By Rami Zurayk, 1 May 2007, Scoop

 

Much of the land in South Lebanon has remained unfarmed this year. In  spite of the active de-mining efforts deployed by the UN and by local NGOs, it has been difficult to plough, sow and harvest, as only a fraction of the million and a half Israeli cluster bombs have been removed. These bombs were sown by the Israelis in August 2006, in the last 72 hours of the war, and after a cease fire was agreed upon in the UN Security Council. Now why would the Israelis do something like that? (more…)

O’Connor envisions conflict lasting 15 years

Brian Laghi, Globe and Mail.

Canada needed to acquire 120 new tanks to deal with another 10 to 15 years of conflicts in Afghanistan and other countries, Defence Minister Gordon O’Connor said yesterday, amid opposition concerns that the war is escalating.

“Afghanistan and these type of engagements are the future for 10, 15 years,” Mr. O’Connor told CTV’s current affairs program Question Period.

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International Trade Daily. Thursday, March 2007

Graphic by Eric Drooker.

The National-U.S. Arab Chamber of Commerce (NUSACC) released a report March 15 saying that U.S. merchandise exports to the Arab world are expected to increase sharply this year, “shattering” the record set in 2006.

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BBC News: Israel was criticised for bombing Lebanese civilian centres

A former top American diplomat says the US deliberately resisted calls for a immediate ceasefire during the conflict in Lebanon in the summer of 2006.

Former ambassador to the UN John Bolton told the BBC that before any ceasefire Washington wanted Israel to eliminate Hezbollah’s military capability.

Mr Bolton said an early ceasefire would have been “dangerous and misguided”.

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Olmert says decided on response to abductions months before war

By Aluf Benn, Haaretz Correspondent

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told the Winograd Commission that his decision to respond to the abduction of soldiers with a broad military operation was made as early as March 2006, four months before last summer’s Lebanon war broke out.

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Time Magazine: Written by By Nicholas Blanford/Marakeh.

Lebanon. Friday, Feb. 2nd, 2007

To 17-year-old Rasha Zayoun, the small metal canister with a ribbon attached to the top looked like a toy. Her father, Mohammed, had found it while harvesting wild thyme in a field near her house in the southern Lebanese village of Marakeh, and had taken it home in his bag of herbs.

One evening four weeks ago, Rasha picked up the strange object and played with the ribbon, wondering what it was. “Then I felt a tingle of electricity,” she says. “I threw it from me and it exploded before it hit the floor.”

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Jan. 31st 2007, IRIN [Integrated Regional Information Networks]:

Israel may have violated agreements regarding the use of American-made cluster bombs during its war in Lebanon in July 2006, the US State Department said on Monday.

Spokesman Sean McCormack did not give details about the possible violations but said the results of a preliminary investigation were being forwarded to Congress.

During the war, Israel used cluster munitions, possibly dropping one million such bombs, including in civilian areas.

Many of the munitions – according to the United Nations, up to 40 percent – did not explode and now pose a hazard to residents of south Lebanon. Unexploded ordnance has killed at least 27 people and injured more than 143 since the war ended.

Cluster bombs are anti-personnel weapons that spray bomblets over a wide area, in an intentionally imprecise manner, when they explode.

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What the Canadian Foreign Minister did not see or discuss during his visit

GAZA CITY, GAZA: Despite the impression cast by corporate news coverage, there is never anything like “calm” here in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The casualty count for 2006 released by Israeli human rights group B’Tselem reports that Israeli forces killed 660 Palestinians, while 17 Israeli civilians were killed, 13 of them in the West Bank. The violence is often spectacular, as during the summer and fall siege operations in Gaza that killed more than 450 Palestinians under withering aerial bombardment, artillery barrages and two major ground invasions. But, as an unusually frank headline in the current edition of the Economist rightly stated, “It’s the little things that make an occupation.”

When Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay visited Israel this week, it was these “little things” that he missed–like the more than 530 fixed checkpoints and roadblocks identified in a joint UN-IDF count in the occupied West Bank. These obstacles make simple travel between neighbouring Palestinian villages often impossible, particularly when added to the more than 7,000 “flying checkpoints” that spring up at the whim of the Israeli army, anywhere and at anytime. As the Economist pointed out, “arbitrariness is one of the most crippling features of these rules.”
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Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister, Peter Mackay, who recently traveled to Afghanistan, is planning a larger visit to the Middle East region, with the stated aim of promoting “peace and dialogue”. The Conservative Foreign Minister MacKay will arrive in Lebanon and Palestine in the coming days.

Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister, Peter MacKay, who recently traveled to Afghanistan, is planning a larger visit to the Middle East region, with the stated aim of promoting “peace and dialogue”. Conservative Party Foreign Minister MacKay will arrive in Lebanon and Palestine in the coming days.

Tadamon! Montreal issues this appeal in an effort to highlight the Conservative government’s role and position as an imperialist player in the Middle East.

Canadian intervention in the region is best illustrated by the Conservative government’s open support for Israel’s brutal assault on Lebanon in the summer of 2006 and by Canada’s ongoing military presence in Afghanistan.

Despite common mythology, Canadian policy has seldom been “balanced” or “neutral” concerning the Middle East. Successive Canadian governments have unconditionally supported Israel. History doesn’t substantiate Canada’s supposed role as the “neutral one”.

Canada’s position must be subject to critique in its entirety and in the context of broader Western intervention in the Middle East. The Canadian government openly supports the ongoing occupation of Iraq, despite world opinion having turned against U.S. policy. Canada was the first country in the world to withdraw all financial aid to the Palestinian people after the democratic election of Hamas in the Occupied Territories, sending millions of Palestinians into devastating poverty.

Within the context of Canadian policy in the region, Tadamon! calls on people in Montreal, Canada and in the Middle East to express their opposition to Canadian intervention in the Middle East. (more…)

Wednesday, December 27, 2006
Jordan Times
Hasan Abu Nimah

Finally the long awaited meeting between Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas has taken place. Hastily planned, it came as a surprise, grabbing headlines that suggested renewed “hope”.

While the media try to analyse it in conventional terms, as to whether it advances the “peace process”, in reality it was a show designed to shore up Abbas in his battle to usurp power from the democratically elected Hamas authority. As such, it represents the “soft” component of a two-pronged Western strategy that includes political and military support for Abbas. (more…)