The G8-UN story was in Saturday's LA Times, but on A10, where we were sure to read it. The front page had 'Soccer Team Throws a Hail Mary Mass' and headlined the 'Open War;' of Hezbollah - not Israel. There was one critical story, that of our record-shattering heat, but nary a mention of global warming, fossil fuels or any other human cause. Guess why. The 3 short items here merit page 1 and your interest. Ed
United Press Interntional - 10 July 2006 http://www.upi.com/InternationalIntelligence/view.php?StoryID 060710-081624-7700r Israeli use of poisonous material alleged GAZA, July 10 (UPI) -- The Palestinian health ministry accused Israel of using a new type of banned explosives containing poisonous material. A ministry report released Monday said testimonies from surgeons in Palestinian hospitals indicated that "all 249 casualties inflicted by the Israeli war machine during the operation on Gaza which started on June 27 resulted from shrapnel of new and developed shells and explosives which cause amputation of limbs and burning of all the injured parts." The ministry called on the international community and human rights organization "to send medical committees to examine the wounded and verify the existence of poisonous material in their bodies caused by Israeli weapons." It also urged international organization to put pressure on Israel to stop using internationally banned arms against inoffensive and unarmed civilians. The report indicated that "most casualties who were submitted to surgeries were caused by strong explosions that led to the amputation and carbonization of limbs while shrapnel caused small openings in the body through which internal parts, including intestines and spleen, are burned." In a related development, the foreign ministry warned Monday that Israel's military operations and threats to expand its incursion in Gaza will not contribute to finding a diplomatic solution to the crisis of the Israeli soldier abducted by three Palestinian factions, including Hamas which leads the Palestinian government. The ministry said in a statement that "international idleness and silence over Israel's crimes do not contribute to boosting the rule of the law but encourages the law of the jungle and Israel's ignoring of all international norms." *** http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-usmideast15jul15,1,2699980.story?coll=la-headlines-world WARFARE IN LEBANON Bush, Peers Worlds Apart on Approach to the Crisis By James Gerstenzang and Paul Richter, Times Staff Writers July 15, 2006, Page A10 ST. PETERSBURG, Russia - President Bush split sharply from other world leaders Friday over the deepening crisis in the Middle East, declining a request from Lebanon's prime minister to pressure Israel to halt its attacks. While Israeli warplanes struck deeper into Lebanon, Bush talked by telephone with Middle Eastern leaders, including Fouad Siniora, the Lebanese prime minister. European leaders sharply criticized Israel's bombardment of its northern neighbor. French President Jacques Chirac condemned the offensive as "totally disproportionate" and said it appeared that Israel "wished to destroy Lebanon." Other criticism came from Spain, Norway, Russia and China. The Vatican said it "deplores the attack on Lebanon." The differing approaches threatened to divide the summit here of the Group of 8 leading industrialized nations. The Bush administration has been hoping the gathering will show world leaders forming a united front against Iran's nuclear program. Attendees are expected this weekend to discuss the violence that erupted in the Middle East this week and try to fashion a joint statement laying out a common approach, U.S. aides said. Lebanese and U.S. officials offered differing accounts of Bush's call to Siniora. The office of the Lebanese leader said in a statement that Bush had promised to urge Israel "to limit damage to Lebanon . and to spare civilians and innocent people from harm." But Bush aides said the president declined to push for a halt to Israeli attacks because he believes the government of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is entitled to defend itself in a crisis that was triggered by Hezbollah militants. The Islamic militia on Wednesday sent fighters in southern Lebanon across the border into Israel and captured two soldiers. Bush "believes the Israelis have the right to protect themselves and that in doing so they should limit as much as possible so-called collateral damage, not only to facilities but also to human lives," White House Press Secretary Tony Snow said in Russia. At the same time, Snow said, "the president is not going to make military decisions for Israel." Russian President Vladimir V. Putin, who had dinner with Bush in St. Petersburg after the American leader arrived from Germany, said earlier Friday that "all sides should immediately end their military actions" as a "starting point for resolving all other problems," the Russian news agency Interfax reported. In comments clearly directed at Israel, Putin said, "It is absolutely obvious that any large-scale use of force, even in response to provocative acts, is as unacceptable as taking people hostage as a method to sort out some issues, including political ones." Analysts said that although the governments' differing responses were consistent with their long-standing positions on the Middle East, they inevitably would pose new complications at the meeting. Charles Kupchan, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and a National Security Council aide under President Clinton, said the Mideast crisis would "to some extent crowd out other issues" the group had planned to discuss. Tensions among the leaders will "make it difficult to maintain solidarity on Iran, North Korea and energy security," he said. On Thursday, in keeping with previous actions at the United Nations, the U.S. came to the aid of Israel by vetoing a resolution proposed by Qatar to condemn the advance into Lebanon. Bush's approach on security issues in the Mideast has been to give Israel full latitude while urging its leaders to use enough restraint to avoid harming civilians. U.S. officials said they were supporting a joint effort of Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, as well as an initiative by a U.N. team, to find a solution to the crisis. U.S. law bars American officials from dealing directly with terrorist groups, so they must rely on others. Snow said the administration viewed the U.N. effort as an important means of putting pressure on Hezbollah. *** The Independent - The Perfect Storm, 13 July 2006 http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article1174098.ece American policy in Middle East caught in 'a perfect storm' By Rupert Cornwell in Washington Rarely can United States policy in the Middle East have been in such disarray as now. Events in Iraq are a fair approximation of civil war, while after a brief display of smiles, Iran is more truculent than ever over its nuclear ambitions. As for Israel, far from moving towards peace with its neighbours, the Jewish state is embroiled in an escalating, two-front confrontation with Lebanon and Syria to its north, and with the Palestinians in its midst. Three years ago when the US invaded Iraq, vowing to install a stable peaceful democracy that would be a model for the region, such a state of affairs was unthinkable in Washington. The war would be brief, policy makers asserted, and Iraq's various ethnic and religious groups would come together to build a new country after the departure of the brutal and hated Saddam Hussein. American troops would be fêted and made welcome as liberators. That was the spring of 2003. By mid-July 2006, some 2,550 US troops have lost their lives in a war costing $250m (£136m) a day, while the death toll among Iraqis may be five times as high. In the past four days, at least 130 people in and around Baghdad have been killed in sectarian violence, including up to 23 Shias seized yesterday at a bus station north of the capital. The killings have made a mockery of the proclaimed security crackdown in Baghdad by the new Iraqi Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki. Iran meanwhile seems less inclined than ever to give up its nuclear ambitions. Yesterday, the world's major powers referred Iran back to the United Nations Security Council after its failure to reply to the West's offer last month of incentives to halt is uranium enrichment activities. But Russia and China have shown no sign of willingness to adopt tough sanctions against the Islamic regime in Tehran. And in the end America may be faced with a choice akin to the one it faced over Iraq: either acquiesce in doing virtually nothing - or bypass the UN and form a new "coalition of the willing" to take tougher, conceivably even military, action. To these two flashpoints, a third has now been added: Israel's reprisals against the Palestinians over one of its soldiers taken hostage last month on the border with Gaza. Some 50 Palestinians have now been killed. The crisis spread to confrontation yesterday with Hizbollah guerrillas, backed by Syria and Iran, in southern Lebanon, after incidents in which three Israeli soldiers were killed and two others captured. The White House insists that its policies are on track. If there are "a lot of issues in motion", according to Stephen Hadley, Mr Bush's National Security Adviser, "in some sense, it was destined to be. We have a president that wants to take on the big issues and see if he could solve them on his watch." More probably an administration whose energies have been consumed by the war in Iraq, on which Mr Bush has staked his presidency, may be simply overwhelmed. The separate crises amount to "a perfect storm", Madeleine Albright, who was Secretary of State under Bill Clinton, told The Washington Post last week. "We have not been paying attention to a lot of these issues." In the latest flare-up between Israel and its neighbours, Washington has been almost silent. Condoleezza Rice, the Secretary of State, who is struggling to orchestrate the response to Iran's defiance, merely blamed Hizbollah for upsetting "regional stability", and urged Syria to rein in its radical protégés. But Washington's rebukes are far less pointed than a year ago, in the aftermath of the St Valentine's Day assassination of the former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri - when the talk here was of "regime change" in Damascus to follow that in Baghdad. The change reflects a growing, if tacit, acceptance that the unilateralist "Bush doctrine", involving pre-emptive action if necessary to remove a threat, is beyond the power of even the US to implement on its own. Hence the President's more restrained tone of late, encapsulated by Time magazine's latest cover, proclaiming an end to "Cowboy Diplomacy". The problems also reflect a failure to think its policies through. The irony is that Hizbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Palestine achieved their roles in government thanks to democratic elections - exactly what Washington has been advocating for the entire Middle East. On the periphery of the region, meanwhile, the problems grow more daunting, with the renewed Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan and the apparent seizure of control of much of Somalia, long a potential terrorist redoubt, by Islamic fundamentalist groups. Further afield, North Korea's brazen missile tests may be a sign that, like Iran, the reclusive Communist regime does not believe that with so many of its forces tied down in Iraq, Washington has a viable military option. ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Great things are happening at Yahoo! Groups. 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