Osama bin Laden has plenty on his mind but he managed to pay close attention this month to the events surrounding Israel’s 60th anniversary and the parallel commemoration of the ”nakba” — the catastrophe — that the creation of the Jewish state in 1948 meant for the Palestinians.
An agreement banning cluster bombs has cheered human rights campaigners, but powerful military states are refusing to join it and experts say the treaty is riddled with holes and could prove unworkable. The agreement commits 111 countries to banning the use of cluster munitions.
Lebanon’s Parliament is set to elect army chief General Michel Suleiman as the country’s president on Sunday, filling a post left vacant for six months by a political crisis that threatened a new civil war. A Qatari-brokered deal last week between rival Lebanese leaders defused 18 months of political stalemate that erupted into fighting this month.
Israel and Syria said in surprise announcements on Wednesday they were conducting indirect peace talks with Turkish mediation. Senior officials from both sides were currently in Turkey, an Israeli government official said. He would not confirm there had been direct contacts between the two delegations.
Rival Lebanese leaders signed a deal on Wednesday to end 18 months of political conflict that had pushed their country to the brink of a new civil war. The deal, concluded after six days of Arab-mediated talks in Qatar, paved the way for parliament to elect army chief General Michel Suleiman as president, filling a post vacant since November because of the political deadlock.
The United States agreed on Friday to help Saudi Arabia protect its oil industry from terrorist attack, while offering to back conservative Arab countries resisting Iranian influence spreading across the Middle East — but King Abdullah was not persuaded to boost Saudi oil production to ease the effect of the -a-barrel price on the US.
Over lavish buffets in giant, air-conditioned tents whose generators battle with the searing summer heat, Kuwaitis have been arguing over an election that is being watched for signs that one of the freest countries in the Arab world is disillusioned with its political system.
United States President George Bush offered a peace prophecy for the Middle East on Thursday in which the enemies of the United States faced a future of defeat. ”This is a bold vision, and some will say it can never be achieved,” Bush told Israel’s Parliament.
Lebanon’s Sunni Muslim leader Saad al-Hariri pledged on Tuesday there would be no political surrender to what he called a bid by Hezbollah and its Syrian and Iranian backers to impose their will on the nation by force. The Shi’ite Hezbollah group and its opposition allies have routed supporters of the Sunni-led government in Beirut.
Lebanon’s army stepped up patrols on Tuesday as part of a drive to restore order after a week of fighting between Hezbollah fighters and pro-government gunmen. Hezbollah, the Shi’ite Muslim movement backed by Iran and Syria, and its opposition allies have routed supporters of the Sunni-led government in Beirut and hills to the east.
Clashes resumed in Lebanon’s northern city of Tripoli on Monday and security sources said at least 36 people had been killed on Sunday in fighting between Hezbollah and its pro-government Druze opponents east of Beirut. A precarious calm prevailed in Beirut, where politicians prepared to meet Arab League mediators.
Fierce battles raged in northern Lebanon on Sunday between rival clans as the Hezbollah-led opposition said it was ending its takeover of west Beirut. The opposition announced that it was ending its takeover of large swaths of west Beirut after the army revoked government moves against the Shi’ite group that sparked days of deadly fighting.
Lebanon was steeped in tension on Saturday after Hezbollah seized control of west Beirut in three days of deadly fighting with pro-government forces, triggering fears of all-out civil war. At least 18 people were killed in the violence that erupted on Wednesday and quickly escalated.
Lebanon’s Iranian-backed Hezbollah took control of the Muslim part of Beirut on Friday, tightening its grip on the city in a major blow to the United States-backed government. Security sources said at least 11 people had been killed and 30 wounded in three days of battles between pro-government gunmen and fighters loyal to Hezbollah.
Hezbollah-led opposition fighters seized control of pro-government strongholds in Beirut on Friday as gun battles rocked the Lebanese capital for a third day, edging the nation dangerously close to all-out civil war. Gunfire and the thump of exploding rocket-propelled grenades echoed across west Beirut.
The Iranian-backed Lebanese group Hezbollah said on Thursday the United States-supported Beirut government had declared war by targeting its communications network. Hezbollah launched a new street campaign on Wednesday, piling pressure on the government after it declared the network illegal.
Israel on Thursday threw a huge birthday bash to celebrate 60 tumultuous years during which the Jewish state made great strides forward but failed to achieve peace with its neighbours. Military air shows topped the programme with war planes being put through their paces even as a dark cloud hung over the political future of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.
Supporters of Lebanon’s Hezbollah blocked main roads in Beirut with burning barricades on Wednesday, paralysing the city and deepening the pro-Iranian group’s conflict with the United States-backed government. They set ablaze old cars and tyres to block the main road to Beirut’s international airport, where air traffic was suspended because of a strike
An Egyptian military court notorious for its harsh verdicts convicted on Tuesday 25 key members of the opposition Muslim Brotherhood and sentenced them to up to 10 years in jail, a security official said. The charges against members of Egypt’s largest opposition group included money laundering and terrorism.
Iran would "eliminate Israel from the global arena" if it was attacked by the Jewish state, the deputy commander of the army warned on Tuesday, amid an intensifying war of words. "We are not worried by Israeli manoeuvres, but if Israel takes such action against the Islamic Republic of Iran, we will eliminate it from the global arena," Mohammad Reza Ashtiani said.
Israel is to begin fitting some of its passenger aircraft with flares to counter potential missile attacks, defence officials said. The missile protection system was first proposed in 2002, but was delayed by disagreements over funding between government ministries, reports said.
Lebanon’s presidential election was postponed to March 25 from Tuesday, the Parliament speaker said on Monday, the 16th delay of a vote derailed by the worst political crisis since the 1975 to 1990 civil war. The new election date set by speaker Nabih Berri is just four days before an Arab summit in Damascus.
Lebanon’s political crisis has turned into an economic nightmare for the vital tourist industry, hard hit by a slump in tourists from oil-rich Gulf states who have been told to avoid the troubled country. Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain have advised their citizens not to travel to a country in the grip of its worst political crisis since the end of the civil war in 1990.
Israeli officials said on Friday they would continue to meet Palestinian leaders under the recently revived peace process, but after escalating violence in Gaza and Jerusalem there was a recognition on both sides that the negotiations are faltering. Mark Regev, a spokesperson for Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, said Israel was still committed to the peace process.
The Islamist Hamas movement on Friday claimed responsibility for a gun attack that killed eight Jewish teenagers at a Jerusalem religious school on Thursday night. ”Hamas is responsible for the attack. The Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades will officially claim the attack at the right moment,” a senior Hamas official in Gaza said on condition of anonymity.
Atrocities in the Middle East are often carefully planned and the Palestinian gunman who killed eight Israelis in Jerusalem on Thursday night may have been carrying out a dual act of revenge for the recent onslaught in the Gaza Strip and the assassination of a Hezbollah commander in Damascus.
Israel was facing widespread international condemnation on Sunday for its onslaught in Gaza, as the United Nations and European Union demanded an end to a ”disproportionate” response to Palestinian rocket attacks, which were also denounced.
United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon condemned Israel for using ”excessive” force in the Gaza Strip and demanded a halt to its offensive after troops killed 61 people on the bloodiest day for Palestinians since the 1980s. The 1,5-million Palestinians crammed into the blockaded, 45km sliver of coast, enjoyed a relative respite early on Sunday from Israeli air strikes and raids.
Israel killed 52 Palestinians on Saturday in its deadliest and deepest incursion into the Gaza Strip since pulling out in 2005, stoking fears of a broader conflict that could derail renewed United States-backed peace talks. At least 29 of the dead were civilians, among them women and children, said Palestinian doctors who were working round the clock.
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/ 29 February 2008
The pro-Iranian Hezbollah group accused the United States on Friday of endangering regional stability by deploying a warship off Lebanon and vowed to defy what it called an act of military intimidation. Hezbollah, which is backed by Syria and Iran, leads a Lebanese opposition locked in a 15-month-old power struggle with the Western-backed governing coalition.
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/ 14 February 2008
Three years after Rafik al-Hariri’s assassination, the crisis unleashed by his death opens ever deeper rifts in Lebanon and threatens the state and society the leader tried to rebuild after the civil war. The February 14 anniversary of al-Hariri’s death has become a symbol for divisions between the heirs to his legacy and their opponents.
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/ 13 February 2008
Hezbollah military commander Imad Moughniyah was killed by a car bomb in Damascus on Tuesday, the Lebanese group said, announcing the death of the man believed to be behind Western hostage taking in Lebanon in the 1980s. Hezbollah, which is backed by Syria and Iran, accused Israel of killing Moughniyah, thought to be in his late 40s.