AP: Syria threatens to close Lebanon border (if UN deployed there)

[Eugene]

Wednesday, August 23, 2006 · Last updated 8:55 a.m. PT

Syria threatens to close Lebanon border

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

HELSINKI, Finland -- Syria has threatened to close its border with Lebanon
if U.N. peacekeepers are deployed along the frontier, Finland's foreign minister
said Wednesday.

"They will close their borders for all traffic in case U.N. troops will be
deployed along the Lebanon-Syria border," Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja said
after meeting his Syrian counterpart Walid Moallem in Helsinki.

Syrian President Bashar Assad has rejected the U.N. deployment along Syria's
border with Lebanon, saying such a move would create animosity between the two
countries.

"This is an infringement on Lebanese sovereignty and a hostile position," Assad said
in an interview with Dubai Television.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1107AP_Finland_Mideast.html

[The Magistrate]

1. That Threat, Sir

Would be of great benefit to the situation of actually carried out....

Assad should be pressed to follow through on it.

[MADem]

2. Yep, leaves only air and sea routes for those pesky missile

shipments from Iran in that eventuality!

And if they are opening 'er up in order to let them pass through, the hullaballoo would be noticeable.

Great threat, IMO! They should go for it!

[PointAndLaugh]

5. Hezbollah has limited domestic rocket manufacturing capabilities already.

They will probably expand these capabilities in the coming years which in the long run is bad news for the Israelis, when compared to the smuggling of few rockets across the border every now and then.

They can already make fully functional replicas of Katyusha rockets in limited quantities. With proper leadership and financial backing they can be pumping out advanced rockets and missiles in no time.

In fact, the anti-ship missile that hit that Israeli warship, set it on fire, and killed 4 of it's crewmen, was quite probably a native Hezbollah creation.

[MADem]

6. Do you have a neutral cite for that assertion?

Hizb'Allah will want to maintain distance from Iran, so they will claim that they made it all by themselves.

Israel, OTOH, will say it was an Iranian cruise missile.

It may have been Chinese, for all we know. It would be helpful to examine photos of the debris.

Both sides will lie about stuff. I'm unconvinced that Narallah's crew have the capability to make anything more than a bottle rocket on their own without direct help and material assistance from Iran.

I think they're getting the stuff that makes it over the border from there or elsewhere. YMMV.

[PointAndLaugh]

9. There are plenty documented instances

of Hezbollah using native drones for surveillance and/or offensive purposes.


August 14th 2006
Hezbollah drone brought down over Galilee held 30 kg of explosives
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/750326.html

August 7th 2006
Israeli shoots down Hezbollah spy drone
http://www.montereyherald.com/mld/montereyherald/news/breaking_news/15219035.htm


Heck, here is a report from 2004 from BBC:

November 7th 2004
Hezbollah drone flies over Israel
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3990773.stm

Google is your friend.

[MADem]

14. The drone story has been debunked. We know a drone did not hit

that ship. That WAS the original story, but it's not held up over time. So, to hold up the mirror, might I say Google is your friend as well.

Yes, they've launched other drones at other times and other locations, but that ship was hit by a missile/rocket, NOT a drone. Virtually all news outlets are saying that. The debate is limited to the origin of the missile at this point: did Iran provide it, or did Syria or Iran buy the thing from China, North Korea, or somewhere else? And as I said, it is in Nasrallah's interest to obfuscate that matter.

The BBC says this: One of the most effective weapons deployed by Hezbollah in this conflict has been the Iranian-made C-802 anti-ship missile. A variant of the Chinese Silkworm missile, one of these was successfully fired at an Israeli warship last month, killing four people onboard and severely damaging the vessel.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/5242566.stm

Al Jazeerah says this: Israel claims that the guided missile that hit one of their naval warships, killing at least one sailor, was Iranian-made. ... Nehushtan said Hezbollah had launched an Iranian-made missile at the vessel.

"This shows very profound thumbprints of Iranian involvement in Hezbollah," he said.
An Israeli military source separately said that a C802 radar-guided missile with a range of 100 kilometres had been fired at the ship as it sat off the coast, enforcing a blockade on Lebanon's ports after two Israeli soldiers were abducted on Wednesday.

"This is sophisticated weaponry," the Israeli military source said. "This is advanced weaponry that is being supplied by one terrorist state to another." ... Iran has denied involvement and their embassy in Beirut has released a statement saying: "These accusations by Israeli officials are baseless and constitute an attempt to escape reality and cover up the impotence of this regime in the face of resistance and the Lebanese people." http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/FCBD9700-D204-44AA-9719-6B2AB11C26C4.htm

More/similar, here: http://www.forbes.com/home/feeds/ap/2006/07/15/ap2880884.html

http://www.globalsecurity.org/org/news/2006/060720-hezbollah-rocket.htm

[PointAndLaugh]

16. Wishful thinking, with some convenient anti-Iranian bent, nothing more.

In fact, it is precisely this kind of wishful thinking that is one of the primary reasons IDF is running back to Israel as fast as their Merkava tanks can carry them.

In reality, Katyusha rockets are indeed nothing more than "bottle rocket"(s), only with larger payloads and longer range. Completely unguided in any modern sense and are based on WWII technology. Look at the Qassam rockets fielded by Palestinian militants. They are completely native and are made in auto-repair shops from readily available materials (plain sheet metal), rockets whose warheads and/or fuel mixtures are cooked up from everyday household products.

Hezbollah has infinitely more resources than all of the Palestinian militant groups put together. You do the math.

[MADem]

18. Look, the article did not say Katushyas were used, so why toss those out?

They aren't guided. And Palestine is a separate matter, dragged in by Nasrallah to create a sense of solidarity amongst those who don't pay attention to matters like deep religious divisive schisms that cannot be reconciled, which is the real state of affairs between shi'a and sunni. After Nasrallah pushes every Jew into the sea, he'd start in on those sunni Filistines if he could.

We're through here. You're parroting your viewpoints, not discussing the issues reasonably. Point and Laugh elsewhere, thanks anyway.

[PointAndLaugh]

19. It is not a separate matter

Listen, from a technological aspect of the issue Palestine is NOT a separate matter. If a bunch of ragtag Palestinian militants have the capabilities to build rockets, domestically, (Qassam rockets seem to be increasing in size and range every year), then Hezbollah, which is much more sophisticated and larger than any and all Palestinian militant groups put together, can do the same or better. Heck, they made IDF run twice.

"every Jew into the sea", "sunni Filistines", I mean, what?

I pressed a button, eh?

No worry.

Here is great book I recommend to people seeking their inner balance, from Amazon.com, written by a native American, Sun Bear.

Walk in Balance: The Path to Healthy, Happy, Harmonious Living

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0671765647/104-6190250-2509510?v=glance&n=283155

Apparently, it also has some healthy eating tips.

Good luck.

edited for a proper link for the book.

[MADem]

20. Take your own advice. NT

[lumpy]

3. Lebanon is being surrounded

confined and controled within it's own borders by edict of Israel and the US. To hell with sovereignity of nations, eh? This really stinks.

[jseankil]

4. A militant group brought war to Lebanon, you have no problem with that?

If you want to talk about sovereignity of nations being violated in regards to Lebanon I suggest you include Syria and Hezbollah.

[lumpy]

8. Israel brought war to Lebanon in 1978,

1982, 1993 and 1996. Israel occupied SO. Lebanon for 18 years finally exiting in 2000 except for an area known as Shebba Farms which belongs either to Syria or Lebanon. Hezbollah was born because of Israel's relentless drive to occupy parts of Lebanon that doesn't belong to them, just like they have done in Palestine. And don't bother telling me that Israel has a birthright to Palesinian territory. History shows that their goal in to expand and control the nations surrounding them. This is a sad bed of their own making.

[MADem]

15. Hizb'Allah was born because the Ayatullah Khomeini said "Make it so"

The Grand Council's plan is to regain Jerusalem as a Shi'a managed Holy Place. That's the bottom line. They are an offshoot of the Pasaradan that roamed the streets of Iran during the Revolution and have morphed into an elite force that answers only to the Council, not the Iranian military. The Pasaradan trained those guys, they equipped them.

They aren't particularly sympathetic types, to put it mildly.

Hizb'Allah killed 241 American USMC peacekeepers all at once back in the eighties with a truck bomb. They put a rope around UN peacekeeper Rich Higgins' neck and filmed his murder.

Israel is in the way of Hizb'Allah's plans vis a vis Jerusalem.

[MADem]

7. Syria has been enabling Nasrallah's crew all this time

Lebanon has nothing to do with this conflict, beyond being the VICTIM that Nasrallah, Iran and Syria wipe their asses on.

Syria cares about Hizb'Allah as a means to their own ends. They only care about Lebanon if they can retake that land and control that population. They don't want to live beside a sovereign, independent nation--they want their thumb on that place. When they left, they left whining and crying. And I'm not the only one who thinks Syria assassinated their PM.

[lumpy]

10. So you and AIPAC say.

Israel cares about Lebanon only to a means to their own ends. If they have a gripe with Syria why don't they face it instead of using Lebanon as their whipping boy 'buffer zone'. Yes Lebanon is the VICTIM. Way past time for Lebanon to become a truly sovereign nation, even if that means arming themselves to fight against further occupation.

[MADem]

17. Israel cares about Lebanon every bit as much as Hizb'Allah does

And that ain't saying much. It's the field of battle, sure. But for you or anyone to suggest that they LIKE this situation of being surrounded by people who wish them dead is absurd. That they gleefully engage in war...I mean, that is insane. But hey, some will believe it, as it suits their worldview. The Israelis were overjoyed to leave Lebanon six years back--they'd had enough. But UNIFIL fell down on the job, and UNIFIL's shitty execution and lousy ROE vis a vis their mission in the south contributed to this horrible situation we see today.

If they could rely on their neighbors to not want to slit their throats and throw their bloated bodies into the sea, well, that might be nice. I wager they'd prefer to live within their borders in peace. People can gripe all they want about Israel, and there's plenty of "blame" to go around with regard to the establishment of that nation in that location. In any event, that ship has sailed. The Jewish state IS a reality, and it ain't going away.

Read Nasrallah's biography, his history with the Grand Council members, his education in Iraq and Iran at famous shi'a institutes of learning, his own words, and tell me he's just engaged in self-defense. He wants to march his crew to the al Aqsa masjid and slaughter anyone in his path enroute. Here's a brief synopsis with all the high points:
http://library.nps.navy.mil/home/tgp/hizbalah.htm

[oblivious]

11. Some background on the economic consequences to Lebanon.

Syria did this last year, and it had terrible consequences for Lebanon's economy. And now it is the main gateway for humanitarian aid as well, not to mention the only escape route for refugees from Israeli bombs and missiles.

The main effect is to make the lives of the poor ever more miserable. How anyone could welcome this is beyond me.

Syria Lebanon Border Lockdown
...Ibrahim el-Tarshishi, an organizer with the Union of Farmers in the Bekka Valley explained the effects of the current crisis on farmers. "The agricultural sector is losing an average of $300,000 every day, $12,000 each hour," he said. "The goods waiting at the borders for weeks are rotten and can't be consumed. Especially vegetables like lettuce, potato and all kinds of fruits are completely spoiled."

...The rage and despair expressed by the drivers on the borders, illustrates the lack of support that governments of both nations have provided toward the working poor, impacted most heavily by the crisis. The Lebanese government has provided no compensation to the thousands of drivers stranded at the border, as they survive on bare necessities with little political representation.

In the squeeze on the flow of capital between Syria and Lebanon, the workers that have made economic trade between the two nations possible have been forgotten and left to survive on the highways.

http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=8393

[lumpy]

12. This is a better source for this latest

news.
http://news.yahoo.com/fc/world/mideast_conflict

[lumpy]

13. Sorry, meant to include this article

included in the debate......http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060823/ap_on_re_mi_ea/lebanon_israel_1265

[bemildred]

21. Lebanon rejects deployment of UN troops on Syria border

BEIRUT: Lebanon is against the deployment of United Nations peacekeeping forces along its border with Syria, Information Minister Ghazi Aridi told AFP. "Only the Lebanese army is in charge of controlling the borders with Syria and it is out of the question to deploy the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL)," he said. "These are ideas put forward by Israel and the United States, but Lebanon does not take orders from anyone, neither the United States, nor Israel, nor Syria, nor Iran," he said. "The Lebanese government only asked for technical assistance to control the border with Syria, and Germany has also offered some help," he said. Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad had expressed strong opposition to the deployment of UN troops to enforce an embargo along his country's border with Lebanon. Damascus has also threatened to close its border with Lebanon if UN peacekeepers were deployed there under a UN resolution that led to the August 14 halt to hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah after a 34-day conflict. UN Resolution 1701 calls for the deployment of 15,000 troops to beef up a UN peacekeeping force charged with policing a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon's militant Hezbollah movement, which is backed by Syria and Iran.

http://www.kuwaittimes.net/regional.asp?dismode=article&artid=636701779