and methods of war on both sides that have caused some of the greatest loss of civilian life. 

Israeli apartheid: The striking parallels to South Africa

Bruce Dixon 19 August 2006


Imagine, if you will, a modern apartheid state with first, second and eleventh class citizens, all required to carry identification specifying their ethnic origin. First class citizens are obliged to serve in the armed forces, kept on ready reserve status until in their forties, and accorded an impressive array of housing, medical, social security, educational and related benefits denied all others. Second class citizens are exempted from military service and from a number of the benefits accorded citizens of the first class. They are issued identity documents and license plates that allow them to be profiled by police at a distance. 

Abu Mazen: America's Tribute to Hafez Assad

Omar Yousef Shehabi 19 August 2006


The late Hafez Assad had “his Palestinians.” Ideologically divergent, they served politically to forestall any move by the PLO towards a negotiated settlement with Israel and personally to thwart the man Assad loathed like no other: Yasser Arafat. Surely few in my generation have even heard of the personalities comprising the Palestinian face of Assad’s crusade. Abu Musa, a celebrated Palestinian commander early in the Lebanon War, in 1983 led his breakaway Fateh faction into battle against what remained of Arafat’s PLO in the wake of Begin and Sharon’s slaughter a year prior. Thanks to Syrian patronage, his combat victory led him into total obscurity and into early retirement in Damascus. 

"They are here again!"

Mayssoun Sukarieh Baalback 19 August 2006


“They are here again!” It took just this one sentence for a gathering of people making burghol in a village to the north of Baalback to scatter in all directions, running to check the news on the TV stations. The “they” being referred were the Israelis, who according the first report at ten last night, were raiding an area to the north of Baalback. The villagers left the wheat and the fire and started to follow the news. At almost ten thirty, Al-Jazeera assured them that the five air raids were “mock raids”. The villagers gathered again around the big boiling pot of wheat but anxiety was still in the air with uncertainty.