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[SIZE="3"]Israel Prepares To Resume Its War Against Hezbollah[/SIZE]
[url="http://www.nysun.com/article/38226?page_no=3"]http://www.nysun.com/article/38226?page_no=3[/url]
JERUSALEM — Any chance of long-term peace between Lebanon and Israel all but vanished last night after the Israeli defense minister, Amir Peretz, said his country was preparing for another round of fighting.
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Mr. Peretz spoke only hours after Israeli commandos mounted a raid deep inside Lebanon. Secretary-General Annan said it was a violation of the weekold U.N. cease-fire.
"We will put everything on the table," he was quoted as saying. "Our duty is to prepare for the next round."
Israeli officials said Prime Minister Olmert had made his decision known at yesterday's meeting of the inner security cabinet.
That would rule out contributions from Indonesia, Bangladesh, and Malaysia, all of which had offered troops.
The offer of 1,000 soldiers and 150 engineers from Indonesia, the world's most populous Islamic nation, was among the most generous received by the United Nations.
However, the country's defense minister, Juwono Sudarsono, said Saturday that it would be too sensitive for Indonesian troops to participate in the disarming of Hezbollah, Lebanon's Shiite militia.
[SIZE="3"]
Israel Prepares for the Next War[/SIZE]
[url="http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0824-32.htm"]http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0824-32.htm[/url]
As Israelis read their newspapers, the message comes through loud and clear: Get ready for the next war, the really big war. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert gave his people an ominous warning yesterday when he “toured northern Israel Thursday and visited, among other venues, the hospital in Nahariya directly hit by rocket fire during the Lebanon war. ‘We must be prepared for (various) scenarios and ready for anything,’ he said. ‘We must push forward deadlines and be ready for the possibility of receiving casualties under all conditions.’ … ‘At this time we shall prepare for any possible scenario of a threat, in full force.’”
But who will be the enemy? “The head of the Israel Defense Forces Military Intelligence Maj.-Gen. Amos Yadlin told the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee that after the war with Hizbullah, Syria will try to reclaim the Golan Heights through either diplomatic or military means,” Yediot Aharonot reports.
Here is the key to Israel’s militaristic mindset. Just days after a disastrous failed war, the Jewish state is preparing for the next war because of the belief that now, as always, dominates its political life: Israel’s enemies, every one, are anti-semites. They have no legitimate grievance against the Jewish state. They simply want to kill Jews.:rollseyes
“Israel is carefully watching the world's reaction to Iran's continued refusal to suspend uranium enrichment, with some high-level officials arguing it is now clear that when it comes to stopping Iran, Israel ‘may have to go it alone,’”
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......In other words, for Jews, Jewish lives really are more valuable than Muslim lives. That’s easier to swallow if you believe that all Muslims are anti-semites bent on killing every Jew. Ha’aretz gives space to that view too, in a column by a retired judge, Hadassa Ben-Itto: “A senior American diplomat once told me: ‘I can't believe this is happening to the Jewish people once again. You have not learned your lesson. Had you thoroughly read 'Mein Kampf,' you would have known what to expect.’… The Muslim world, which has picked up the Nazi torch, has joined the cause and set for itself the goal of destroying our nation and people."
Akiva Eldar has apparently heard the news about 2008 too. He sees a real possibility of “an accelerated preemptive war against Syria, before Iran is equipped with a nuclear bomb and before Tehran completes the transformation of the Syrian army into a modern army rich in new types of weaponry. According to cautious assessments, this process will take no longer than two years. Unfortunately, in the foreseeable future, we will not have a government that is capable of conducting negotiations with Syria and in the United States there is not a president who will do this for us.”
No negotiations, and a looming deadline in the summer of 2008. Eldar’s conclusion seems to sum up the prevailing thinking in the Israeli government: “Keep the shelters clean.”
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