Lebanon Day 8 - The world turns its back

[zengrifter]

Lebanon: Day 8 ~ While the world is turning its back and closing its eyes

21 Jul 2006

While the world is turning its back and closing its eyes

by Raida Hatoum / Indy Media

I can hear the bombs as I write this: today, the 20th of July, is Day 8 of the Israeli war on Lebanon.

The bombing continues today especially in all the south and east of Lebanon. Today more massacres were conducted and more civilians were killed. Tomorrow we will count our lost ones from today and we will see more photos of murdered children and families.

Today we counted our lost ones from yesterday. We collected photos of the remains of families, of women and children who were killed. Yesterday was the worst, 70 civilians were killed - most of them are still under the ruins of their houses destroyed in the south and the Beqa'a regions.

On the television and radio people from the south and east Lebanon who are beseiged in their villages are asking for medicine, food, water, and are asking for mercy. They say there are still people buried under their houses that Israel bombed yesterday. They say there are still fires they cannot put off as Israel is using phosphorus bombs that burns everything. They say please give us one hour to allow us to have medicine and food at least for the children and to bury those who were killed.

...continued here - http://english-cyprus.indymedia.org/.../176/index.php

[zengrifter]

Lebanese Devastated In Multitude Of Ways

By Dahr Jamail
Inter Press Service
7-24-6

BEIRUT (IPS) -- Much of Beirut is a devastated city, infrastructure in many areas lies in a shambles after the Israeli bombing. But the Lebanese are also just feeling devastated.*

"Does our country not have the right to move forward like other democracies," says Nidal Mothman, a 35-year-old taxi driver in downtown Beirut. "We hate the American government for giving the green light for the Israelis to bomb us back to the stone age."

Mothman, like so many Lebanese in the capital city, is seething with anger over what he called "indiscriminate" Israeli aggression towards their country.

"How many Hezbollah have they killed," Mothman said. "Maybe just a few, while they've killed over 350 Lebanese civilians. What kind of war are they waging against my country?"

From the street to the leadership, most people seem to talk the same language. Last Thursday Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Siniora told reporters that his country has been torn to shreds. "Can the international community stand by while such callous retribution by the state of Israel is inflicted on us?"

Siniora also accused Israel of massacring Lebanese civilians and attempting to destroy everything that allows the country to stay alive.

The facts on the ground add credence to his remarks. The humanitarian crisis continues to worsen by the hour, with close to a million Lebanese displaced. Officials say at least 64 bridges have been bombed. Many roads are cut by the bombing, and this is hindering transportation of food and aid supplies.

Other Israeli targets have included the country's largest milk factory, a food factory, two pharmaceutical plants, water treatment centres, power plants, grain silos, a Greek Orthodox Church, hospitals and an ambulance convoy.

In certain districts of Beirut life goes on as normal, but southern Beirut has been hit hard, with entire buildings brought to the ground by Israeli air raids.

"When do you think this war will end," 22-year-old student at the American University of Beirut Nishan Ishaqi said. "I lived in southern Beirut, and everything I know is totally destroyed now. I only want peace, and a safe place to stay."

Ishaqi, who was preparing to leave for Tripoli (north of Beirut in Lebanon) to stay with relatives, wept as he said, "Why must they do this to us? If they want to fight Hezbollah, let them fight them -- but not the Lebanese civilians."

Meanwhile, Israeli military operations continue to pummel southern Lebanon, including the city of Tyre, while Lebanese in Beirut had a day of relative calm Sunday.

Foreign war ships are crowding ports as evacuation of foreign nationals continues. "Yes, we see the priorities of the western countries as they evacuate their people," 55-year-old clothing merchant in the Hamra district of Beirut, Ayad Harrar said. "So you see, screw the Lebanese, they do not matter to us. This is what their governments are saying to us by these actions."

Harrar said people are shocked that his country was once again plunged into war, just when they thought they had found peace.

"This afternoon it is calm, but we all know that when they finish evacuating their people, we will be bombed once more," Harrar said. "It is not possible to live a life while we live under these conditions; not knowing when our day to die is coming from more Israeli bombs."

On Saturday, after meeting with members from a United Nations team who had just returned from the region, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice told reporters that the situation in Lebanon was part of the "birth pangs of a new Middle East", and said that Israel should ignore calls for a ceasefire.

Not many people in Beirut are able to see it that way. Suthir Amalat carrying her child in one arm as she bought water to take home for emergencies said she was preparing for everything to worsen.

"We are angry at Hezbollah for starting this catastrophe, but even more angry at the Israelis for destroying all of Lebanon," she said. "And America, who we thought was our friend, clearly now supports the Israeli destruction of our country."

(c)2006 Dahr Jamail.

[zengrifter]

US Complicit In Destruction Of Lebanon

By Paul Craig Roberts
7-24-6

There never was any doubt of the Bush regime's complicity in Israel's naked aggression against the Lebanese civilian population. Bush has protected Israel from world condemnation. Bush has blocked those who attempted to bring a stop to Israel's bombing of residential neighborhoods and civilian infrastructure, and now Bush rushes more bombs for Israel to drop on Lebanon.

On July 22, the New York Times revealed the full extent of the Bush regime's participation in the heinous war crimes being inflicted on the Lebanese people:

"The Bush administration is rushing a delivery of precision-guided bombs to Israel, which requested the expedited shipment last week after beginning its air campaign. The decision to quickly ship the weapons to Israel was made with relatively little debate within the Bush administration, the officials said."

Obviously, Bush and his government do not think Israel has yet murdered enough Lebanese. Bush denounces Syria and Iran for allegedly arming Hezbollah, while he rushes more deadly weapons to Israel.

The entire world is appalled at the Bush regime's support for Israel's policy of expanding its borders through naked aggression.

Every Arab and Muslim now knows that the U.S. is Israel's enabler. Arab hopes are dead that the U.S. will pressure Israel to behave more humanely toward people not armed with American fighter planes, tanks, and high explosives.

America's complicity in Israel's war crimes is more than America's UK lapdog can stand. According to the French news service, AFP, "The United States is starting to look isolated in its refusal to rein in Israel's attacks on Lebanon with key ally Britain criticizing the wholesale killing of Lebanese civilians and widespread destruction."

AFP reports that Britain's deputy foreign minister Kim Howells "questioned Israel's military tactics and slammed Israel's killing of 'so many children and so many people. If Israel is chasing Hezbollah, then go for Hezbollah. You don't go for the entire Lebanese nation.'"

But is Israel after Hezbollah, or is Israel after the real estate that comprises southern Lebanon?

Right-wing Israelis say Israel needs southern Lebanon as a buffer against Hezbollah. If Israel were to succeed in driving Hezbollah out of southern Lebanon, Israel would then want a buffer for southern Lebanon, where Israeli settlements would quickly spring up, and after that buffer, another, just as Israel has gobbled up Palestine.

The American people need to understand what everyone else in the world understands: The Bush regime is empowering the Israeli state to push out its borders by stealing land from other people.

This Israeli policy is the source of the Middle East conflict.

It is ignorant and immoral to blame the conflict on Hamas and Hezbollah. These organizations were created by Israeli aggression. Lacking American jet fighters, tanks, ordinance, and resupply, these organizations resort to terror, which is the only weapon that they have. Otherwise, the world would pay no attention as Arabs are ground under by Israeli expansion.

The fault is America's more than Israel's. The American government and the brainwashed American public are the source of the conflict. If America did not enable Israeli aggression, Israel would have to behave responsibly and endeavor to coexist with its neighbors.

Israel is an artificial state created in Arab lands by European colonial powers after World War II. Instead of working to win acceptance and overcoming Arab hostility to Europe shipping off "the Jewish problem" to the Middle East, Israel has antagonized its Middle East neighbors. Israel can play the bully-boy role because the U.S. acts as Israel's big brother. With its policy of fang and claw, Israel endangers its own right to exist.

Many distinguished Israelis came to this conclusion long before I did. I am only repeating what can be read in more eloquent writings of distinguished Israelis.

Israel's greatest friends are its own peace movement and those few in America who dare to criticize Israel's self-destructive policies. It is not anti-Semitic to hold Israel to the same standards as other civilized countries or to report facts instead of Israeli propaganda.

Israel's greatest enemies are the American neoconservatives, who hold the power in the Bush regime. What we are witnessing in the Middle East is the unfolding of the neocon plan to destroy all vestiges of Arab/Muslim independence and to remove all opposition to Israel's agenda. Can 5 million Israelis, even when backed by the United States, forever suppress hundreds of millions of humiliated Muslims stewing in their humiliation?

This is a recipe for perpetual conflict and the eventual destruction of Israel.

Neocons believe that deception of the American public is a legitimate way for them to achieve their plan. Bush's so-called "war on terror" is the cloak for neocon deception.

Bush's war is not on terror. Bush's war is on Muslim states not ruled by American puppets.