Tuesday, July 13, 2010

  • Tuesday, July 13, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
From All Headline News:
Russia, a key Iranian ally, has publicly admitted for the first time that the Islamic nation may be moving closer to creating nuclear arms.

Speaking at a meeting of ambassadors in Moscow, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said, "Iran is moving closer to possessing the potential which in principle could be used for the creation of nuclear weapons."
Iran responded characteristically:
A senior Iranian lawmaker blasted the recent allegations by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev that Iran is moving closer to the acquisition of military nuclear capability, and cautioned Moscow officials not to be fooled by the "false information" presented by the US and British spy agencies.

"We expect Russia, as a powerful country, not to be fooled by the false information of the American and British spy agencies," Head of the parliament's National Security and Foreign Policy Commission Alaeddin Boroujerdi told FNA on Tuesday.

Noting that Medvedev's comments on Iran's nuclear program are "unreal", Boroujerdi advised Moscow not to follow the policies of the US and Britain.

He also referred to the presence of approximately 3,000 Russian experts at Iran's first nuclear power plant in the southern city of Bushehr as well as the vast cooperation between the two countries in this field, and said, "They (the Russians) are well aware that our nuclear activities are peaceful."
Saeb Erekat, speaking to a Syrian newspaper, emphasized yet again the intransigence of the Palestinian Authority - a word that the Western media applies exclusively to Israel.

He said that the PA will not enter into direct negotiations with Israel unless there is a full, and permanent, end to building in Jerusalem and the West Bank.

He said that Barack Obama made a direct phone call to Mahmoud Abbas asking for direct negotiations, but that the Palestinian Authority would not agree to that no matter how much international pressure is applied.

This is, of course, exactly the attitude that the world ascribes to Israel - of ignoring the international community and acting arrogantly. Yet when the PA does this, explicitly, there is no public criticism to be heard anywhere.

It hardly needs to be mentioned that the PA used to negotiate with Israel directly and that these demands are completely new conditions that were unilaterally added by Mahmoud Abbas - the so-called "moderate" who expects to get all his demands met without a single concession.

In fact, Mahmoud Abbas, that man of "peace" who is pushing to get a Nobel Peace Prize, is more intransigent than Yasir Arafat was in his negotiating positions.
  • Tuesday, July 13, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
The IDF put out videos (Hebrew only so far) and an English description of the events that happened on the Mavi Marmara, based on the results of the Eiland team investigation:

The IDF forces were divided and each group boarded a different ship. The soldiers arrived at the Mavi Marmara at 4:28 AM, but could not board the ship due to metal objects being thrown at them, and electric buzz saws used by the demonstrators to slice the ladders IDF soldiers needed to board the Marmara. After an unsuccessful attempt to board the ship by smaller boats, a helicopter arrived at 4:30 AM with 15 IDF soldiers. The first rope dropped by the helicopters was tied by the demonstrators to the deck of the ship in order to prevent the soldiers’ descent.
Soldiers that descended down the second rope were met by 2-4 demonstrators each who wielded knives, axes, and metal poles. The second soldier to descend was shot in the stomach by a demonstrator. The soldiers who were in danger of their lives were forced to use their live weapons. Five soldiers were injured by stabbing, blows and live fire by the demonstrators. Within seconds of boarding the ships, three soldiers were thrown off the deck by demonstrators. The injured were dragged to the hull of the ship.
A reinforcement of soldiers arrives from a second helicopter, which is also attacked by demonstrators, and the soldiers are met with violence when they attempt to access the lower deck of the ship.
At 4:46 AM a third helicopter arrives to the Mavi Marmara, and the two groups of soldiers combine forces on the ship roof and descend to the other parts of the ship, where they are also met with lethal violence, and thus respond with live fire.
Many of the demonstrators enter inside of the ship as the smaller boats arrive at the side of the ship, however some still violently attack the incoming boats and the soldiers respond with live fire.
The Commander of the Special Navy Forces boards the ship, and while evaluating the forces, it is discovered that three soldiers are missing. The missing and injured soldiers are discovered to have been abducted by a number of violent demonstrators, who abandon the soldiers and run back into the ship when fired at.
Two of the injured soldiers jump off the ship so that they can be picked up by the IDF boats. The third injured soldier is on the bow of the boat and slipping out of consciousness. IDF soldiers remaining on the boat come to his aid.
At 5:17 AM the situation is evaluated and some of the findings: live fire was used by demonstrators towards IDF soldiers who were on the ship, including one soldier who descended down the rope and was shot in the abdomen. Live fire by the demonstrators was also aimed at the soldiers on the small Israeli Navy boats next to the Marmara. The first occurence of live fire was that used by the demonstrators. In addition, a gun with emptied magazines was found in the hull of the ship.
IDF forces had boarded the other ships without incident. Treatment and evacuation was carried out for the injured soldiers and demonstrators alike. 38 injured were airlifted, 7 of them soldiers.
The three soldiers who had been attempted to be kidnapped and were taken to the hull of the ship were witness to an argument between the violent demonstrators, and other passengers of the Marmara who asked the violent demonstrators to cease their violent activity.
24 of the injured passengers were diagnosed at the Ashdod Port and treated in hospitals in Israel.
After the operation ended, the ships arrived at the Ashdod Port accompanied by Israeli Naval forces. An intelligence investigation following the flotilla incident found that 40 of the IHH activists previously boarded the Marmara ship from Istanbul before joining the others.
The 8 of the 9 demonstrators killed were members of the IHH or other allied groups. Around half of those killed had declared in front of their families their aspiration to die as martyrs (“shahids”). Footage on the Marmara shows that the violence had been prepared: metal poles and chains were prepared, slingshots, buzzsaws, gas masks, tear gas, bulletproof vests, knives, and more. A briefing had taken place before the IDF had boarded the ship, with the leader of the violent demonstrators telling the group to attack the IDF soldiers at any cost.
There were 718 total passengers of the flotilla ships. Most were released without undergoing any investigation. The last passenger left on June 6th.

Monday, July 12, 2010

  • Monday, July 12, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
Today we saw many news stories about the German government banning the IHH - the Internationale Humanitäre Hilfsorganisation - "charity" organization because of its ties with Hamas:

Germany's government has banned an organization it accuses of collecting donations that are sent to Hamas-related welfare projects. The Islamist movement is included on the European Union's terror group blacklist.

German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said in a statement that the International Humanitarian Relief Organization was banned Monday because it has used donations to support projects in Gaza that are related to Hamas – while presenting their activities to donors as humanitarian help.

"Under the guise of humanitarian aid, the IHH has long backed, with significant financial assistance, so-called social welfare organizations based in the Gaza Strip that can be linked to Hamas," he said.

"Donations to so-called social welfare groups belonging to Hamas, such as the millions given by IHH, actually support the terror organization Hamas as a whole."
All of these stories take pains to say that this IHH is not related to the Turkish organization with the same initials, which was involved in attacking IDF soldiers on the Mavi Marmara.

The Turkish IHH actually does stand for something different: İnsan Hak ve Hürriyetleri ve İnsani Yardım Vakfı,[2] in English: The Foundation for Human Rights and Freedoms and Humanitarian Relief. Wikipedia has a link to the German IHH site (not available today but retrieved last month) where they issued a clarification that they were not associated with the Turkish IHH.

So even though both groups apparently have the same Islamist goals and support the same terror organizations, they appear to be different.

And yet, their logos are strikingly similar, down to the number of leaves:

Even if they do not have the same pedigree, it is a distinction without a difference - the very same rules that prohibit IHH Germany apply to IHH Turkey.

But I think that it might be a good idea, as a pre-emptive measure, to ban all Islamist-leaning organizations that have logos with the same number of leaves around a globe meant to symbolize the world:


UPDATE:
The organization was founded in 1992 in Freiburg, Germany, the ministry said. In 1997 the group split in two, IHH Germany and IHH Turkey, which are now two separate entities, it said.
(h/t Lucy Lips)
  • Monday, July 12, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
Maj. Gen. (Res.) Giora Eiland had the task of examining, from a military perspective, the conduct of the IDF in the Mavi Marmara incident. He gave his report today, and here are some highlights - not only from the IDF report on his debriefing but also some details given by a senior IDF official that I received via email.

In terms of the intelligence effort, the team concluded that not all possible intelligence gathering methods were fully implemented and that the coordination between Navy Intelligence and the Israel Defense Intelligence was insufficient. At the same time, the team emphasized that it is not certain that an optimal intelligence effort would create a complete intelligence picture. The team also pointed out that the anticipated level of violence used against the forces was underestimated.

In terms of situation assessments towards the flotilla, the team clarified that the operation relied excessively on a single course of action, albeit a probable one, while no alternative courses of action were prepared for the event of more dangerous scenarios.

Regarding technological alternatives, the team determined that on the day of the incident, decision makers were not presented with alternative operational courses of action other than a full boarding of the flotilla. The team emphasized the fact that as far as is currently known, no country in the world holds the ability to stop a vessel at sea in a non hostile manner. Therefore statements made on this matter following the incident are unfounded and irresponsible. At the same time, the team determined that alternative courses of action could have existed had the process of preparation begun enough time in advance, and recommended to accelerate the process of examining alternative methods....

The team determined that the Navy Commando soldiers operated properly, with professionalism, bravery and resourcefulness and that the commanders exhibited correct decision making. The report further determines that the use of live fire was justified and that the entire operation is estimable.
The additional points I have found out are perhaps more interesting:

* Nine IDF soldiers were injured in all, 3 of them seriously
* There were at least four and perhaps as many as six separate incidents where IDF soldiers were fired upon by "peace activists". In one case a soldier shot in the knee was shot by a weapon which was not IDF issued, and shell casings were found on the ship of bullets that did not come from Israeli weapons.
* In every situation where IDF soldiers used their weapons they were in life-threatening situations.
* The first Israeli soldier shot was the second one who rappelled down. This was almost certainly the first use of live fire by anyone in the incident - in other words, Mavi Marmara passengers shot first. The bullet that hit him came, apparently, from an Israeli gun that had been stripped off one of the other soldiers. He was not shot while going down the rope but soon thereafter.
* 3 soldiers were taken hostage. All of them were taken to the lowest deck. Two of them managed to escape and jump overboard where they were rescued; the third one was too badly injured and was rescued later.
  • Monday, July 12, 2010
  • Suzanne
After the soccer match Netherlands vs. Spain in the World Cup finals of 2010 in South Africa, which ended in Spain winning the World Cup (0-1), not everyone was coping well with it.
Now, I should say that in general the many Dutch supporters behaved nicely, even though in sorrow after the loss. There were not many reports of riots. However, in the Hague, the seat of the Dutch government, Dutch supporters showed their sorrow quite differently.
If you listen carefully, at 0:40 the crowd starts to shout: "Hamas, Hamas, Joden aan het gas" (translation: "Hamas, Hamas, send Jews to the gas"). We've heard that one before.

But wtf? Really, what has this to do with football?

More shocking was the news that hundreds of miles farther, in Uganda, at least 74 people watching the finals got killed in a trio of bombings. A Somali Islamist militant movement claimed responsibility today.

Today, I'm in mourning. Not because the Dutch lost, but because of our fallen humanity.
  • Monday, July 12, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
Real life intruding on blogging. Have fun in the comments.
  • Monday, July 12, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
Dar al Hayat has an article that begins to discuss the issues with the new, large natural gas fields that have been discovered or are expected to be discovered in the Mediterranean.

Briefly, gas fields have been discovered off the coasts of Egypt, Gaza ("Marine"), southern Israel ("Mary B") and northern Israel near Haifa ("Tamar.")

Chances are good that the Marine and Mary B are a shared field. Chances are also pretty good that Tamar field extends into Lebanese waters, with Lebanon technically at war with Israel with no demarcated borders - especially at sea. The Tamar field may also reach Cypriot waters.

And to make things more complicated, Turkey would assert rights over offshore Cypriot gas fields, and Syria might want to get in on the action as well.

A recent US Geological Survey indicates that the entire Levant basin might hold 227 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, as well as billions of barrels of oil.

This could get very, very dicey.
  • Monday, July 12, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
A few weeks ago there were rumors, immediately denied, that Saudi Arabia would allow Israel to use its airspace (or even to build an airbase!) in order to attack Iran. While the airspace story might have some plausibility in a situation where the Saudis could maintain deniability, an analysis by a rabid Israel-hater in Dar al Hayat includes a paragraph that needs to be studied:

Perhaps the Saudi government has a thousand objections to the practices of the Iranian government. However, it would never help Israel against a Muslim country. This is impossible with Abdullah bin Abdulaziz as King, Sultan bin Abdulaziz as the Crown Prince, and with his brothers, their children, grandchildren, ministers and the entire people.

It takes a lot for an Arab country to accept help from the US against another Arab country - as in the case of Kuwait against Iraq. But to accept help from the hated enemy Israel? Sorry, it will never happen in any sort of public way. It is inconceivable that even  Egypt or Jordan would accept military help from Israel. Under the table, away from the public, in the back rooms, with absolute deniability - perhaps. But the citizens of any Arab country, raised for generations with implacable hate against the Jews cum Zionists, would not stand for such an absolute betrayal from their leadership. The Arab hate against Israel is palpable (as can be seen in the remainder of the article linked to here.)
  • Monday, July 12, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
James Carroll, in the Boston Globe, defines the Palestinian Arab/Israeli conflict neatly symmetrical terms that are very elegant, and very false.

Against the usual perception, the Israeli and Palestinian stories are not contradictory but parallel. Jews and Arabs did not dig the ditch that keeps them apart.

To shift the analogy, Israelis and Palestinians are trapped in a corner. But the walls of that corner were constructed by someone else — an unacknowledged third party. Those walls are anti-Semitism and colonialism, each of which is thought to be well understood. But their recombination begets something new — a lethal feedback loop, as the historic hatred of Jews mixes explosively with the contempt for native peoples that defined imperial expansion.

Now Europe, together with its legacy culture America, sends representatives, such as Mitchell and Blair, claiming to offer disinterested “help” to the stubbornly warring parties. Yet that broader culture is fully complicit as the source of the two momentous animosities. Because that complicity is never reckoned with, energetic diplomatic interventions, going back past Jimmy Carter and Henry Kissinger to successive British “white papers,” have come to nothing....

The return to the land of Israel was momentous for people who had prayed for most of two millennia, “Next year in Jerusalem.” From the Arab point of view, however, Zionism could only be taken as a manifestation of the colonialism that native Palestinians had by then every reason to detest. Just as it is wrong to take Zionism as colonialism, it is wrong to take Palestinian hatred of Jewish arrival — and, even more pointedly, of Israeli occupation — as anti-Semitism....
Carroll seems to be a nice guy, and he is not the first to think he has come up with a unique perspective that could help break the impasse.

Creating false equivalences does not help to solve the problem, though.

The Zionist viewpoint is not that Palestine was filled with anti-semites as Jews returned from exile. To be sure, there was anti-semitism among the Arabs - to deny that it exists is as foolhardy as to compare it to the far worse traditional European anti-semitism. Even so, today the problem is not the underlying implicit anti-semitism that still festers in the Arab world, but the explicit and festering anti-Zionism - the utter inability to accept a Jewish state under any circumstances in what they consider Arab land. That is a problem that cannot be wished away. Whether modern anti-Zionism is congruent with traditional anti-semitism is not the pertinent issue - rabid anti-Zionism, which I once termed misoziony, is in itself a roadblock to any chance for peace. When Palestinian Arabs are claiming that Jews in Israel are colonialists, it is not merely the opposite of the truth - it is a manifestation of an underlying hatred that is endemic and every bit as toxic as traditional anti-semitism.

When Carroll tries to create a symmetry between Arab views of Zionism as colonialism, and Jewish views of anti-Zionism as anti-semitism, he is missing the point. Even if anti-Zionism is not a specific manifestation of anti-semitism, it is no less hateful and no more tolerant.

When Palestinian and Israeli negotiators finally face each other across one table, these common notes of experience should be paramount — but only for the sake of moving beyond them. Two peoples who have each defined themselves positively by negative hatred of the other have been at the mercy of a broad culture that created this very habit of mind. Jews and Arabs can renounce this history without renouncing themselves. Each can then receive the other’s account of the past, and, perhaps for the first time, hear it respectfully.
Again, he is ascribing to the Zionist side the hate that exists on the Arab side. While it is undoubtedly true that Palestinian Arabs define themselves in negative terms, by their shared hate of Israel, Jewish nationalism is a far richer and naturally positive historic trend. Before 1948, and even before modern Zionism, no one doubted that the Jewish people were a nation as well as a religious group. Jew and Gentile alike recognized this fact as a given, and newspaper clippings from the 19th century are as likely to use the term Israelites as they were to use Jews. While modern Zionism was partially a reaction to anti-semitism, it was European anti-semitism that the Jews were trying to find an antidote to: Arabs were considered irrelevant to the issue, and often even regarded as potential allies in creating a parallel national movement.

Carroll also errs when he tries to imply that misoziony is merely a Palestinian Arab phenomenon - it is at the very least a pan-Arab psychosis, perhaps the only true pan-Arab mindset that exists. There is precious little else that the Arab world can agree upon.

Another problem is that Carroll (and many others) think that Zionist Jews' false understandings of the Palestinian Arab narrative is partially to blame for there being no peace, when in fact Zionism has almost always shown an almost superhuman ability to empathize with the other side. Consistently, Zionist peace plans have attempted to address the purported issues  in a way that would support a win-win solution. The real problem is that the other side has shown zero interest in a solution that still allows a Jewish state to continue to exist, and these continuous attempts to compromise will inevitably fail because they are not regarded as confidence building gestures or goodwill measures, but as steps on the way to the annihilation of Israel. There is a vast gulf between the Western perception of a solution being a win-win for everybody and the Arab mentality of the zero-sum game.

The unfortunate truth is that the Arab world will never accept Israel except as an entity too strong to defeat or dislodge. The only thing protecting Israel is its strength. Pretending that there are myths on both sides that can be transcended to reach peace is not realism, but another case of wishful thinking. It assumes that peace is the goal for both sides, and that is simply not the case.

Sunday, July 11, 2010

  • Sunday, July 11, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
According to Israel's Channel 2 news, George Mitchell accused Bashir Assad of transferring weapons in convoys to Hezbollah. When Assad denied it, Mitchell showed him satellite photos - and Assad still denied it.

Finally, after a number of such iterations, during which Mitchell informed Assad that he had seen incontrovertible proof, Assad asked Mitchell, "And if we are transferring - so what?"

A senior US official is quoted as saying that Assad is a liar and that it is impossible to reach an agreement with him.

But, meanwhile, Syrian weapons still pour into Lebanon.

(h/t Jed)
  • Sunday, July 11, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
From Palestinian Media Watch:
The PA daily reports that Abbas said this at a meeting with writers and journalists in the home of the Palestinian Ambassador to Jordan.

The following is the transcript from the official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida:

"'We don't accept the statement [of Hamas]: a [Palestinian] state of resistance and refusal. What we hear from everyone is that the basis is negotiations, at a time that the entire world agrees about this, despite the absence of other options, we either have negotiations or no negotiations, what has put Israel in the corner.
We are unable to confront Israel militarily, and this point was discussed at the Arab League Summit in March in Sirt (Libya). There I turned to the Arab States and I said: 'If you want war, and if all of you will fight Israel, we are in favor. But the Palestinians will not fight alone because they don't have the ability to do it.' He [Abbas] said: 'The West Bank was completely destroyed and we will not agree that it will be destroyed again,' in addition to 'the inability to confront Israel militarily.'"
[Al-Hayat Al-Jadida (Fatah), July 6, 2010
I saw this on Friday and couldn't find the original article in Al Hayat al Jadida online, so I emailed PMW, who provided me with a facsimile of the print page, with the quote highlighted in yellow:


Once again we see that peace is not a goal for even the "moderate" PA. The goal is to destroy Israel; peace (or, more accurately, the "peace process") is a strategy towards achieving that goal.

Somehow, I don't think that there will be any angry requests from the White House demanding that Abbas explain or disown his statements.  They reserve those actions for things that are really heinous, like announcements of Jews building houses in their capital city.
  • Sunday, July 11, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
I just received an email from JCPA, the excellent Israeli think-tank, bragging about its Internet success:
Which Israel-Based Think-Tank Leads the Pack on the Internet?
After a decade of concentrated effort on the front lines of the Internet, the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs headed by former Israeli UN Ambassador Dore Gold leads the pack of Israel-based think tanks, according to data from Alexa.com, an independent website traffic ranking service owned by Amazon.com.
 A comparison of 17 think tanks in July 2010 shows that the Jerusalem Center ranks much higher than better known and more lavishly funded institutions such as the Israel Democracy Institute, Tel Aviv University's Institute for National Security Studies, the Shalem Center, and the Peres Center (see table).

RankWebsiteWorld Ranking
1Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs368,054
2NGO Monitor605,446
3One Jerusalem752,482
4Daily Alert962,386
5Institute for Counter-Terrorism, IDC Herzliya978,644
6Institute for National Security Studies, Tel Aviv University1,093,413
7Israel Democracy Institute1,302,090
8Reut Institute1,735,615
9Van Leer Jerusalem Institute1,878,871
10Israel-Palestine Center for Research and Information2,205,274
11Peres Center for Peace2,594,697
12Ariel Center for Policy Research2,761,903
13Israel Center for Social and Economic Progress3,312,665
14Shalem Center4,859,252
15Dayan Center, Tel Aviv University5,812,872
16Rabin Center6,365,319
17Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies8,419,974


So I looked up my Alexa rank:

209,116.

I am speechless.

I don't know whether to be proud that my ranking is so high, or upset that these professional think-tanks - with full time staff and salaries, filled with stellar content - cannot do better. 

Maybe, if they would hire me full time, I could make aliyah and increase their ranking!

(Just for context - newspapers and magazines do much, much better than my little blog, and these sites don't generally have daily news updates, but still....)
  • Sunday, July 11, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
Haaretz reported last week:
Mexico foiled an attempt by Hezbollah to establish a network in South America, a Kuwaiti newspaper reported on Tuesday.

Hezbollah operatives employed Mexicans nationals with family ties to Lebanon to set up the network, designed to target Israel and the West, the Al-Seyassah daily said.

According to the report, Mexican police mounted a surveillance operation on the group's leader, Jameel Nasr, who traveled frequently to Lebanon to receive information and instructions from Hezbollah commanders there.

Police say Nasr also made frequent trips to other countries in Latin America, including a two-month stay in Venezuela in the summer of 2008.

Nasr was living in Tijuana, Mexico at the time of his arrest, the report said.

The report follows warnings from the United States that Hezbollah and its backer Iran are stepping up operations in the region.

In June, a U.S. congresswoman wrote to the Department of Homeland Security to warn that Hezbollah was increasing its presence in Central and South America.

In her letter, Congresswoman Sue Myrick called on the U.S. to work with Mexican forces, as there was intelligence that Hezbollah was working in conjunction with Mexican drug cartels on the U.S.-Mexico border.

In 2009 a U.S. commander tasked with overseeing U.S. military interests in the region said Hezbollah was linked to drug-trafficking in Colombia.
Hezbollah's activities in Central and South America are a bit more long-term and entrenched, however. From The Sunday Paper, May 21, 2007:
Argentina linked Hezbollah to the bombings of the Israeli Embassy in 1992 and the Argentine-Israeli Community Center in 1994, both in Buenos Aires. A car bomb loaded with 300 kilograms of explosives was used to execute the latter attack, which killed 81 people.

In February 2000, Paraguayan authorities arrested Ali Khalil Mehri, a Lebanese businessman with financial links to Hezbollah, in the country's Tri-Border Area, so called because Brazil and Argentina's borders meet Paraguay's there. In November of that year, Paraguayan authorities arrested Salah Abdul Karim Yassine, a Palestinian who allegedly threatened to bomb the U.S. and Israeli Embassies in Paraguay, and charged him with entering the country illegally.

As reported by the Washington Times on Aug. 21, 2001—less than a month before Sept. 11—U.S. Special Forces were training Paraguayan soldiers here in anti-drug operations "that closely resemble counterinsurgency operations," while hundreds of U.S. soldiers spent four months in Paraguay which had "long been a home to Arabs linked to the Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad militias."

As reported in international Spanish newspaper El Pais in November 2001, an investigation by the National Direction of Civil Aeronautics determined that 16 foreigners enter Paraguay illegally on a weekly basis via the airport of Ciudad del Este, paying some $5,000 in advance, but many more are believed to enter by land.

According to the state department, since 2003, "al-Said Mokhles was extradited from Uruguay to Egypt, Ali Nizar Dahroug was convicted in Paraguay of tax evasion and sentenced to 6.5 years in prison, and Assad Ahmad Barakat, the Hezbollah financial kingpin in the Tri-Border Area, was extradited from Brazil to Paraguay also to face tax evasion charges."

[Quoting Forbes] Iran is the biggest patron of Hezbollah, delivering $100 million or so a year to the terrorists ...Last year, Rady Zaiter, a Lebanese citizen, was arrested in Colombia for allegedly heading a cocaine smuggling outfit in Ecuador that sent most of its profits to Hezbollah … The Party of God gets $10 million a year from the area where Paraguay, Brazil and Argentina meet.
Hezbollah's international reach is barely reported in the MSM, as it continues to morph Western perceptions of the organization from a worldwide terrorist group into just another Lebanese political party.
  • Sunday, July 11, 2010
  • Elder of Ziyon
From Ya Libnan:
Central News Agency (CNA) has reported that MP Walid Jumblatt has agreed to withdraw his bill, that grants Palestinians civil rights and allows them to buy property in Lebanon, in favor of a humanitarian bill that was worked out between al Mustqbal , March 14 Secretariat and and the Lebanese Forces that will grant the Palestinians the right to work in Lebanon.

The new humanitarian bill was formulated following discussions with Patriarch Nasrallah Boutros Sfeir , former PM Fouad Siniora and Phalange party leader Amin Gemayel and was also approved by Speaker Nabih Berri and MP Michel Aoun.

MP Nuhad Mashnouk has been commuting between Jumblatt, Aoun and Berri to get consensus on the new bill.

During an interview with CNA Mashnouk said, "Wwe have reached consensus on a bill that will grant the Palestinians the right to work on condition that this action will not add any burden to the state of Lebanon (either through social security, subsidies or through any other funds)."

Mashnouk added ”The international community should bear some responsibility in this regard.”

Mashnouk also confirmed that discussions are ongoing between all the concerned groups over granting Palestinians the right to own property in Lebanon.
There was fierce opposition to the idea of Palestinian Arabs being able to purchase land in Lebanon.

One Lebanese MP noted on Friday, “It is shameful that Israel grants Palestinians their rights while Lebanon stands idly by.”

Yet even he was dead-set against the possibility of granting full citizenship rights to Palestinians.

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