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[TayyaRevolution]

Part III: the CIA and the Pentagon weigh in

21 April, 2008
— Franklin Lamb
Dahiyeh

“Those bastards [the Israeli military] know the rules and what the US Arms Export Control Act requires! The CBU 58’s are decades out of date! We [the US] have not even had them in our weapons inventory since we last used them in 1991 during Desert Storm. They are now complete junk and I am amazed that any of them after 35 years even detonated. By using them this time in Lebanon, Israel was illegally dropping landmines.”

–Pentagon official commenting on Israel’s use of American weapons against civilians in Lebanon during the July 2006 war (chap. II, The Price We Pay)

Ridicule of Israel’s 2006 performance by US Intelligence and Military agencies creates pressure for the White House to engage with Hezbollah

It has been a fact that, since at least 1982, perhaps the harshest and most frustrated American critics of Israel are those who work in Langley, Virginia, at CIA Headquarters and especially those across the 14th Street Bridge from the White House, on the banks of the Potomac River, who work at the Pentagon.

Harshest because, as fed up Pentagon employees have long protested, they work with Israel closely on weapons supply matters and they know first hand how consistently the US is lied to and cheated by Israeli weapons procurement officials. Frustrated because they are prohibited by law, politics and the ever-watching Israel lobby from disclosing the regular chicanery they witness to the public.

American researchers, including the late indefatigable Janet Stevens, learned about Pentagon attitudes toward Israel decades ago when she methodically wrote down serial numbers found on US cluster bomb canisters and other ordnance during the 75-day Israeli siege of West Beirut, now less than two months shy of a quarter century ago.

Janet’s motivation was transparent. She wanted proof to offer to skeptical Beirut media (’Hotel Journalism’ as she used to call it) who were blithely repeating Israeli denials regarding its use of American weapons. Many hunkered down in the Commodore Hotel Bar waiting for Israeli press releases rather than venture out into the dangerous streets of Beirut. Janet made a ‘deal’ with Pentagon contacts that they could have the scores of serial numbers she catalogued (which the Pentagon wanted in order to learn how far down its stockpile of US cluster bombs and ordnance Israel had dipped during its 1982 invasion) if the Naval Ordnance Disposal Unit working at the Indian Head, Maryland Navel Base would provide Janet with diagrams of the US cluster bombs and information on how to disarm them. It was agreed and the information Janet received was used to make public information posters for Beirut citizens warning of the danger and how to defuse the US cluster bomblets. (In those days the humanitarian work such as being done today by Qatar, UAE, UNICEF and other public information projects re cluster bombs were not functioning as well in Beirut—but Norwegian Aid, Oxfam, the Menonites and a few others were here).

Even some in the French, British and Italian contingents of the so-called ‘Multi-National Peacekeeping Force’ (MNF) used Janet’s posters because the US Marine contingent was not allowed to share their technical information concerning US weapons with their allies. (Copies of these posters distributed around Beirut are reproduced in the 1984 volume, Israel’s War in Lebanon, F. Lamb, Ed, South End Press).

Whereas in 2006 Israel saturated South Lebanon with four types of US cluster bombs, in 1982 Israel used all seven types that President Nixon had ordered transferred to Israel from the US stockpiles in Subic Bay, Philippines meant to supply US troops who were increasingly under pressure in Vietnam. Nixon later admitted he erred, but reported that Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir, fearing military collapse in the face of Egypt’s 8th army during the 1973 October war, had threatened to use nuclear weapons in the Sinai unless the US rescued Israel.

Increasing Pentagon anger in 1982-83 was the fact that US marine and navy ordnance disposal specialists based at the US Marine barracks were taking casualties from unexploded American cluster bombs, which Israel continued to deny using (an acquaintance of Janet’s, Corporal David Reagan, was killed next to his Barracks on the edge of Beirut airport on September 30th, 1982 by an M-43 ‘birdie’ US cluster bomb and three of his platoon were wounded).

Researchers in West Beirut during the 11-week 1982 siege continued to catch the Israeli government’s serial lies as their officials maintained that US cluster bombs were not used against civilians in Lebanon. Janet knew differently and proved her claims with detailed lists of geographic place names, dates and types of US cluster bombs Israel dropped around Beirut on civilian areas.

This observer distinctly recalls even during heavy bombing and shelling in West Beirut when not a soul, stray cat or terrified bird dare venture out, Janet would say: “Yala! (Let’s go!) I heard from one of the guys [fighters defending Beirut] Israel fired 155’s nearby [155 mm shells holding 143 US cluster bomblets] with ‘birdies’!”

(’Birdie’ was the nickname for the M-43 Raytheon manufactured cluster bomb which was widely used by Israel against civilians in 1978, 1982, and to a lesser extent in 1993, and 1996 but not at all, according to this observer’s research during 2006, contrary to some inaccurate reports).

Janet would lead the way through the smoke, deafening blast noise and debris along Hamra streets while her companion tried to keep up wondering to himself: “Why do I always do what this woman says?”

The Reagan administration had access to Janet’s work also through the media. President Reagan, after confronting Israeli PM Begin in late June of ‘82, with what he and Secretary of State George Shultz believed was irrefutable evidence, was shocked by Begin’s complete denial and his aggressive demeanor toward Reagan. As the President later recounted, Begin pointed his finger at him and shouted that Reagan’s accusations amounted to “a blood libel against every Jew everywhere”.

Reagan later explained that at the time of his meeting with Begin that he did not know what “blood libel” meant, but that he subsequently learned “that the man had looked me straight in the eyes and lied to me”.

Reagan immediately cut off shipments of US cluster bombs to Israel and the ban lasted for 6 years, until in 1988 George H. Bush, in a tough race for the White House, and under pressure form the Israel lobby, got Reagan to lift the ban. George W. Bush has refused to re-impose it despite the July 2006 experience.

The Pentagon’s distrust of Israel reached new depths following the July 2006 war with Israel’s use of the now ancient Lockheed Martin CBU-58 A/B cluster bomb unit. This bomb which was first used in Vietnam consists of a large canister which is designed to open in flight dropping 650 baseball sized bombs called BLU (Bomb Live Unit) 61 or 63 depending on the fusing, shocked and enraged some in the Pentagon.

As reported in the recent volume, The Price We Pay, the Pentagon at first did not believe reports that Israel still had any CBU-58’s because they had been told that Israel used up their stockpile of the type in 1982. The CBU-58, it should be noted, was among those sent to Israel by Nixon from Vietnam in 1973!

Each one has a yellow tag on the ‘mother bomb canister’ that clearly states that the shelf life is ‘365 days’. Every one used by Israel and examined in Lebanon by this researcher following the July 2006 war showed this 365 days warning plus a manufacture date of March or August 1973.

Thus, according to the Pentagon and UN deminers, Israel dropped US bombs in 2006 that were up to 35 years out of date. This guaranteed, according to Pentagon specialists, that nearly 75% of the CBU-58’s that Israel dropped were duds and now lay around South Lebanon as land mines. Other US cluster bombs Israel used (M-42’s and M-77’s) had lower dud rates as widely reported by the United Nations and various researchers on the scene.

Pentagon anger and frustration was strongly expressed in the autumn of 2006 by Pentagon officials (see The Price We Pay, Chap. II). As one official who oversees arms shipments from US stockpiles to Israel commented:

“Those bastards (the Israeli military) know the rules and what the US Arms Export Control Act requires! The CBU 58’s are decades out of date! We (the US) have not even had them in our weapons inventory since we last used them in 1991 during Desert Storm. They are now complete junk and I am amazed that any of them after 35 years even detonated. By using them this time in Lebanon Israel was illegally dropping landmines.”

When asked why Israel would use them if they didn’t function as designed, the official replied:

“They were emptying their closets of old **** so they can get the new M-26’s. We (the Pentagon) don’t resupply them (the Israelis) until their stockpile goes down to a certain level. They told us they didn’t have any CBU-58’s which are purely anti-personnel. The M-26 is the rocket fired cluster bomb [Ed: He was referring to the Honeywell manufactured Multiple Launch Rocket System that fires 7,728 M-77 bomblets up to 35 miles in less than one minute] the Israelis used across South Lebanon and will use again during their next war. We suspended shipments of the M-26 during the July war after we learned about the CBU-58 and Israeli lies about what they were doing with the M-26’s in their inventory.”

Some in the Pentagon are urging engagement with Hezbollah following the realization that Israel performed poorly in its latest attack on Lebanon. This included major military surprises as the vulnerability of Israeli armor to Hezbollah anti-tank rockets which resulted in dozens of tanks hit and the greatest proportion of Israeli casualties among tank crews. On the first day of its ground offensive 27 Israeli troops were killed.

A recent Pentagon funded study of Israel’s July 2006 performance reached the following summarized conclusions:

· Israel erred in going to war over two captured soldiers.

· “Israel disregarded the central American tenet of precision targeting—that fewer weapons and less physical destruction can achieve desired effects with far less “collateral” damage, human and political.”

· “Israel’s military strategy was deeply flawed. Israel bombed too much and bombed the wrong targets, falling back upon cookie-cutter conventional targeting in attacking traditional military objects. Israel also undertook an intentionally pun*ishing and destructive air campaign against the people and government of Lebanon.”

· “The IDF seemed to satisfy itself with conventional measures of “success”—accumulating suspect statistics of Hezbollah launchers and rockets hit, dead fighters, and destroyed Hezbollah “structures.” Israel may have satisfied itself that every building and structure it was attacking in Bei*rut and every civilian home in the south was associated with Hezbollah, but the cumulative impact was far less impressive militarily and far more politically damaging than the planners and commanders projected.”

· “Hundreds if not thousands of ci*vilian buildings were falsely and promiscuously labeled Hezbollah “structures” and attacked in the name of degrading or destroy*ing that organization”.

· “Israel expanded its attacks on civilian targets to exact punishment on Hezbollah support*ers and the government and people of Lebanon. Israel doggedly explained its action by reiterating again and again that Hez*bollah fighters were “terrorists” and that Hezbollah was ulti*mately responsible for any damage caused, but outside of a small circle of supporters, Israel increasingly was objectified, by US military analysts, as the aggressor.”

· “The argument we hear from the Israeli government is dubious i.e. that it had no alternative—that these otherwise civilian homes and buildings had to be attacked because of the nature of Hezbollah and its use of Lebanese society as a human shield”

· “Hezbollah’s resilience demonstrated that the organization had deep roots and enormous popular support in Lebanon, and yet Israeli political and military leaders seemed to believe their own propaganda that Hezbollah had no Lebanese sup*port, was weak, and was losing. From this stemmed a wholly conventional and false measure of success that Israel seemed content to apply: Hezbollah’s six years of investment and effort to build up infrastructure in Lebanon was gone, the routes of Syrian and Iranian resupply were disrupted, 70–80 percent of the long-range and 50 percent of the short-range launchers were destroyed, half of the stock of actual rockets and missiles was destroyed or expended, and more than 600 Hezbollah fighters were dead. Destruction of the organization’s support infrastruc*ture—roads and bridges, fuel, communications, media, even financial institutions—accumulated. The Pentagon knew that this was not true. Israel failed to make a holistic analysis of the military benefit relative to the human and political impact”.

“From a military standpoint, a different course should have been followed. Airpower as it was employed by Israel is not that alternative. (Added to this is the speculation that Hezbollah’s recently mentioned ‘Surprise for Israel” includes surface to air missiles that can destroy Israeli aircraft when they attack Lebanon).

Israel also failed to protect its tank crews.

The potency of infantry anti-armor weapons have plagued the Israelis since the 1973 Ramadan War when Russian made wire guided Sagger missiles were fired in barrages at Israeli tanks by Egyptian forces crossing the Suez Canal.

In July 2006 Hezbollah used the Russian AT-13 Metis or Saxhorn, the modern tube-launched successor to the Sagger which can punch through 18 inches (46cm) of Merkava IV tank armor.

Israel’s ‘reactive armor’–which consists of explosive pads or bricks on the outside of a tank or vehicle–is designed to explode outwards when hit by an incoming missile, disrupting the effect of the missile warhead. But these enhancements have not proved sufficiently effective against the most modern anti-tank systems operated by determined fighters on the ground. Hezbollah adapted and used tandem charges whereby the first warhead triggers the Israeli ‘reactive armor’ and the second penetrated the tank. Hezbollah’s RPG-29, a shoulder-fired weapon designed with a tandem charge proved devastating to Israeli tanks. Military analysts speculate that were Israel to launch a major ground assault on Lebanon it would lose hundreds of tanks from tandem charge weapons including the Kornet which is accurate form three miles away, includes tandem charges, and can penetrate 1,200 cm of hardened armor. A reporter from the London Daily Telegraph reported seeing Kornet missile casings laying around Maroun al Ras, Eita Shaab, and Aitaroun.

[TayyaRevolution]

Part IV: Bait, Hook and Switch: the US offer and the quid pro quo

21 April, 2008
— Franklin Lamb
Dahiyeh

“Absolutely not! Without a credible deterrent force, there is no real Lebanese sovereignty. Israel came very close to getting nearly all it wanted with the 1983 May 17th agreement. Had Hezbollah not prevented this, Lebanon today would be colonized with near confederation status with Israel. The Bush administrations democracy and ’save the Christians’ crusade back-fired when each election resulted in Islamist victories while his war in Iraq and support for Israel is making refugees of a high percentage of Christians. It is now Hezbollah and its allies who are protecting the Christians and want free elections in the Middle East, not the Bush administration”.

– American student interviewed as part of a survey of 27 Lebanese institutions of higher education on whether Hezbollah should immediately disarm

Disarming Hezbollah: the Bush administration will not insist

As noted previously, the US government is not obsessed by Hezbollah’s deterrent capability. It appears prepared to back off from this issue and signal to Hezbollah that it can keep its weapons if they use them only in legitimate self defense against a foreign attack.

This seemingly sharp change of policy is similar to Secretary of State Rice’s apparent switch from Bush administration demands regarding an immediate election of a Lebanese president to her April 14, 2008 statement that it is really not necessary after all. Beirut’s pro-government An Nahar newspaper reported this week than an Arab diplomat quoted U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice as telling the foreign ministers of the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council that the absence of a president in Lebanon was not a problem and that her top priority was to keep Premier Fouad Siniora as head of the executive body: “What’s wrong with keeping the situation in Lebanon as it is? Our priority is to keep Fouad Siniora as head of the democratically elected government…and that he acts according to the powers granted to him and the president,” the source, according to Beirut’s As Safir daily, quoted Rice.

The new US rationale creates a legal fiction to avoid the “resistance/militia” problem presented by UNSC Resolutions 1559 and 1701 and would align the US position with the views of the late Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, the current Prime Minister Siniora as well as a majority in Parliament, the Lebanese public the United Nations membership. To wit:

The 2005 Lebanese cabinet statement: “The government considers that Lebanon’s resistance is a sincere and natural expression of the Lebanese people’s right to defend its land and dignity in the face of Israeli aggression threats, and ambitions as well as its right to continue its actions to free Lebanese territory”

Hassan Nasrallah, in his speech at Bint Jbeil on May 25, 2005, explained that during meetings with Prime Minister Rafic Hariri that they had become friends and that Hariri offered to write out is his own handwriting a statement regarding the right of the resistance to bear arms.

According to Nasrallah: “I told him, “Forgive me, please; I do not want you to do that; I will accept your word. Just say it and it will be enough. He (PM Rafic Hariri) then said to me, word-for word, ‘After a careful examination of the resistance’s experience, performance, wisdom, equilibrium, and efficiency, I came to believe in it. I can also tell you that if I become prime minister again, I will not implement that paragraph in Resolution 1559. I agree that the resistance and its weapons must stay until a comprehensive settlement is reached in the region.”

His son, Saad Hariri confirmed this to CNN when he stated that Hezbollah was not an armed militia but an armed resistance movement for all of Lebanon. Moreover, the State Department Office of the General Council knows the legal and political effect of the February 2006 Siniora declaration that his government will not call Hezbollah “by any name other than the resistance”.

Does the Lebanese public want Hezbollah to disarm?

A recent survey of an important segment of Lebanese opinion confirms that the general Lebanese public favors Hezbollah retaining its deterrent capability pending a just resolution of the Question of Palestine.

As part of a research project on Hezbollah, an admittedly unscientific survey of 27 Lebanese institutions of higher learning was undertaken, conducted over a four-month period. The following questions were posed to randomly approached students, faculty and staff from, among others, the American University of Science and Technology, University of Balamand, American University of Beirut, Arab Open University, University of Saint Joseph, Beirut Arab University, Islamic University of Lebanon, Lebanese American University. (To consult the complete list of the 27 Lebanese institutions surveyed please inquire c/o: ngolebanon@aim.com)

Survey Questions:

1. Do you favor Hezbollah retaining its armed military wing and its weapons for the time being?

2. If yes, why?

3. If no, why not?

Of those surveyed, 12% thought Hezbollah should immediately turn its weapons over to the Lebanese Army after agreement with the Government and with international guarantees in place that Israel would not attack Lebanon again. The main reasons given were variations on the idea that a sovereign country should have only one source of authority and control over its military and deterrence capability.

The remaining 88% surveyed thought that Hezbollah should retain its weapons for the time being and offered a range of reasons:

· Hezbollah is currently the only force In Lebanon capable of deterring Israeli aggression;

· Having Hezbollah as a deterrent force at this time is in Lebanon’s national interest given US and Israel provocations such as the 6th fleet, numerous threats, Israeli over flights, assassinations etc.;

· Israel continues to interfere with our water sources and threatens war over Lebanon’s use of our own Wazzani and Hasbani Rivers;

· UN Security Council Resolution 425 has not yet been implemented as Israel continues to occupy the Shebaa farms, the village of Ghajar, and other parcels of Lebanese land;

· Israel cannot be trusted not to invade Lebanon at will and US ‘guarantees’ are worthless as Lebanon and the world saw in 1982 when the US ‘guaranteed’ the safety of the Palestinian Refugee Camps including Sabra-Shatila;

· Israel still has not released our Lebanese hostages and prisoners and arrests our citizens along the northern border of Palestine at will;

· Hezbollah has a national and moral duty to retain a military capacity to support the liberation of Palestine, the central cause for Arabs;

· Without facing a credible deterrent, Israel would never consider giving back the occupied Golan Heights to Syria;

· Without Hezbollah being able to contain and deter Zionist Israel, Lebanon’s resources would be siphoned by Israel including its water, its land, and its independence;

· Hezbollah is the only Party with broad enough support, moral suasion, and substance to maintain stability and prevent a US/Israeli encouraged civil war;

· Hezbollah keeps the US from repeating the 1982-83 intervention and disaster;

· Some American students studying in Lebanon identified with the views expressed by a student from New York: “A strong Hezbollah provides moral support to resistance and liberation efforts in the Middle East and human rights causes in the West. For example, the American people have a daunting task in breaking the Zionist hold on its government and its media. But it is slowly being achieved by education and the American people learning the facts of the Israeli occupation of Palestine and Lebanon. Hezbollah’s success inspires and encourages this movement”;

· “There is no other group to protect Lebanon. UNIFIL has never been respected by Israel and the Lebanese army is too weak and will likely remain so because the Bush administration and Israel worry its arms may be used to defend Lebanon against, God forbid, Israel!”;

· Hezbollah helps protect UNIFIL and even the US Embassy from al Qaeda kidnappings and attacks;

· A strong Hezbollah provides inspiration and moral support for increasing numbers of Lebanese, Europeans and Americans who reject the Bush administration aggression in Iraq, Afghanistan and its funding of Israeli aggression with its killing in Lebanon and Palestine;

· In the early 1980s Lebanese President Amin Gemayel moved against the weapons in Muslim west Beirut but did not disturb the Phalangist arms in Christian east Beirut. In addition, Gemayel ordered the army to remove Shia from their homes on the outskirts of Beirut shortly after he was inaugurated. We need a settlement before we feel trust and confidence to give up the security we now have;

· Hezbollah’s strength gives the Palestinians hope whereas leaders of Arabs states have failed to join the liberation/resistance struggle either in Palestine or Lebanon, some as a result of being bought off such as Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and most of the Gulf or threatened;

· Given the long history of discrimination against Lebanon’s Shia population, Hezbollah’s vigor gives the community confidence as they rebuild their lives and try to get the government to deliver services to their areas;

· Our citizens continue to die in the South from US/Israeli landmines and cluster bombs and Israel still refuses to give the UN demining teams maps to help clear them;

· The Lebanese army is weak and the US/Israel project is intent on keeping it weak;

· Israel’s threat to transfer the Palestinian population must be resisted and only Hezbollah currently has the power and credibility to do this;

· The Lebanese Resistances’ strength has a stabilizing and calming affect on Lebanon because it will not allow others to provoke another civil war;

· The question of Hezbollah’s weapons should be referred to the new government following the coming elections and the selection of a President;

· The Bush administration push to disarm the Lebanese Resistance is an Israeli decision to help Israel, not to help the Lebanese people.

A recent editorial in the conservative Beirut Daily Star reflects the views of much of Lebanon’s academic community:

“During all the years that Hezbollah conducted low-intensity warfare against Israeli occupation forces in South Lebanon (and perhaps even in 2006), there were many instances in which its capacity to exact a heavier toll deterred or limited escalation by the Jewish state… Hezbollah came into existence as the direct result of Israeli aggression. Today the party serves a far wider variety of social, political and economic purposes, but it was born of a refusal to acquiesce in Israel’s continual abuse and bullying of this country. …

The history matters more than anything else because solving a problem requires an understanding of cause and effect - and because the historical behavior that created the situation has not changed: The Israelis have not, for example, fully vacated the Lebanese territory they occupy, stopped violating Lebanese airspace, or provided badly needed firing data that might help demining crews clear unexploded ordnance that has killed or wounded 300 Lebanese since the end of the 2006 war.

By stressing Hezbollah’s guns today instead of the decades of innumerable depredations to which they have been a response, therefore, the Security Council tries to put the cart before the horse.

The bottom line is that Hezbollah will not grant impunity for the Israelis to run roughshod over the Lebanese as they have the Palestinians. The sooner the Security Council absorbs that immutable fact, the sooner it can get to work on the source of the conflict. If not, it becomes even more important for March 14 to do so because if Israel retains its “free pass,” this country and its government is going to need all the strength they can muster.”

“Believe it or not there are some plusses for the Bush administration if Hezbollah is strong”, explained a Senate Intelligence Committee Staffer during an email exchange recently:

“It seems they (the Bush administration) don’t see any really good options right now nor do they see certain long term American benefits if Hezbollah disarms. Some see a strong Hezbollah as a deterrent to regional interference in Lebanon. Hezbollah might be the stabilizing factor in the region the international community is looking for. Being Lebanese nationalists, if need be in the finally analysis they [Hezbollah] can be counted on to stand up to Syria, Israel or Iran for the good of their people and country.”

She continued:

“The terrorism case against Hezbollah is weak and the Administration does not feel it has solid grounds to pursue it. Believe it or not some of us were a little embarrassed back in October of 2001 when then National Security advisor Rice was new on the job and expressed surprise to the international media that so many in Lebanon supported Hezbollah which she claimed, without offering any proof, “has killed innocent people”.

The next question for Rice from a reporter was to ask her about the US bombing that very same day by the Bush administration of the Sultanpur Mosque in Jalalabad which killed more than 200 family worshippers.

Rice said she had no knowledge of that and would get back to the Reporter, who the last I heard was still waiting her reply.

“The point is their [Hezbollah's] record is better than ours and given our credibility problem the US does not want to touch the “you are worse than we are pissing contest”. Hezbollah has not attacked us for almost 25 years, really since they went public in 1985. We discount the early and wild 1980s a bit because they weren’t really organized and we were also playing pretty rough over there (in Lebanon) when we used the New Jersey and tried to hit Fadlallah and some other stuff. We don’t need to fight Hezbollah. There are plenty of other actors out there who constitute a real threat to us and we know Hezbollah, like us, can’t always choose associates which sometimes geopolitical conditions impose”.

For nearly a quarter century the feelers from the American side have been variations of selected boilerplate tenders. Recent Middle East realities have added some others.

What the Bush administration wants from Hezbollah:

· A public announcement of, and adherence to, a Hezbollah policy that separates Islam from terrorism in the minds of the western public, i.e. between religions on the one hand and terrorist activity on the other. This, the US argues, will allow for acceptance of Hezbollah in the West and allow for normalizing relations;

· In a switch from sponsoring salafists against Hezbollah, Washington now wants a “security cooperation understanding” with Hezbollah whereby it would monitor al Qaeda and provide the US with information about groups or individuals Hezbollah may have information about. For example, those who are apt to strike inside the US;

· Hezbollah is to agree to stay away from the Blue Line from Naqoura to Khiam and further up opposite Shebaa Farms;

· To end its encouragement of and support for Hamas and Islamic Jihad;

· Remove itself from activity regarding Syria and the Golan Heights and leave that issue to the parties directly concerned;

· Desist from making an issue of the Shebaa Farms and Ghajar and leave it to the US and the UN to see that Israel withdraws;

· Pull back from Iran and concentrate on its own role as a political party operating strictly for, of and by Lebanon.

Further, that:

· Hezbollah must separate itself from the Arab-Israeli conflict including Jerusalem;

· Hezbollah should commit to Lebanon not taking more than its “equitable share” of the Lebanese rivers and water sources including the Wazzani, which, argues the Bush administration, supplies 30% of “Israel’s Jordan River” (!)

· Hezbollah must agree not to interfere with the naturalization or relocation of Palestinians in Lebanon or with transferring groups of them internationally to suitable countries for ‘proper settlement’ as a resolution of the Right of Return issue.

What does Hezbollah get in return?

[TayyaRevolution]

and the last piece of the "series"

Part V: Hezbollah’s part of the bargain

21 April, 2008
— Franklin Lamb
Dahiyeh

“Nobody can impose terms on us, or commit us to anything we do not believe in. Let me be clear: Israel won’t get through politics what it didn’t get through war, even if the UN resolu*tion gave this to Israel. What they couldn’t do through war, they want to do by peaceful means? It doesn’t work like that.”

—Hezbollah deputy secretary-general Naim Qassem, Al-Manar television, 15 August 2006

Joseph Robinette Biden, Jr (”just call me Joe–anything but Sue” as he does his Johnny Cash imitation) Chairman of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and twice Presidential Candidate, is a friendly, loquacious, decent and knowledgeable fellow. Having served on that Committee for nearly a quarter century and traveled widely, Biden thinks of himself as someone who can be confronted with ‘deal breakers’ at the negotiation table and work out mutually acceptable solutions. “I’m the real deal bridge builder!”, he sometimes kids with his devoted staff, as he shadow boxes and mimics his favorite boxer, Evander “the real deal” Holyfield.

But the Bush administration is no favorite of Biden’s and he and others on Capitol Hill have run out of patience with its Middle East policy. Once Barack Obama, a junior member of his Foreign Relations Committee who has become his friend and who Biden has taken under his wing and tutored ‘on the ways of the World out there’ becomes President next January (as Biden and his staff believe he will—”unless the same dark forces, which have become stronger in the past few years, who killed Medgar Evers, Dr. Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, John and Robert Kennedy and several others have their way)”, we are, he thinks, “going to see some serious changes in US Foreign Policy starting with the Middle East.”

Some members of his bright Committee staff generally favor engagement with Hezbollah (privately) if the Party would agree. “The Party of God, not the Zionist controlled Democratic Party”, one staffer hastens to add.

When asked what they conclude the US would be willing to extend Hezbollah based on earlier feelers and offers and what they learned from Committee Staff discussions with White House Congressional liaison personnel, State Department contacts, and their own tuition, the following emerge:

Rebuilding Lebanon and Keeping Israel At Bay

“The US will consider funding a ‘Marshall Plan’ type operation for rebuilding South Lebanon and guarantee [that word again!] that Israel stays out. The US would be prepared to transfer directly to Hezbollah designated bank accounts “enormous sums of money to spend on the territories Israel destroyed, and equivalent sums to improve other deprived areas of the country”.

A Congressional media operative noted this off the record by email:

“Just ask Egypt and Jordan how we can sweeten a deal! Hezbollah should not worry about losing Iranian funding. We’ve got a lot more than they do!”

International Legitimacy

The Bush administration would anoint Hezbollah with the US imprimatur of ‘international legitimacy’, repeal the relevant targeting Executive orders and remove Hezbollah’s Information Unit (Al Manar TV, Radio Noor etc), its Construction Company (Jihad al Bina), its social service agencies and its financial institutions from the US Treasury and State department Terrorism lists.

Cluster Bomb Maps

The US will force Israel to turn over maps of planted land mines, cluster bomb maps and firing logs which the international community has been demanding for the past 18 months following the end of the 2006 July War. Hezbollah is greatly concerned about the unexploded ordnance terrorizing its popular base in the South. The Tyre based UN Mine Action Coordination Committee has so far uncovered 966 civilian locations where Israel dropped US cluster bombs covering an area of 39 million square meters. UNMACC Program Manager in Tyre Chris Clark estimates that de-miners have been able to locate and disarm 143,000 US supplied cluster bombs, but another million or more may remain. Since the end of the fighting in mid August 2006, the total number of people injured or killed is 296 according to Dalia Farren, Director of Media Relations at UNMACC.

To date the Bush administration has not demanded the maps from Israel, despite Lebanese continuing to die, because the State Department Office of General Counsel produced a Legal Memorandum which warns that if Israel releases the demanded information it will effectively constitute a self-indictment for War Crimes.

UNIFIL knows this but has chosen to keep quiet while routinely renewing its public demands knowing that Israel will not comply unless the US forces it. The Pentagon has no problem with “cutting the bastards (Israel) loose on this one and forcing them to ‘fess up”, according to a Congressional source.

A clarifying comment from one of the aforementioned Memorandum’s authors:

“The Winograd Commission claims that Israel used cluster bombs in accordance with international and US law has no support from the July 2006 record. Israel committed serial war crimes as well as wholesale violations of American law that no other country would be allowed to do.

In 1982 President Reagan cut off cluster bombs to Israel for 6 years. This time President Bush won’t touch the issue and Congress has buried the US Arms Export Act violations, hoping the public won’t demand its application. Some US officials complain that they have a hard time looking their Lebanese-American constituents in the eye. We are not proud of what’s become of their little country because of our weapons.”

Releasing Lebanese Prisoners in Israeli Jails and Territorial Sovereignty

The US would obtain the release of all Hezbollah detainees and prisoners from Israeli jails;

· The US will force the return of Shebaa Farms, Ghajar, end Israeli over flights of Lebanese territory and violations of Lebanese sovereignty.

From Opposition to Government

· The US would secure a bigger role for Hezbollah in the Lebanese Government while establishing normal relations with the party, lifting all US travel constraints imposed on its members and supporters while cooperating with Hezbollah in forming a new government based on the results of the 2009 elections while encouraging a new census, the first once since 1933.

As a Library of Congress, Congressional Research Service, Lebanese specialist recently emailed:

“Do you really think Lebanon’s hereditary tribal government is going to change? More than one-third of Lebanon’s Parliament constitutes family hand-me-down seats. If you agree that the Lebanese people are fed up with the ‘warlords’ how do you think we feel? There ought to be a one person, one vote system to elect their leaders. For me personally, dealing with a group that keeps its word would be a welcomed relief in my office. Hezbollah is quintessentially nationalist and can handle Iran and Syria. You get my meaning”.

One staffer on the House subcommittee on the Middle East explained as background:

“Personally, and I certainly don’t speak for the White House, I see the whole of Lebanon on the table. The right deal and Hezbollah can have it as far as I am concerned. What is the right deal? Our Committee Staff mainly believes Hamas will offer essentially a perpetual cease-fire to Israel in exchange for all, repeat, all of the Palestine taken in 1967 and a return to the June 4, 1967 border with Jerusalem at its Capitol. That includes a full right of return for the 4.5 million Palestinian refugees. That means no checkpoints, no settlements, no outposts, no Israeli presence and no excuses!”

If Hamas can accept this, then Hezbollah’s past statements regarding acceptance of a solution to the Question of Palestine arrived at by the Palestinians might mean peace.

Hezbollah’s Response

Hezbollah accepts dialogue as a matter of principle and axiom. Historically, the Shia culture generally and Hezbollah in particular is comfortable with discussions and exchanging ideas with friends and foes ranging from issues of war and peace to societal problems to religion and ways to improve peoples lives. It is prepared for dialogue over the question of Palestine, the bloodstream issue and central cause of Arabs and Muslims and increasingly people around the World.

However, Hezbollah has consistently rejected most US feelers because, as Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah has stated, “our acquiescence to America’s demands would simply have meant abandoning our faith, our people and our history.”

As far back as November 16, 2001, Hassan Nasrallah explained Hezbollah’s past objections to US offers to the Kuwaiti daily Al-Rai Al-Aam:

“As for their demand that we sever our connection to the Arab-Israeli conflict, that would mean the total elimination of Hezbollah’s head and heart, a complete disregard for the martyrs’ blood and a betrayal of their families’ tears, of our people and of their sacrifice. It would also mean giving up our religious and legal duty to come to the assistance of Palestine”.

According to Hezbollah, the US has tried several times “to place us in a state of confrontation with what they called “Sunni fundamentalism”. They tried to provoke us along these lines, on the grounds that, in the future, Sunni fundamentalism will pose the gravest threat to Shiism”. The Bush administration, according to Hezbollah, also tried to get Iran to attack the Taliban and provoke a Shia-Sunni confrontation. But Iran did not fall into the trap.

With respect to the bargaining chip of pulling back from the Palestinian cause, Hezbollah considers that it has, in the words of Nasrallah, “a moral, humanitarian, religious, patriotic, and national duty towards the Palestinians”.

Hezbollah believes that peace will come to Palestine and the region not through a phony ‘peace process’ trying to buy off the Palestinian or Lebanese Resistance but when the occupation ends. It really is that simple. And until the Bush administration or its successor in Washington really understand this, negotiations will remain just talk.

One Hezbollah acquaintance stated: “We need to ensure at the beginning of negotiations that the occupation ends. Then peace can be made between states. An occupied people cannot make peace with its occupiers”.

With respect to the current ’situation’ in Lebanon, Hezbullah’s international relations officer, Nawaf Moussawi stated recently that the “most dangerous thing in US policies currently [has been] their engagement in the blatant disruption of attempts at dialogue and consensus among Lebanese political forces.” Moussawi added that the US was engaged in “deepening political and sectarian divides within each confession in order to ignite mobile civil wars.” He stressed that the freedom of Lebanon could only come through its “self-defense capabilities, including those of the resistance” and that independence could only be attained through consensus and unity.

What the Hezbollah leadership discusses in its Shura Council becomes public knowledge only when Hezbollah wants it to. But until today Hezbollah views US proposals with deep suspicion and as calculated to advance Israel’s agenda in the region.

Hezbollah is no stranger to the Bush Administration carrot and stick pattern of wooing and then harshly threatening if overtures are spurned. Hezbollah respects the American people but views most of the recent American governments proposals “as nothing but a political bomb meant to destroy Hezbollah, since they cannot of course destroy us by dropping a nuclear bomb on us,” as Hezbollah’s Secretary General Nasrallah has said.

Regarding the future, Nasrallah told the Kuwaiti Daily Al-Rai Al-Aam,

“We are not at all worried. We are holding fast to the options that our legitimate, religious, national, humane, and moral commitments impose on us, and do not think that the US will carry out military operations in this region. At any rate, they do not have valid pretexts for doing so, and we stand firms in our positions, our path, and our convictions.”

Many in Washington would favor dialogue with Hezbollah. It remains to be seen if ‘bridge builders’ can make that happen and if we are going to see some serious changes in US Foreign Policy starting with the Middle East.

.....

Source for all 5 parts: An Offer Hezbollah Cannot Refuse? « Peoples Geography — Reclaiming space

[joseph_lubnan]

Originally Posted by PhoenixResurrection

In the coming period? the "race to arms" started a couple of years ago and most if not all "parties and sects" already have their storehouses and training camps. it would be quite deceitful to pretend otherwise.
If anything the recent events will not stop the already rampant armement race and the parties that were defeated will most probably change their training techniques and instructors.


In the coming period, everyone should escalate its expectations from ALL parties to push for a concrete disarmament of ALL parties.

It is about time to open both eyes and stop with the single obsession.

I wholeheartedly agree that all should disarm.

Back when Syria left, no one had any arms to speak of except for HA and they insisted on refusing even to discuss their arms. Their blatant disregard to every other Lebanese has caused the race to arms that you spoke of in recent years, although it was Minor and not pronounced enough to sustain a civil war. It is HA's recent use of their weapons internally and politically, that will further accelerate that arms race and bring us to the brink of civil war.

It is about time to open both eyes and see that HA's arms have been recently a problem and an agent of destruction of Lebanon's future. Other parties and sects are reacting to HA's arms and their disregard to the rule of law and the sovereignty of the Lebanese state, and not the other way around. Focusing on the root cause of the problem, and underscoring the truth is not an obsession, it is a duty.

[joseph_lubnan]

The prospect of a wider peace
May 29th 2008 | CAIRO
From The Economist print edition

If Lebanon's latest deal holds, why not bring in Syria and Israel?


JUST two weeks ago, Lebanon was on the verge of civil war. Suddenly, it seems to be on the brink of a lasting peace. And just as Lebanon's own troubles reflected wider tensions in the Middle East, the fractious country's sudden mood of conciliation is sending positive ripples through the region. At least, that is how things appear on the surface.

Following a deal cut on May 23rd in Qatar between Lebanon's bickering factions, Lebanon's parliament swiftly voted into office a new president, a 59-year-old former army chief, General Michel Suleiman. The second part of the deal looked well on the way to being fulfilled, as faction leaders were poised to name ministers for a new cabinet of national unity.

After Syria and Israel, the bigger neighbours who have often sparred for control of Lebanon, confirmed whispers that they had begun talking, Syria's President Bashar Assad even suggested that at some point Lebanon should join in. Meanwhile, Hizbullah, the Lebanese Shia party-***-militia that started the clashes three weeks ago, revealed that it is close to clinching a deal to trade two Israeli soldiers it holds with five Lebanese men jailed in Israel.

That would be a big breakthrough, considering that Hizbullah's capture of the soldiers, with the intent of using them as bargaining chips for such a swap, sparked a 33-day war with Israel in 2006. There has even been some optimistic talk of an emerging regional bargain, with America and Iran, instead of egging their proxies on to fight, letting them come to terms.

Yet severe doubts linger, in Lebanon and at large. The Hizbullah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, tried to answer them in a conciliatory speech, asserting that despite its swift and violent takeover of Sunni districts in Beirut earlier this month, his Iranian-backed party had no intention of imposing its rule. Every weapon in the country, he said, should “remain in the service of the goal for which it was intended”: defending Lebanon against outsiders (ie, Israel), and not settling internal squabbles.

But he insisted that his “resistance” retained a sacred right to bear arms. Some of his enthusiasts celebrated the speech by riding into Sunni quarters and shooting in the air, sparking violence that injured 16 people. A day later, fighting between Hizbullah fighters and Druze villagers left a soldier dead. Lingering ill-will, especially among Sunni militants who felt humiliated by the Shia show of force, leads many Lebanese to expect more such incidents.

“Ultimately, only a regional deal can get the Lebanese to fix the hard and messy issues, like Hizbullah's guns and how to build a non-sectarian state,” says a diplomat in Beirut. Given the fragility of Israel's government, the reluctance of Israelis to surrender territory in exchange for peace with Syria, and Syria's refusal so far to meet Israeli demands that it drop its alliance with Iran and end support for groups such as Hizbullah, a regional deal looks hard to strike in the near future. But at least its outline looks clearer.

[Ashrafieh_101]

Originally Posted by Dry Ice

Since Hezbollah and the Resistance are one of the major topics of discussion and whereby Hezbollah is a national resistance and deemed as so as per the ministerial statement and the general political understanding..

What would be your opinion as a Lebanese citizen, supporting your national resistance, on the type of counterstrike that Hezbollah should do?

(please mods if you can make this a poll)

1. A military operation on the Lebanese borders as in July 2006 (kill or capture israeli soldiers)

2. An intel operation within or outside Israel to liquidate one of the israeli military commanders (eye for an eye), provided it minimizes civilian casualties

3. A direct and massive hit, either on a military or a civilian target in Israel or abroad, regardless of casulaties

4. Do nothing

5. Other

My choice would be for HA to cut relations with Syria who clearly offered Mughnieh's head in exchange for furthering talks with Israel...

[joseph_lubnan]

Shouldn't the new Lebanese government and HA, together, start peace negotiations with Israel that includes disarmament and integration within the army, in return of a basket of issues that include Shebaa, prisoners, Palestinian refugees in Lebanon, etc... like Syria is doing?

Wouldn't that be an excellent way to resolve the arms issue, along with many others. Wouldn't making a public declaration of such an initiative send the right message to the Lebanese citizen that have reservations against HA, and to the international community? Shouldn't that declaration be part of the new governments bayen? Wouldn't that be a good way to move the MOU forward and away from ambiguity?

Would HA agree???

[joseph_lubnan]

The Axis of Weakness
By DANIEL FREEDMAN
FROM TODAY'S WALL STREET JOURNAL EUROPE
June 2, 2008

In a Middle East full of dissenters and conspiracy theorists, there are usually at least ten interpretations of any noteworthy event. So perhaps most remarkable about Hezbollah's recent power play in Beirut is how uniform commentary has been. The conventional wisdom is that the deal to give Shiites more control in the central government is a victory for the Iran-Syria-Hezbollah axis and a defeat for Saudi Arabia, France and the United States, who support the Cedar Revolution.

But why, at the moment of Hezbollah's big military victory -- when it had taken parts of Beirut and proved the army would not stand in its way -- did it not finish its coup? The Lebanese government's attempt to shut down Hezbollah's telecoms network and remove a Hezbollah-friendly army commander from Beirut airport miserably failed. Why did Hezbollah only demand a new political settlement? Why wave the white flag when your opponents have laid down their arms? This doesn't add up.

Perhaps then Hezbollah's temporary seizure of Beirut wasn't so much a sign of the strength of the Iran-Syria-Hezbollah axis as of its weakness. The "Party of God" may realize the axis with Tehran and particularly Damascus is not quite as strong as it appears. Seen in this light, the decision to secure tangible political gains while it still has military strength makes sense.

Syria's ongoing negotiations with Israel must worry Hezbollah. Any peace agreement that nets Damascus the Golan Heights would have to include a promise to abandon Hezbollah. If these talks don't bring a deal immediately, the fact that Damascus entertains the idea of cutting ties with Hezbollah must concentrate minds in South Lebanon.

Another sore point is the February assassination of Imad Mughniyah in Damascus, a key Hezbollah leader. Most fingers pointed at Israel. But there is another theory that the Syrians may have killed Mughniyah as a sign to Jerusalem of their sincere intentions.

The pressure on Syria to abandon Hezbollah is rising and coming not just from the West. The March Arab League summit in Damascus was boycotted by half of the leaders. This snub was not only a blow to Syrian prestige. It also showed how isolated Damascus is in the Arab world -- a world it once hoped to lead. It was a signal that its gambit of creating a new regional alliance with Iran comes with a heavy price tag.

While Iran has no plans of making peace with Israel or abandoning Hezbollah, it would be difficult for Tehran to keep Hezbollah alive without Syrian help. If Damascus closed its border to Lebanon, it would cut off a key route for Iranian arms smuggling to Hezbollah. And Iran's financial support for the Shiite group is in the end no match for the kind of money Saudi Arabia can pour into Lebanon to counter Tehran's influence. Riyadh has indicated that it will increase its support for its Sunni allies in Lebanon.

Hezbollah may have also learned a lesson from recent events in Iraq, where the Iranian-backed militia headed by Muqtada al-Sadr has at least for now abandoned its fight and started negotiations with the government. Apparently, Iranian support was not enough to keep up al-Sadr's war.

Why should it be different in Lebanon? Although Hezbollah portrayed its recent war with Israel as a victory, it wasn't. The fight did serious damage to Hezbollah's military capabilities. And the Shiite group lost legitimacy among the Lebanese people for the way it acted, both in disregarding Lebanese lives and starting an unnecessary war.

The once dominant sentiment among all Lebanese that "everyone can get along because we are all Lebanese," is waning. Sunni citizens are increasingly wary of Hezbollah. The Shiite group therefore faces the prospect of a hostile Israel on one side, a Syria that is no longer its ally on another, and a third column of opponents within: Lebanon's Sunnis together with Druze and Christian populations who have their own problems with the Shiites.

Sensing the tide in Lebanon might be turning against it, it used the government's attempted crackdown as an excuse to take parts of Beirut to scare its opponents into accepting a new political reality. This new reality gives Shiites, and therefore Hezbollah, more power in the central government.

So perhaps what we are seeing is the beginning of the gradual transformation of Hezbollah into a predominately political actor. It won't be easy and it will take time. Just like Northern Ireland, where it took the IRA 10 years to decommission their arms.

Some people argue that given Hezbollah's ideological commitment to an Islamic Lebanon such a transformation could never happen. Well, in the Middle East, everyone promises never to negotiate with their enemies, but everyone has their price. The PLO promised to never recognize Israel. Israel promised never to recognize the PLO. And so on. While the PLO certainly didn't start off negotiating in good faith, the political process helped gradually changing their stated ideological aims. The same could potentially be true for Hezbollah.

If Hezbollah really is on the brink of what could turn out to be a seismic change, the U.S. should do everything to encourage this process. It should accept a greater role for Shiites in the Lebanese government as long as Hezbollah agrees to start, however gradually, decommissioning. Israel should also be allowed to negotiate seriously with Syria.

Much more is at stake than easing frictions at the Israeli-Lebanese and Israeli-Syrian borders. Iran is on the verge of becoming a nuclear power. Separating Tehran from Damascus and Hezbollah would isolate and weaken the Islamic Republic at this crucial time. If we fail to do this, the conventional wisdom -- that the recent Lebanese developments were a victory for the Iran-Syria-Hezbollah-axis -- may unfortunately turn out to be right.

Mr. Freedman was the foreign policy analyst for Rudy Giuliani's Presidential Committee.

[Mr Aoun]

Originally Posted by joseph_lubnan

The Axis of Weakness

Excellent. They're weak. You got absolutely nothing to worry about then. So you can stop troubling yourself with weak little kittens and get on with your life.

[joseph_lubnan]

Originally Posted by Mr Aoun

Excellent. They're weak. You got absolutely nothing to worry about then. So you can stop troubling yourself with weak little kittens and get on with your life.

Its an article, with an interesting perspective... You just focused on the word "weakness" and it pissed you off? read the rest of the arguments and comment on them. Or perhaps if you want to show real strength and courage, give us you opinion on what HA would think of this approach:

Shouldn't the new Lebanese government and HA, together, start peace negotiations with Israel that includes disarmament and integration within the army, in return of a basket of issues that include Shebaa, prisoners, Palestinian refugees in Lebanon, etc... like Syria is doing?

Wouldn't that be an excellent way to resolve the arms issue, along with many others. Wouldn't making a public declaration of such an initiative send the right message to the Lebanese citizen that have reservations against HA, and to the international community? Shouldn't that declaration be part of the new governments bayen? Wouldn't that be a good way to move the MOU forward and away from ambiguity?

Would HA agree???