Israel at War Watch: The Cease-Fire – Disarming Hezbollah
JPost: LAF to deploy in South within 72 hours
Lebanon’s communications minister told French radio Monday that the Lebanese army was preparing to cross the Litani River into the troubled south within two or three days, despite uncertainty about a future UN force for the region.
“The Lebanese army is readying itself along the Litani to cross the river in 48 or 72 hours,” Marwan Hamade said on Europe-1 radio.
It will then be flanked by “the first contingents of an international force,” he added, likely from France, Turkey, Spain and Italy. He did not give a timeframe.
He spoke shortly after a UN-imposed cease-fire went into effect across the region, halting a month of fighting.
But implementation of the resolution was in question after the Lebanese Cabinet on Sunday indefinitely postponed a crucial meeting dealing with plans for the deployment. Lebanese media reported that the Cabinet was sharply divided over demands that Hizbullah surrender its weapons in the south.
Does anyone expect Hezbollah to disarm and turns its weapons over to either the Lebanese Army or an international force?
NOPE
And Israel will NOT leave unless they are disarmed.
Hamade said the Lebanese government would try Monday to find a “formula” for implementing the resolution.
Lebanon’s industry minister, Pierre Jemayel, a member of a majority anti-Syrian bloc in parliament, told Al-Siyassah daily, “Hizbullah has to deliver its weapons to the Lebanese army, and its light weapons to the police.”
“Its fighters are welcome to join the military force and the state will then quickly regain control of all Lebanese territories.”
“I’m not telling Hizbullah to surrender its weapons to Israel, or to the international community,” Jemayel told the daily. “(I am telling it) to surrender them to the Lebanese army.”
Well, the Lebanese and UNIFIL folks had better quickly work out the details of Hezbollah disarming or this cease-fire will be short-lived indeed.
A couple of Lebanese Shiite men look at destroyed apartment buildings in the Hezbollah strongholds of southern suburbs of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Aug. 14, 2006,after an overnight aerial bombardment by Israeli forces. Israel halted its offensive against Hezbollah guerrillas as a U.N.-imposed cease-fire went into effect Monday after a month of warfare that killed more than 900 people, devastated much of south Lebanon and forced hundreds of thousands of Israelis into bomb shelters.
Captain Ed has The Humiliation Of Lebanon
Fuad Siniora’s collapse yesterday humiliated his armed forces, the Times of London reports, and demonstrated the illusive grasp of power that the official government holds in Lebanon. The consensus in his Cabinet to accept the cease-fire collapsed when it came time to deploy the army into southern Lebanon.
Will this move the Siniora government to quit blamimg everyone but the terrorists that started the war? As late as Saturday, the PM still talked about the brave “national resistance”, but those moments appear to have ended. If Fuad Siniora expects to lead his nation, he now has to acknowledge that Hezbollah cannot exist as a state within a state.
The civil war is coming very soon now.
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Israel at War Watch: Lebanon Falters Over Cease-Fire
Israel at War Watch: Israeli Cabinet Approves United Nations Cease-Fire
Israel at War Watch: Israeli-Hezbollah Cease-Fire Begins Monday
Israel at War Watch: Israeli Troops Reach Latani River – Will Cease-Fire 7 AM Monday
Israel at War Watch: Israeli Prime Minister Olmert Has Accepted United Nations Cease-Fire Deal
Israel at War Watch: United Nations Security Council Resolution to End War?
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john Carey
Misunderspinning
By John E. Carey
August 14, 2006
President Bush is known for his malapropisms. Some are merely ascribed to the president; he doesn’t hold the copyright.
“Strategery,†a Saturday Night Live creation, became the title of a Bill Sammon book.
But these buzzwords tell us a lot of how the people in popular culture view their leaders and their world.
We might assign the new word “misunderspinning” to the Hezbollah-Israel conflict, now entering a difficult cease-fire phase.
Or for Israel: “misunderwinning.â€
Israeli leaders are claiming tremendous gains, if not outright victory on one side of the border, and issuing a veiled threat on the other.
Israeli Prime Minister Mr. Ehud Olmert insisted, “Hezbollah won’t continue to exist as a state within a state.â€
That assertion remains to be proven.
In fact, in Lebanan and the greater Arab world, Hezbollah is a state and its leader, Hassan Nasrallah, appeared almost daily of Hezbollah TV (al-Manar “The Beacon”), and al-Jazeera during the conflict saying, “We have not been harmed.” Within 24 hours before the start of the “cease fire,†Hezbollah fired over 200 missiles into Israel. Maybe as many as 250.
Since destruction of Hezbollah and elimination of these missiles were the number one and two goals of the war for Israel, according to Boaz Ganor, an Israeli expert who discussed the goals with me at the outset of the conflict, who do you think “won�
A government spokesman said Israel came out ahead in the Lebanon war and will abide strictly by the U.N. cease-fire deal. “The situation on the ground is advantageous, the diplomatic situation is advantageous to Israel,” said Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev.
Yossi Kuperwasser, a brigadier general in the Israeli army, wrote in an article for the Jerusalem Post, “We created the necessary conditions to compel the international community to… ultimately turn Lebanon into an accountable, sovereign nation. If this happens, Syria and Iran would be the main losers of this war.”
We’ll see.
In Lebanon, as the clock struck 8 this morning and the cease-fire commenced, the streets of Beirut were littered with a new leaflet dropped by Israeli planes saying that Hezbollah had brought the people of Lebanon “to the edge of the abyss†and brought only “destruction, displacement and death.†The leaflet warned that the Israelis could return “with all necessary might.â€
Addressed to Lebanon’s citizens, Israel’s leaflet said, “Will you be able to pay this price again?”
Hezbollah distributed leaflets of its own on Monday congratulating Lebanon on its “big victory” and thanking citizens for their patience during the 34-day war with Israel.
This morning, as the cease fire begins, The Washington Post features a page one story under the headline “The Best Guerrilla Force in the World.†The article is, of course, about Hezbollah.
If Israel had won, the headline might have read “Finest Fighting Force On Earth Again Prevails†referring to the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF).
I’m really a military analyst with only ten years in the media as a journalist and even I can figure this out.
For good or bad, Israel appears to have not prevailed in their goals in this war.
Israel, and in particular, Mr. Olmert’s government, are guilty of misunderspinning and also seriously misunderwinning.
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