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Prepared for the
Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs
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To contact the Presidents Conference: click here In-Depth Issues:
Hizballah Leader's "Regret" -
Has Israel Regained Its Deterrence? (Times-UK)
UNIFIL Broadcasts Israeli Troop Movements - Lori Lowenthal Marcus (Weekly Standard)
U.S. Support for Israel Soars after Hizballah War - George Conger (Jerusalem Post)
UK Poll Shows Increase in Fear of Islam - Jonny Paul (Jerusalem Post)
El Salvador Announces Embassy Move from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv (AFP/Sunday Telegraph-UK)
Search Key Links Media Contacts Back Issues Fair Use
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News Resources - North America, Europe, and Asia:
After being forced at gunpoint to say they embraced Islam, American reporter Steve Centanni, 60, and New Zealand cameraman Olaf Wiig, 36 - two Fox News journalists kidnapped 13 days ago - were delivered unharmed to a Gaza hotel Sunday. A videotape sent to al-Jazeera television just hours before their release showed the two men somberly reading texts criticizing the American administration and saying they had become Muslims and had taken the names Mohammed and Yusef. "We were forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint," Centanni said. (Washington Post) Congressman Tom Lantos, the top Democrat on the House International Relations Committee, said Sunday he would ask the U.S. administration to freeze the $230 million aid package to Lebanon proposed by President Bush until the Lebanese government takes control of its borders with Syria and prevents arms smuggling to Hizballah. "A porous Syrian-Lebanon border will only invite the repetition of Hizballah attacks in the future. Hizballah must not be allowed to rearm again," he said. Lantos said he aimed to put a temporary hold on the aid package until the Syrian border was secured. (AP/Washington Post) The Mufti of Tyre, Sayyed 'Ali Al-Amin, told the Lebanese daily Al-Nahar on Aug. 22: "I don't think Hizballah asked the Shi'ite community about the war. Perhaps the great emigration from the south is the best proof that the people of the south were against the war. The Shi'ite community authorized no one to declare war in its name or to drag it into a war that was far from its wishes and from the wishes of the other ethnic communities in Lebanon. What happened in the south does not represent the will of the Shi'ite community, and is not its responsibility, but was caused by the vacuum that the Lebanese state left for years in this region." (MEMRI) On Saturday, just days before Iran is supposed to suspend enrichment of uranium or face the prospect of sanctions, President Ahmadinejad formally inaugurated a heavy-water reactor. Nuclear experts note that heavy-water facilities are more useful for weapons than peaceful power generation because they produce lots of plutonium - the preferred ingredient for missile warheads. (New York Times) See also Russian Assessment: Iran's Heavy-Water Project Could Spark Regional Armed Conflict (Interfax-Russia) See also U.S. Plans for Sanctions on Iran - Bill Gertz The Bush administration plans to move rapidly to organize and impose international economic sanctions on Iran after a Thursday UN deadline passes, according to Bush administration officials. Sanctions likely will be imposed after passage of a UN Security Council Chapter 7 resolution, and will be applied in stages. A coalition of nations in Europe and Asia also is being organized to impose sanctions on Iran should the UN Security Council fail to take action. (Washington Times) News Resources - Israel and the Mideast:
In recent days, IDF troops uncovered and blew up a network of underground outposts, tunnels, and bunkers in southern Lebanon near Rosh Hanikra. Lt.-Col. Rasal Elian, deputy commander of the Golani brigade, said fortified bunkers were found carved in the mountain, as were a communications networks between positions, rocket launching sites, escape routes, a ventilation system, showers and bathrooms, as well as a lab for manufacturing explosives. The network was not visible from the air, nor from ground-level observation posts. "You can't see it until you're 10-15 meters from the site," Elian said. (Ha'aretz) The U.S. security coordinator in the territories, Gen. Keith Dayton, presented a detailed proposal last week to PA representatives and to Israel to enable the reopening of the Karni crossing, Gaza's economic lifeline. Due to repeated threats of terror attacks at the crossing, Israel has frequently shut it down. According to Dayton's proposal, 90 international observers would be stationed on the Palestinian side to ensure that PA security personnel do what is necessary to prevent terror attacks in the vicinity. While the observers would be European, like those already stationed at the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt, American officials would supervise them. While Israeli security officials welcomed the plan, terming it an opportunity to both improve Gaza's economy and strengthen Abbas' position in the Palestinian political arena, they warned that Israel will not agree to implement it until Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier who was kidnapped to Gaza in June, is released. (Ha'aretz) In an article published Sunday, Ghazi Hamad, spokesman for the Hamas-controlled PA, questioned the effectiveness of Kassam rocket attacks on Israel and noted that since Israel evacuated Gaza, the situation there has deteriorated on all levels. Dismissing Israel's responsibility for the growing state of anarchy and lawlessness in Gaza, Hamad said it was time for the Palestinians to embark on a soul-searching process to see where they erred. "We're always afraid to talk about our mistakes," he added. "We're used to blaming our mistakes on others. What is the relationship between the chaos, anarchy, lawlessness, indiscriminate murders, theft of land, family rivalries, transgression on public lands and unorganized traffic and the occupation? We are still trapped by the mentality of conspiracy theories - one that has limited our capability to think." Hamad admitted that the Palestinians have failed in developing Gaza following the Israeli withdrawal and in imposing law and order. He said about 500 Palestinians have been killed and 3,000 wounded since the Israeli pullout, in addition to the destruction of much of the infrastructure. By comparison, he said, only three or four Israelis have been killed by the rockets fired from Gaza over the same period. (Jerusalem Post) Global Commentary and Think-Tank Analysis (Best of U.S., UK, and Israel):
Can Hizballah be disarmed? The UN Security Council, the major Western powers, and the government of Lebanon have all called for the Shiite militia to be shorn of its weapons. But how? And by whom? And if Hizballah is not disarmed, all of the appalling bloodshed just concluded may be only the prelude to something worse. Victors in war forcibly disarm the losers. But in a war that ends without decisive victory, the fighting force must more or less agree to disarm itself. Disarmament, like peacekeeping itself, offers a set of time-tested, codified practices that are quite effective under certain political conditions and futile in their absence. Kosovo and Sierra Leone worked not because peacekeepers got disarmament right but because the politics were right, or because the balance of force was favorable to peacekeepers. Otherwise, disarmament fails. Hizballah has used its weapons on Israel, and it fights Israel with the professed goal of destroying it. If we take Hizballah at its word, disarmament can come only in the wake of apocalyptic triumph. (New York Times) Hizballah is not a headache for Israel alone. The Shiite extremist group poses an equally daunting challenge to the Sunni Arab regimes in the Middle East. For behind Hizballah's perceived heroics in the Lebanon war sits Shiite Iran, with its claim to great-power status. If unchallenged, the Iran-Hizballah axis will end the millenniums-old Sunni Arab domination of the Middle East. The writer is a professor of Middle East and South Asia politics at the Naval Postgraduate School and adjunct senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. (Los Angeles Times) See also Arabs Between Israel and Iran - Sana Abdallah (UPI) Observations: Palestinians Envy Hizballah - Harry de Quetteville (Telegraph-UK)
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