CINA

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Here the - interesting, but possibly controversially - opinion of one(a kind of famous) German-Jewish writer about the war in Lebanon and the position of the Germans in this case(published some days ago in the German magazine Der Spiegel):

The Harmless Children of Hezbollah?

By Henryk M. Broder

Germans are squabbling about whether Israel's military strikes against Lebanon are justified. But how else can Israel defend itself against Hezbollah rockets? By staging sit-down protests along the Israeli-Lebanese border, perhaps?

Should Israel quit defending itself?

It was more than 20 years after the end of the Second World War, during the 1960s, when Germans realized that the Nazis had murdered a large number of Jews as part of their proposed "final solution of the Jewish question." The Frankfurt Auschwitz trial, which continued for two years (1963-1965) and involved 183 court sessions, resulted in an extensive documentation of what had occurred in the concentration camp near the Polish city of Oswiecim. The German public was shocked, horrified -- and most of all, surprised.

Apparently no one had ever read Hitler's "Mein Kampf," heard Hitler's speeches, subscribed to the Nazi newspaper Stürmer or even noticed that their Jewish neighbors had "moved out" without taking the furniture.

More than a decade later, in 1978, German television aired the four-part TV series "Holocaust." Once again the Germans reacted with horror, shock, and endless surprise. The fate of the Jewish family portrayed in the film brought tears to German eyes. They asked questions for which there were no answers. "How was that possible?" And: "Why did the Jews allows themselves to be led like lambs to the slaughter? Why hadn't they defended themselves?"

This question dominated debates on the Holocaust for almost 20 years, until Daniel Goldhagen published his book "Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust" in 1996. The book caused another wave of shock and horror. But this time the upheaval was not over what the book described, but about its author, who spoke of "eliminatory anti-Semitism" and claimed that the "final solution" was the logical endpoint of a development implicit in German identity.

Ever since Goldhagen's book, the debate is no longer about what the Jews experienced and didn't survive, but about what the Germans knew or didn't know -- about how many of them were more or less willing accomplices in the Holocaust. The focus of the discussions has shifted from the victims to the perpetrators, and the perpetrators are trying to present historical proof that they too were victims, at least in the end, when Dresden was bombed -- an event the political chief of the neo-Nazi NPD party has likened to the Holocaust -- and when the Gustloff, a converted cruise ship filled with German refugees, was sunk by a Soviet submarine.

Shifting the blame
 
By this point in the public conversation, Berlin-based political scientist named Ekkehard Krippendorf had already contributed an original thought. He claimed that if the Jews hadn't allowed themselves to be deported -- if they had practiced passive resistance and organized sit-down strikes -- the Germans would have rallied to their cause, the Third Reich would have been shaken to the core and the worst catastrophes would have been avoided.

So historical blame was re-distributed. In Krippendorf's analysis, the Jews were not only to blame for anti-Semitism -- there wouldn't be any anti-Semitism if there weren't any Jews -- but for the Third Reich as well. They had the power to destabilize the system and missed out on that unique opportunity.

Today the debate has advanced by a few rounds. Every day you read and hear people saying the Israelis have done to the Palestinians what the Nazis did to the Jews. Meanwhile the Germans -- or rather the "non-Jewish Germans," as the new expression goes -- take it to be their historical duty to ensure that the Jews learn from their own history and behave decently. Sociologist Wolfgang Pohrt's remark on the perpetrators who turn into probation assistants and make sure their victims don't relapse was never more topical and accurate than today.

The old question "Why didn't the Jews defend themselves?" is no longer fashionable. Today the Jews are accused of defending themselves. They're blamed for concluding from the last-attempted "final solution" that it's better to defend yourself early than to let yourself be pitied afterwards. As nice as the Holocaust Memorial in Berlin may be -- it's a place "one likes to visit," according to former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder -- a day on the beach in Tel Aviv or in Nahariya beats it hands down.

Now Germany -- where even a convicted cannibal can successfully sue for violation of his constitutional rights -- is witnessing a lively debate over the means by which Israelis should be allowed to defend their basic right to lie on the beaches of Nahariya or Tel Aviv. Politicians such as Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul from the Social Democrat party SPD, researchers such as Udo Steinbach from the Orient Institute and journalists such as Heribert Prantl from the center-left daily Süddeutsche Zeitung are among those who argue that Israel's reaction to the rocket attacks from Lebanon is exaggerated and "disproportionate." "No one is denying Israel the right to defend its borders. But rockets fired across the border don't threaten the existence of a state," writes Claudia Kühner in the Swiss daily Zürcher Tages-Anzeiger, for example.

Stop shooting and start shopping?

But if rockets designed to fly across borders don't threaten a state's existence, then who or what does? Excessive payroll fringe costs? Excessively low taxes? Too many unemployed people? Too few children? And how would the Swiss react if one of their border regions were attacked with rockets? Would they retaliate by firing "Luxemburgerli" pastries from their famous confectioner? Or would they airdrop coupons issued by the Migros grocery chain and urge their attackers to "Stop shooting and start shopping"?
 
Of course the question of a "proportionate response" is entirely justified -- and it's justified when asked about Israel or any other state. And: Those who ask the question have to be ready for an unexpected answer. It's a sign of reasonableness and moral maturity that Germans like to solve problems by sitting down at a round table to talk. The approach has worked for workplace conflicts and squabbles within clubs and associations, but it turned out to be ineffective in Northern Ireland and Kosovo. And it amounts to committing suicide for fear of dying when you're dealing with an enemy that loves death more than life.

The late King of Jordan had no qualms about using his might to put down a Palestinian uprising during "Black September" in 1970. He ordered refugee camps to be bombed. Between 3,000 and 5,000 people died. The PLO then moved its headquarters to Lebanon. Arafat moved to Cairo and later to Tunis.

Former Syrian President Hafis al-Assad, the father of Syria's present ruler, pulled no punches in fighting insurgent members of the Muslim Brotherhood. He devastated the city of Hama in February 1982, killing between 10,000 and 30,000 civilians. No one accused him of "genocide" -- and if someone had, al-Assad would have asked his critics not to meddle in the domestic affairs of his country.

When one considers what Israel is doing one has to admit that it is behaving quite moderately -- notwithstanding the bloodbath in Qana, in which dozens were killed including children. What happened in Qana just shows that the precision of high-tech wars can lead to catastrophic results. The war isn't between two regular armies, but one between an army and a guerrilla group that doesn't hesitate to use civilians as a human shield. At least the Israeli army warns the civilian population of imminent bombings by dropping leaflets, whereas Hezbollah fires Katyusha rockets without warning, in order to terrorize a civilian population.

"It'll work out somehow."

The most powerful army in the Middle East is fighting with one hand tied behind its back -- and paying for the mistakes of politicians. Everyone in Israel who had something to do with defense knew Hezbollah wasn't building holiday camps for Palestinian orphans in southern Lebanon -- it was preparing for military action. Instead of sounding the alarm because UN Resolution 1559, which calls for Hezbollah to disarm, wasn't being implemented, the choice was made to ignore the danger. The Israelis were glad to have turned their backs on the Lebanese quagmire. You could once again go shopping in Kiryat Shmona and swim in Lake Genezareth without having to hear the sounds of combat.

Of course it would have been better to disarm Hezbollah when it was still possible to do so relatively easily. But such a decision would have been difficult to justify within Israel -- and it would have caused the world to brand Israel as an aggressor. And so UN Resolution 1559 vanished into the mists of history, and the Israelis -- who can only think and plan in the short term -- said to themselves: "Ichije tov" -- "It'll work out somehow."

And since they didn't commit the necessary atrocities straight away, they're now paying twice the cost. They're fighting an enemy they underestimated and they're being pilloried as aggressors. It's not just on the nationalist and radical-left fringes of German civil society where people agree that Israel is the "new center of genocide" -- similar noises can be heard from the political center. Israel should negotiate with Hezbollah instead of shooting innocents, some commentators say.

You'd think Hezbollah was a group of children who had been playing with matches in the barn -- and that the Israelis insanely stoked the fire until the whole farm burned down. That kind of view is widespread in Germany. This is a nation where people will seriously debate whether a civilian airplane hijacked by terrorists should be pre-emptively shot down. But Israel is supposed to wait for Hezbollah to fire its rockets and then go complain to Kofi Annan.

Common roots

So the Germans' "becoming-good-again" -- predicted by essayist Elke Geisel 20 years ago -- enters its final stage. The "Holocaust" has been outsourced; now it's taking place in the Middle East. What started with the question "Why didn't you defend yourselves?" ends with the cool observation that the Jews have learned nothing from history, and that they are doing to the Palestinians what the Nazis did to them. And it's apparently the task of Germans to admonish and educate them. Ahmadinejad's willing executioners only want the best for Israel.

Theologian and itinerant preacher Jürgen Fliege reminds Israel of the "common cultural and religious roots" that "our ancestors laid down in the Torah." The principle of "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth" is "no call for abandoning restraint in an emergency situation and swearing revenge, come hell or high water," writes Fliege. According to him, what the principle really means is: "Only one soldier for one kidnapped soldier" -- everything else would be going too far. In a ludicrous reversal of cause and effect, action and reaction, perpetrator and victim, Fliege calls on the Israelis to act moderately. But why doesn't he direct his appeal at Hezbollah's leader Hassan Nasrallah? Perhaps because in Hezbollah's case the "common cultural and religious roots" are still so fresh they should be given time to develop.

Even though Germany's former Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer has now relaized that the conflict with Hezbollah and Hamas is not about "occupied territories" but about Israel's existence, Middle East expert Michael Lüders finds it lamentable that "the Israeli settlements in the Palestinian territories" west of the border "are not perceived as a problem," unlike the "terror" that threatens Israel's existence. And he really does place "terror" in quotation marks -- suggesting it doesn't exist outside the subjective perception of Israelis. Western policy "in the region," he writes, creates "its own counterpowers, especially in the form of Islamic fundamentalism." With those words, Lüders justifies everything that Islamic fundamentalists do.

But what logical conclusion would have to be drawn from this insight that Lüders is still hesitant to utter? In order to eliminate the fuel of Islamic fundamentalism, the West would have to abandon Israel. The message is clearly there between the lines, and it's only a question of time before it's raised explicitly. For now, Lüders contents himself with Schadenfreude. "Even if Israel were to succeed in defeating Hezbollah and Hamas tomorrow -- the day after tomorrow there would be new groups with different names, ready to continue the struggle against the omnipotence of the Washington-Jerusalem axis."

Unlike the word "terror," Lüders doesn't place "the omnipotence of the Washington-Jerusalem axis" in quotation marks -- to him, that phenomenon is perfectly real. It used to be referred to as the "Jewish-American claim to world dominance." Today, it's not just Iranian President Ahmadinejad who is wishing for "a world without Zionism" in order to preserve world peace.

The situation is getting uncomfortable for the Israelis. They're beginning to suspect that they can't win this war, because they're dealing with an international public that demands a "proportionate" reaction even in an "asymmetrical conflict." And the appeals to respect international law and the rules of the game are always directed at Israel, never at those who believe that all means are justified in the struggle against Israel.

If the Israelis don't succeed in defeating Hamas and Hezbollah, they will have to come up with other forms of resistance. How about sit-in strikes along the Israeli-Lebanese border?

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638 ways to kill Castro (Guardian, 8.03)

The CIA's outlandish plots to bump off the Cuban dictator would put 007 to shame ... poison pills, toxic cigars and exploding molluscs. Once he even offered to shoot himself..

For nearly half a century, the CIA and Cuban exiles have been trying to devise ways to assassinate Fidel Castro, who is currently laid low in Cuba following an operation for intestinal bleeding. None of the plots, of course, succeeded, but, then, many of them would probably be rejected as too fanciful for a James Bond novel.

Fabian Escalante, who, for a time, had the job of keeping El Commandante alive, has calculated that there have been a total of 638 attempts on Castro's life. That may sound like a staggeringly high figure, but then the CIA were pretty keen on killing him. As Wayne Smith, former head of the US interests section in Havana, pointed out recently, Cuba had the effect on the US that a full moon has on a werewolf. It seems highly likely that if the CIA had had access to a werewolf, it would have tried smuggling it into the Sierra Maestra at some point over the past 40-odd years.

The most spectacular of the plots against Castro will be examined in a Channel 4 documentary entitled 638 Ways to Kill Castro, as well as in a companion book of the same name written by the now-retired Escalante - a man who, while in his post as head of the Cuban secret service, played a personal part in heading off a number of the plots. While the exploding cigar that was intended to blow up in Castro's face is perhaps the best-known of the attempts on his life, others have been equally bizarre.

Knowing his fascination for scuba-diving off the coast of Cuba, the CIA at one time invested in a large volume of Caribbean molluscs. The idea was to find a shell big enough to contain a lethal quantity of explosives, which would then be painted in colours lurid and bright enough to attract Castro's attention when he was underwater. Documents released under the Clinton administration confirm that this plan was considered but, like many others, did not make it far from the drawing-board. Another aborted plot related to Castro's underwater activities was for a diving-suit to be prepared for him that would be infected with a fungus that would cause a chronic and debilitating skin disease.

One of the reasons there have been so many attempts on his life is that he has been in power for so long. Attempts to kill Castro began almost immediately after the 1959 revolution, which brought him to power. In 1961, when Cuban exiles with the backing of the US government tried to overthrow him in the Bay of Pigs fiasco, the aim was to assassinate Fidel and Raul Castro and Che Guevara. Two years later, on the day that President Kennedy was assassinated, an agent who had been given a pen-syringe in Paris was sent to kill Castro, but failed.

On one occasion, a former lover was recruited to kill him, according to Peter Moore, producer of the new film. The woman was given poison pills by the CIA, and she hid them in her cold cream jar. But the pills melted and she decided that, all things considered, putting cold cream in Castro's mouth while he slept was a bad idea. According to this woman, Castro had already guessed that she was aiming to kill him and he duly offered her his own pistol. "I can't do it, Fidel," she told him.

No one apparently could. This former lover is far from the only person to have failed to poison Castro: at one point the CIA prepared bacterial poisons to be placed in Castro's hand-kerchief or in his tea and coffee, but nothing came of it. A CIA poison pill had to be abandoned when it failed to disintegrate in water during tests.

The most recent serious assassination attempt that we know of came in 2000 when Castro was due to visit Panama. A plot was hatched to put 200lb (90kg) of high explosives under the podium where he was due to speak. That time, Castro's personal security team carried out their own checks on the scene, and helped to abort the plot. Four men, including Luis Posada, a veteran Cuban exile and former CIA operative, were jailed as a result, but they were later given a pardon and released from jail.

As it happens, Posada is the most dedicated of those who have tried and failed to get rid of the Cuban president. He is currently in jail in El Paso, Texas, in connection with extradition attempts by Venezuela and Cuba to get him to stand trial for allegedly blowing up a Cuban airliner in 1976. His case is due to come back before the courts later this month but few imagine that he will be sent to stand trial, and he appears confident that he will be allowed to resume his retirement in Florida, a place where many of the unsuccessful would-be assassins have made their homes.

Not all the attempts on Castro's life have been fancifully complicated: many have been far simpler and owe more to the methods of the mafia who used to hang out in the casinos and hotels of Havana in the 40s and 50s, than they do to James Bond. At one time the CIA even approached underworld figures to try to carry out the killing. One of Castro's old classmates planned to shoot him dead in the street in broad daylight much in the manner of a mafia hit. One would-be sniper at the University of Havana was caught by security men. But the shooters were no more successful than the poisoners and bombers.

Officially, the US has abandoned its attempt to kill its arch-enemy, but Cuban security are not taking any chances. Any gifts sent to the ailing leader as he lies ill this week will be carefully scrutinised, just as they were when those famous exploding cigars were being constructed by the CIA's technical services department in the early 60s. (They never got to him, by the way, those cigars contaminated with botulinum toxin, but they are understood to have been made using his favourite brand. Castro gave up smoking in 1985.)

All these plots inevitably changed the way Castro lived his life. While in his early years in office, he often walked alone in the street, but that practice had to change. Since then doubles have been used, and over the decades Castro has moved between around 20 different addresses in Cuba to make it harder for any potential hitmen to reach him.

Meanwhile, jokes about Castro's apparent indestructibility have become commonplace in Cuba. One, recounted in the New Yorker this week, tells of him being given a present of a Galapagos turtle. Castro declines it after he learns that it is likely to live only 100 years. "That's the problem with pets," he says. "You get attached to them and then they die on you".

http://www.guardian.co.uk/cuba/story/0,,1835930,00.html

More articles/reports about Cuba and the current situation you can read here:

Propaganda war grips a land crippled by shortages (Guardian)

U.S. Prepares for Showdown in Cuba (AP/Guardian)

The White House and Congress, caught unaware by Fidel Castro's illness, prepared Wednesday for a possible showdown in Cuba as lawmakers drafted legislation that would give millions of dollars to dissidents who fight for democratic change.

``The message will be, `The United States stands with you,''' Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., one of the bill's authors, said in an interview. ``Be ready to assert your independence.''

There was no sign of upheaval in Cuba on Wednesday, two days after Castro stunned U.S. officials and many of his own countrymen with the news that he had temporarily ceded power to his brother, Raul, in order to undergo surgery.

The handover was a surprise to the White House and Congress, one senator said...

Please read the full article here:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-5991159,00.html

What now for Cuba? A guessing game over Castro (IHT/NYT, 8.02)

And now, even the "serious" bourgeois madia, such as the German magazine Der Spiegel are starting with extreme agitating against Cuba.. They are all waiting for REGIME CHANGE, "hopefully very soon"... F*** them all!!

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VICTORY!! ...but for whom??

Especially after the Qana massacre it seems that Israel is losing the war. The "rulers" all over the world - except the US, GB and Germany - are calling for a immediate cease fire in Lebanon. (BTW.. after the 1996 Qana massacre by IDF israel was also forced by the "world's public opinion" to stop all its military actions there..).

Well, the Israeli PM Olmert said yesterday(local time) that there will be no cease fire NOW and also not in the NEAR FUTURE and today he said "Israel will keep fighting Hizbullah until multinational force deploys in south Lebanon"(and the "intl. community" said they will only deploy troops there when the fighting will be stopped..). But so or so, sooner or later the Isreali govt. will be forced to agree for a cease fire.

And what Israel was achieving with the war?

The first aim, beside to free the two kidnapped soldiers, was the "complete destruction of Hizbullah", so the Israeli media in the first days of the war. After some days of massive bomb attacks against assumed bases of Hizbullah, causing hundreds of civil losses, the new aim was to push Hizbullah back and to destroy their missile/rocket launchers.

Instead to achieve this goals by air attacks IDF ground forces got more and more involved in the battle, with heavy losses on its side.

Now the aim is "just" to push Hizbullah's forces behind the Litani River(about 20 to 40 KM north of the Israeli/Lebanese border). And this goal the IDF must achieve in the next days or coming two weeks. Actually, especially after the experiences in the last fierce battles in some few small border villages - it is impossible!!

Actually, except hundreds of killed Lebanese (mainly) civilians, 700,000 displaced people and a humanitarian desaster.. Israel achieved nothing! The soldiers are still in the hand of Hizbullah, daily Katyushas and other missiles launched by Hizbullah are raining on Isreali villages and towns(only yesterday 210 rockets, according to Israeli media)... And day by day Hizbullah is becoming more and more an "organization of hereos", the "only real resistance" for "the Arab nation and dignity", so a Jordanian bourgeois newspaper.

Finally at the present point Israel got exactly the opposite what they wanted to achieve. Instead of a weak, isolated Hizbullah they have now a strong, in the entire Lebanon, but also the surronding Arab world respected Hizbullah. For example even Israeli Arabs/Palestinians, attacked by Hizbullah missiles, like a short while ago in An-Nasirah/Nazareth, feel not like victims. They just see it as a kind of "friendly fire", so a report on CNN(8.02).

After Hizbullah's first missile, hitting yesterday the West Bank(near Jenin) a "Fatah member related that local residents cheered when they heard the rocket fall and saw the resulting flames. 'Even if it were to fall on our heads, it wouldn’t have spoiled our joy. All of us here are praying for Hizbullah’s success and victory,'" said(ynet, 8.02).

And what will be the result of this developments?

About these - in my opinion - very unattractively consequences I, possibly, will write tomorrow.

IDF paratrooper.

Not happy anymore, not really..

To get an idea of the current situation, please check out following articles:

How Israel's bombing turned Hizbollah leader into a symbol of Muslim pride

(The Independent, GB, 8.02)

A new face to Hezbollah's resistance
(Asia Times, HK/China)

Senior Fatah members: Nasrallah, bomb Tel Aviv (ynet, 8.01)

Palestinian protesters in Ramallah urge Hizbullah to fire missiles on central Israel; former Palestinian interior minister calls on Fatah fighters to go on high alert ahead of possibility of escalation in fighting

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3284779,00.html
 

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DAY 22

Today in the morning the 48 hours of arial "cease fire", after the Qana massacre(BTW... today nobody in the "West", for example in the German media, is talking/writing anymore about it..) - in fact the IAF was continuing their activities(just on a lower level) - ended. And now everything is starting again, but on a much more extreme level.

IDF is preparing for a massive ground offensive - already 20,000 soldiers are now operating in the southern border area in Lebanon. And, according to several intl. news agencies, thousands of IDF troops are ready to enter the Lebanese territory soon(likely in the coming night).

On the other side Hizbullah is attacking Israel since the morning with Katyushas and even long-range missiles. According to Hizbullah 300 missiles were fired... according to Israeli sources around 100 were hitting targets mainly in north Israel.

And IDF troops and HIzbullah fighters are involved in heavy and fierce ground battles. Already yesterday three IDF soldiers were killed in house-to-house fights in villages near the southern Lebanese border.

Here the latest by ME and intl. news agencies, news papers:

Israel raid 'captures Hezbollah fighters' (Al Jazeera)

IDF commandos complete Baalbek raid, reportedly capture five Hezbollah militants (Haaretz)

19 killed as Israel raids hospital (Guardian)

Israel strikes deep in Lebanon (IHT/NYT)

Exchanges of fire rage in Lebanon (ynet)

150 Hizbullah rockets hit Israel (Guardian)

..and so on, and so on.....

Later(likely in the coming 2 or 3 hours) i'll write some of my thoughts about it.. And perhaps not everyone will like it^^

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DAY 19

Actually today I wanted to report about yesterday's "Solidarity Demonstration Against the Israeli Aggession in Lebanon and Palestine", which took place in Berlin. But considering the latest developments in the Middle East, especially in Lebanon I don't want to comment this trash-event(the demo in Berlin) today(perhaps I'll do it tomorrow or so..).

As I wrote in the beginning of the IDF operation in Gaza, about 4 weeks ago - some in the region were already talking about the "Israeli mass murder" - that's just a matter of time that real war crimes, or worse a massacres by the IDF will take place. Today in the morning(local time) it was happen: an Israeli air strike against the south Lebanese village Qana killed, according to CNN Int'l(tv), 54 civilians/34 children.

Of course the int'l condemnation of Israel is very strong. Even CNN Int'l brought full coverage about it and denounced it clearly as war crime. For example the anchor-woman of the 1 pm(CET) edition was extreme strange and angry during an interview with the Israeli spokes-woman of the foreign ministry.

In the course of the early afternoon thousands of extreme angry protestors - muslims AND christians, but also "communists" and "ordinary" people - took the streets of Beirut and stormed the UN compound there.

UN stormed amid fury over Qana bombing (Al Jazeera)

BTW.. this wasn't the first deadly attack against Qana: In April 18, 1996, IDF attacked a UNIFIL base there where hundreds of Lebanese refugees took shelter and killed about 150 of them.

1996 massacre in Qana

Here the first facts by int'l news agencies...

Children hit hard in Israeli strike (IHT/NYT) 

An Israeli airstrike killed at least 50 people - more than half of them children - in a southern Lebanese village Sunday in the deadliest attack in 19 days of fighting. The U.S. secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, postponed a visit to Lebanon in a setback for diplomatic efforts to end hostilities.
 
Infuriated Lebanese officials said they had asked Rice to postpone the visit after Israel's missile strike. But Rice said she had called Prime Minister Fuad Siniora to say she would postpone the trip, and that she had work to do in Jerusalem to end the fighting.
 
The missiles destroyed several houses in the village of Qana as people were sleeping. Rescue officials said at least 50 people were killed, and the bodies of 27 children were found in the rubble.
 
Israel said it attacked Qana because it was a base for hundreds of rockets launched at Israel, including 40 that wounded five Israelis on Sunday. Israel said it had warned civilians several days before to leave the village.
 
"One must understand that Hezbollah is using their own civilian population as human shields," said an Israeli Foreign Ministry official, Gideon Meir. "The Israeli defense forces dropped leaflets and warned the civilian population to leave the place because the Hezbollah turned it into a war zone."
 
Rescuers aided by villagers dug through the rubble by hand. At least 20 bodies wrapped in white sheets were taken away, including 10 children. A row of houses lay in ruins and an old woman was carried away on a plastic chair.
 
Villagers said many of the dead were from four families that had taken refuge on the ground floor of a three- story building, believing they would be safe from bombings.
 
"We want this to stop!" shouted Mohammed Ismail, a middle-aged man pulling away at the rubble in search for bodies, his brown pants covered in dust. "May God have mercy on the children. They came here to escape the fighting."
 
"They are hitting children to bring the fighters to their knees," he said.
 
Rice said she was "deeply saddened by the terrible loss of innocent life" in Israel's attack. But she did not call for an immediate cease-fire.
 
"We all recognize this kind of warfare is extremely difficult," Rice said, noting that it came in areas where civilians lived. "It unfortunately has awful consequences sometimes."
 
"We want a cease-fire as soon as possible," she added...

Please read the full article here:

http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/07/30/news/mideast.php

Rice says time for cease-fire after IAF strike kills 54 people in Qana (Haaretz)
 
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, speaking after the Israel Air Force strike bombing of the Lebanese village of Qana, said it was time for a cease-fire in the war between Israel and Hezbollah.

Rice will hold a second round of talks with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Sunday evening, after cancelling a scheduled trip to Beirut to hammer out a cease-fire deal with Israel.

At least 54 Lebanese citizens were killed, at least 37 of them children, in the IAF strike on a building early Sunday, Lebanese police said. Dozens of others were reportedly trapped in the rubble. Several houses collapsed and a three-story building where about 100 civilians were sheltering was destroyed, witnesses and rescue workers said.
 
Israel, meanwhile, expressed "deep regret" for the deaths and said it would investigate the bombing.

"Israel deeply regrets, is greatly saddened, by this attack on innocent civilians in Lebanon. Israel takes full responsibility and is going to start an open investigation to find out how this happened," government spokeswoman Miri Eisin said...

The entire article here:

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/744295.html

Dozens killed in Lebanon air raid (BBC World) 
 
Lebanon described the bombing as a "heinous crime"

More than 54 civilians, at least 34 of them children, have been killed in a town in south Lebanon in the deadliest Israeli strike of the conflict so far.
Displaced families had been sheltering in the basement of a house in Qana, which was crushed after a direct hit.

Lebanon's prime minister denounced "Israeli war criminals" and cancelled talks with the US secretary of state.

Israel said it regretted the incident - but added that civilians had been warned to flee the village...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/5228224.stm 
 

Meanwhile..

..Hizbullah(said): We won't ignore massacre (ynet/Yedioth Ahronoth)

Terror groups threaten to avenge what they refer to as 'Qana village massacre.' Iranian president says, 'US and Britain must pay the bill for the Zionist regime's crimes'

The Hizbullah organization threatened revenge following the Israel Defense Forces' air strike in the southern Lebanese village of Qana. According to sources in Lebanon, more than 50 people were killed in the bombing, including more than 20 children.

"We will not ignore the shocking massacre," the organization said in a statement.

Hamas also released a statement, according to which all possibilities are open for a Palestinian and Lebanese resistance following what was dubbed "the Qana village massacre."...

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3283627,00.html

..and..

Olmert: We need 10 more days of military operations (ynet) 

Israeli PM tells US Secretary of State Rice country needs 10 days to two weeks to finish Lebanon offensive. Defense Minister Peretz warns of 'final strike' by Hizbullah in retaliation for Qana attack 
 

We need ten to fourteen days of continued military operations – This was said by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in a meeting between the two Saturday...

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3283686,00.html (please check out the "talkbacks" - very interesting this opinions)

*** 

If, finally, all this reports are true - no doubt: it's true!! - Israel has a real big problem. At least it forced many people, likely never before they supported Hizbullah, to the point to see them as "heroes of resistance", as the "only defenders of Lebanon, the Arab nation and its dignity", so one student of the American University of Beirut on today's mass rally in the Lebanese capital...

More about this issue in the coming days.

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DAY 18

First of all the latest body count:

Until yesterday, according to the Lebanese Ministry of Health, around 600 people were killed by IDF. The Lebanese gov't gave the number of at least 400 killed and the Israeli Military Staff included there 200 killed Hizbullah fighters. At the same time in Israel and Lebanon at least 52 Israelis, mainly soldiers were killed. In Gaza, until today morning, 159 Palestinians, according to Israel mainly militants, were killed in the last 4 weeks.

Yesterday in Berlin a demonstration "For Paece - Against the Terror of Hamas and Hizbullah" took the streets - at least 1,000 people participated. At several places the demonstrators were verbally attacked by Arabs but also German neo-nazis, according to Berliner Zeitung.

Today, according to CNN International(tv), hundreds of demonstrators demanded in Moscow "solidarity for the Palestinian and Lebanese resistance". On the pictures it was clear to see that, beside several so-called "communist" and "socialist" parties and organisations also many members/activists of the National "Bolshevist" Party, in fact a fascist group, jpined the demo.

In about two hours here in Berlin a demonstration will take place, organized by several Palestinian and Arab groups, demanding "Solidarity with the People in Lebanon and Palestine". I'll go there and later I'll report about it(please be patient^^).

Here two very interesting articles about the current situation in Lebanon, especially about Hizbullah's role/resistance:

UNIFIL: Hizbullah undefeatable militarily (Ynet/AP, 7.29)

Top UN peacekeeping official says Israel would flatten whole villages, neighborhoods if Hizbullah continues firing rockets into Israel
 

A top UN peacekeeping official on Friday said he feared the war in southern Lebanon would continue until late August and voiced fears Israel would flatten Lebanon's southern villages and destroy Tyre "neighborhood by neighborhood" if Hizbullah rockets keep landing in the Jewish state.
 

At UN peacekeeping headquarters in Naqoura, barely a stone's throw from Israel, political affairs officer Ryszard Morczynski said Tyre would become a target of intense Israeli attacks because Hizbullah was firing rockets from the city's suburbs into Israel's northern port of Haifa.
 

Hizbullah boasted Friday of a new kind of rocket it called the Khaibar-1 that it fired deeper inside Israel than the hundreds of others 
since the outbreak of fighting more than two weeks ago.
 

"I have no doubt that Israel will flatten Tyre if civilian casualties continue in Haifa. Tyre will be taken off neighborhood by neighborhood," Morczynski said. "I think Israel is contemplating flattening villages, flattening every single house to deny Hizbullah any advantage of urban fighting in the streets."
 

He estimated that 80 percent of the roughly half-million people who live in southern Lebanon have already fled the embattled area. He also said he feared the civilian death toll in Lebanon was more than 600, well more than the official count of 400-plus.

'Hizbullah still strong'

"Hizbullah are still strong" 17 days into the conflict, peacekeeping chief, Maj. Gen. Alain Pellegrini told The Associated Press. Pellegrini told the Times newspaper that "a military victory will never be possible."
 

And according to Morczynski's calculation, roughly 800 Hizbullah fighters operate in the southern region on any given day.
 

"They are mobile, well-prepared, devoted and willing to act," he said. "When there is shelling ... they are not sitting in their bunkers."
 

The Hizbullah stronghold of Bint Jbeil attests to the group's tenacity.
 

"In Bint Jbeil it looks like the Israelis have pulled out and are now preparing the ground to come in again," Morczynski said, after Hizbullah fighters had pushed the limited Israeli ground force to the southern edges of the town.

'Hizbullah communication intact'

Also, he said, there was evidence Hizbullah's communications were intact and their fire-and-run tactics were still effective. There was no sign that the guerrillas' supply of rockets was dwindling and Israel has had limited success in targeting their launchers.
 

Morczynski said the peacekeepers occasionally intercept Hizbullah communications. He recalled a typical such exchange: "Allah is great. My brothers this is number 13 and we are going to operation number 7. We hope that our brothers are safe for the day." Hizbullah uses numbers and letters as codes to identify the fighter and the location.
 

Hizbullah firepower would seem to be a combination of sophisticated missiles and the older Katyusha rockets, Morczynski said. Some rockets are launched from the back of trucks, while older ones are ferried on motorcycles and fired from portable triangular-shaped launchers.
 

"They have thousands of them. They are scattered everywhere - in caves, houses, bushes, abandoned buildings. They aren't all in one, two or three depots that you can hit and say now we have wiped them out," he said adding Israel wanted to clear Hizbullah from a two-kilometer strip along its northern border.
 

"The only way to prevent the launch of rockets is to erase all launching positions of Hizbullah. That is the only solution," Pellegrini said. "But it is difficult."

'Large-scale invasion possible'

Despite the sophistication of the Israeli military machine, the advantage seems still to lay with Hizbullah, Morczynski said. While it takes the Israelis only about two minutes to target the origin of a Hizbullah rocket and retaliate, it hasn't stopped the barrage and it is unclear how many fighters have been hit.
 

The thrust of the Israeli attack is still with its air force but Morczynski said he anticipated a large-scale invasion if the hostilities continued.
 

"It is clear that if the pace of the war continues as it is today it will continue until the end of August," Morczynski said.
 

While Israel is reluctant to wage a ground assault, he said it would be unavoidable in another two weeks because the Israeli Defense Force will need a victory.
 

"Now the war is going on too long without any big success. Something has to happen soon because they have to show some success to the Israeli public," he said.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3282947,00.html

As the shells fall around them, Hizbullah men await the Israelis (Guardian, 7.29)


An injured Lebanese boy with his mother after their van was attacked by Israeli

aircraft as they fled their village in Tyre, Lebanon. Photo: Ghaith Abdul-Ahad/Getty
 

"Patience is our main virtue, we can wait for days, weeks, months before we attack. The Israelis are always impatient in battle and in strategy," says the cleric, Sayed Ali, who claims to be a descendant of the prophet. "I know them very well."...

Please read the entire article here:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/syria/story/0,,1832931,00.html

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DAY 16

First of all a summary from the latest developments (by Guardian, GB)


Israeli soldiers hold up a Hizbullah flag as their armoured personnel carrier pushes

across the border into Lebanon. Photograph: David Furst/AP
 

Hizbullah guerrillas fired at least 150 rockets at Israeli border towns, the highest daily total since the start of fighting, while Israel followed its highest one-day casualty toll in the fighting yesterday with air strikes on suspected Hizbullah positions across Lebanon.

Israel is also to call up three reserve divisions, but a meeting of senior Israeli cabinet ministers decided against expanding the ground offensive in Lebanon. The Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, said the goals of Israel's 17-day offensive were being met, participants said. 

The ministers said the call-up of reserves, comprising thousands of soldiers, was intended to refresh troops in Lebanon. 

Israeli attacks meanwhile killed three people in the Gaza Strip, Palestinian medical workers said, a day after fighting that left 24 Palestinians dead. Those who died included a 75-year-old woman, whose house was hit by a missile or shell. The identity of the other dead, aged 16 and 23, was not immediately clear.

A senior UN official said he feared an escalation in the fighting and warned there was a high risk the conflict might broaden. 

"I do not feel confident that this war between Hizbullah and Israel has peaked yet," Terje Roed-Larsen, Kofi Annan's envoy on Syria-Lebanon issues, said. "There are apparently plans and threats to hit deeper into Israel and that will for sure lead to an escalation of the conflict."

This morning's Israeli air strikes also hit a Lebanese army base, a radio relay station and destroyed several roads. The series of raids in northern, eastern and southern Lebanon killed at least one person and wounded several others.

Ayman al-Zawahiri, al-Qaida's deputy leader, warned in a tape broadcast by al-Jazeera that his group would respond to the violence in Lebanon.

Thousands of civilians are believed to be trapped in villages across the border region in southern Lebanon, according to humanitarian officials who have toured the region. Americans who escaped a village near the focus of the ground fighting said many US citizens were still there.

The Israeli military's radio station in south Lebanon today warned that the army "will totally destroy any village from which missiles are fired toward Israel". The statement, aired on al-Mashriq radio, also told Lebanese not to use the road from Qleileh - which is near the Mediterranean coast - to Houlah in eastern Lebanon, across the border from Israel's Kiryat Shmona. 

Israeli warplanes struck a road in Rayak, a few miles from the Lebanese-Syrian border early today, wounding two soldiers and a civilian, Lebanese officials said.

Israeli fighter jets also carried out more than 30 bombing runs in Iqlim al-Tuffah, a highland region where Hizbullah is believed to have offices and bases, officials and witnesses said. The airstrikes, which targeted mostly deserted houses allegedly belonging to Hezbollah activists, and roads linking villages in the region, caused a number of casualties, the officials said.

Ambulances and civil defence crews were unable to reach the targeted areas because of intense bombardment, witnesses said. A Lebanese policeman was killed when an Israeli missile struck his car as he drove in the eastern city of Zahle, security officials said.

At least 423 other people have been killed in Lebanon, including 376 civilians reported dead by the health ministry and security officials. The deaths of the soldiers yesterday brought to 51 the number of Israelis killed in the campaign, according to the military.

Israeli planes also attacked targets near the southern market town of Nabatiyeh, wounding at least three people. 

An international conference in Rome yesterday to discuss the crisis ended in disagreement, with demands from 11 countries and the United Nations for an immediate ceasefire resisted by the US and British governments.

The Israeli justice minister, Haim Ramon, who is a close ally of the prime minister, Ehud Olmert, said Israel interprets this as a green light to continue its offensive. "We received yesterday at the Rome conference permission from the world ... to continue the operation, this war, until Hizbullah won't be located in Lebanon and until it is disarmed," he told Israel Army Radio. "Everyone understands that a victory for Hizbullah is a victory for world terror."

Israel yesterday suffered its heaviest casualty toll in a single battle in the 16-day campaign, with at least nine soldiers killed and 25 wounded in house-to-house fighting in Hizbullah strongholds in Lebanon. An Israeli military source said "several dozen" Hizbullah fighters had been killed in the fighting...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,1831570,00.html

Al-Qaida No 2 calls for global war

Israel Decides Not to Expand Offensive

Iranian Envoy, Hezbollah Leader Meet

Israel 'can take its time' (Al Jazeera)

Scores killed in Gaza fighting (Al Jazeera)

Security cabinet okays mass call-up of reservists, but nixes expansion of south Lebanon operation (Haaretz)
 
 
The security cabinet, headed by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, decided Thursday morning against expanding the Israel Defense Forces operation in southern Lebanon, but did okay a further, extensive call-up of reserve troops.

During the meeting, which came a day after nine IDF soldiers were killed in fierce battles with Hezbollah, the ministers decided that while the troops would be called up, they would not be deployed until further notice.

The decision, which was passed by 11 votes to one, takes into account "the need to prepare forces for possible developments," such as an expansion of the operation, but also takes into account the need to calm Syrian concerns that Israel could be preparing for an attack on its interests...

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/743489.html

Katyushas hit communities across north; seven wounded

 

7.26, Nahariya and Haifa once again under Hizbullah attacks..

.......

Night life in Beirut. Because IDF is "only" targeting the areas in the city where

Hizbullah have offices and places from where they launch missiles, in the other parts

of the city the life is going as "usual", such as in the northern and eastern parts.

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Israeli refugees from the north of the country: "Party, techno-beats and Tai Chi at

a beach refugee resort at the south coast, Netzanim", Der Spiegel(Germany)

Lebanese refugees from the south of the country after heavy bomb attacks by IDF

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DAY 12

Until now in the latest war in the Middle East at least 370 Lebanese, mainly civilians, were killed by IDF. According to Al-Jazeera more than 100 Palestinians have been killed in the Gaza offensive, the majority of them fighters.  37 Israelis - 20 soldiers and the 17 civilians - were killed too.

Following some reports, analysis and latest news:

The German magazine Der Spiegel published this report last week(7.21):

BEIRUT IN RUINS

Hezbollah's Dead Neighborhood

After more than a week of Israeli bombing raids, Lebanon's southern suburb of Haret Hreik has become uninhabitable. Hezbollah is organizing visits for journalists to the devastated neighborhood that was once its stronghold.

There are wars in which one bombed-out building is shown from different angles so many times that most television viewers end up thinking the whole city has been devastated. There is no need for such tricks in Beirut. In Haret Hreik, a cameraman who wants to show the consequences of war just has to keep on filming -- entire streets in the Beirut suburb have ceased to exist.

A drive to the southern suburbs of Beirut is like a nightmare in which everything only gets worse. At first it's only the burnt smell that reminds you that the ruins alongside the street don't date back to the last war. Next come the craters in the asphalt where bombs have hit, then a burnt-down gas station, and then a newly destroyed highway bridge. But it's only on stepping out of the cars marked "TV" and proceeding on foot that you understand the catastrophe that is playing out in Haret Hreik these days. There is more destruction, more rubble around every street corner -- until the sheer quantity of shattered concrete just blocks your path, stops you from moving further into the chaos.

As many as 700,000 people are thought to have lived in the southern suburbs of Beirut. No exact figures exist of how many called Haret Hreik their home. But one thing is clear: the district is now completely deserted. The Shiite-dominated working-class neighborhood, a stronghold of Hezbollah located between the city center and the airport, has been attacked to the point of being uninhabitable. And the bombs keep falling several times a day. The only people who continue to frequent the neighborhood are the ones who have no other choice, and they don't stay any longer than necessary. Cars race through the streets at speeds as high as 100 kph (62 mph) -- streets where you used to be stuck in perennial traffic jams. Pedestrians keep falling into a nervous trot and cast worried glances skyward. As if that will help -- only two seconds of time separate the sound of an approaching Israeli fighter jet and the detonation on the ground, they say. There's no time to take shelter.

Armed men stand on some street crossings. They're meant to discourage looters and catch Israeli spies. The latter are suspected of being everywhere since war broke out. Some Hezbollah representatives who have agreed to lead a few journalists into Haret Hreik consult with militia members. Is the neighborhood safe? The answer is vague -- move quickly, don't stand around for too long under any circumstances.

The tour leads past bedrooms whose outer wall is missing and stores whose metal blinds have been ripped out by explosions. It leads past a burnt-down store called "Chic-Choc, Bags and Shoes" and an "Oxford Language Center" whose façade lies in pieces on the street. Glass shards from shattered storefronts lie inches-deep on the street and make crunching noises as you walk over them. The stench of trash is in the air. The air tastes dusty from the blasted concrete.

The Hezbollah leaders are nervous. The last attack on these streets happened only a few hours ago, and the next one could be imminent. The men keep in touch with each other by Walkie Talkie -- the signal from a mobile phone could attract Israeli attackers to the group. Drones and spy planes are searching for anything in the neighborhood that's still moving, the men claim. Faint echoes from distant explosions are felt more than they are heard. "That's the airport," one man says. "It's being bombed again."

 
The translator begins to cry as we approach a street where the devastation is particularly bad. "I know this street," she says. "I was often here." She tells us that the burning building down there used to be a children's hospital. The men from Hezbollah are staring down the street too. "If what happened here happened in the USA, in Israel, France or another Arab state, the people would cry, scream and be angry. But it makes us stronger and nourishes our hunger for more fighting," one of the men claims. He says he's glad that fighting on the ground has now begun.

Grim tour with propaganda included

Of course, the quick visit organized by Hezbollah is a propaganda event. According to the men from Hezbollah, everyone who died in the entire area was a civilian. "There were no martyrs -- only civilians died," the leader of the men says. "Why is Israel doing this?" But who can say whether mobile rocket launchers weren't hidden in these densely inhabited residential streets. It's a known fact that Hezbollah -- which is a legally recognized political party in Lebanon, and which is represented in parliament -- had many of its offices and social centers in this neighborhood. It is reasonable to assume that the military section of the militia was also present here.
 
But even if the Israelis did assume that this neighborhood served as a hideout and base of operations -- the attacks on Haret Hreik are not a matter of "surgical strikes" against military targets alone. UN Human Rights Commissioner Louise Arbour said on Wednesday that war crimes that need to be punished may have been committed during last week's fighting. The ruins of the residential neighborhood could at least serve as corroborative evidence for the charge of "predictable death or injury of civilians."

A man rushes to the porch where our little group is standing, seeking shelter. He's clutching a bundle of plastic bags. "I thought I could use them to take a few things from home with me," says the man, who is in his mid-40s. But his home no longer exists.

The apartment building that Khaled points to is a crushed concrete sandwich -- steel girders, parts of balconies and the remains of furniture jut out from between the massive concrete slabs. In this case, the cliché is accurate: The man's life is in ruins. Just three days ago, he came here from a northern suburb where he had taken refuge with his family. His house was still standing then. "It must have happened the night before last," he says calmly -- as if he still can't understand what has happened to him.

Asia Times(HK/China) published following in the last days:

Bunkered down for a war of attrition 

Troops poised for ground offensive 

A job half done
 

The arms that keep Hezbollah fighting

The Observer(GB) in its today's edition:

Scared to flee ... even more scared to stay
P. Beaumont talks to refugees from the south of Lebanon as whole families leave all their possessions behind.

Rites and prayer as rockets rain

Are the Shias on the brink of taking over the Middle East?

Our city is being torn by these two brutal foes

IHT/NYT:

A new era with winds of change in Mideast

Haaretz(IL):

Israel believes U.S. will grant it a week to end incursion
 
Lebanese FM: Abducted soldiers in 'good health'
 
 
The two Israel Defense Forces soldiers abducted by Hezbollah on July 12 are "in good health," Lebanese Foreign Minister Fawzi Salloukh said Sunday.

On the eve of U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's visit to Jerusalem, senior officials believe Israel has received American approval to continue operations against Hezbollah at least until next Sunday.

Rice will first explore ways with Israel's leadership to end the crisis and begin to shape a new order in Lebanon. She will return next Sunday to try to implement a cease-fire...

Please read more here:

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/741445.html 

Rockets hit car in Haifa, carpentry in Haifa suburb
 
Two killed in Katyusha rocket strikes on Haifa

  
Two people were killed and several others were wounded as ten Katyusha rockets slammed into Haifa and its suburbs Sunday morning.

A man was killed in Haifa when rocket shrapnel hit his vehicle as he was driving along a main road in Haifa. A second person was killed when a rocket hit a carpentry shop in a suburb of Haifa.

The full text:

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/741722.html

Meanwhile Hamas' Palestinian Information Center wrote last week(7.19) following:

NSB forms first women human bombers

The Nasser Salahuddin Brigades, armed wing of the popular resistance committees, Tuesday declared the formation of the first group of women human bombers in a parade organized in Gaza city.

Shima Al-Quqa, daughter of the martyr Al-Abed Al-Quqa the NSB commander who was martyred two months ago, said that the women contingent would defend the honor of the Ummah at a time the Arab and Muslim men refrained from shouldering their religious and ethical duty towards the Palestinian and Lebanese women and children.

She said that all members of the purely female group had vowed almighty Allah to brandish the weapons alongside the male Mujahideen to confront the Israeli occupation forces.

The spokeswoman asked all Arab rulers to seek shelter underground because "We will remain above the ground defending them and their dignity and the dignity of the Arab and Muslim Ummah".

The group of women carrying Kalashnikovs, RPGs and Al-Yassin projectiles paraded the streets of Gaza city until they arrived at the PLC premises where they burnt the Israeli, American and EU flags after which one of the women drew an X on the Arab League flag then torched it in a clear sign of anger over the AL weak position towards the Israeli crimes against the Lebanese and Palestinian people.

http://www.palestine-info.co.uk/am/publish/article_19235.shtml

And Al-Jazeera reported 7.20:

About 4,000 Palestinians demonstrated in Nablus in support of Hezbollah calling on it's leader, Hassan Nasrallah, to attack Israel - Haifa and even Tel Aviv - with rockets.

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DAY 8

United States to Israel: you have one more week to blast Hizbullah (Guardian, 7.19)

Bush 'gave green light' for limited attack, say Israeli and UK sources



An Israeli gunner rests on top of a artillery piece near Kiryat Shmona, northern

Israel, next to the Lebanese border. Photograph: Sebastian Scheiner/AP
 

If it really goes after the will of the US administration in one week, or so, at least half of Lebanon could look like that(and likely 1,000 people will be killed there):

PS.:

Today the first time Hizbullah was attacking Nazareth/An-Nasirah the main/largest Arab/Palestinian town in Isreal, killing two children.

But perhaps in Hizbullah's opinion the Arab/Palestinian inhabitants there are only "collaborators".. and so it's their own problem..

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3278460,00.html

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/740309.html

One(Isreali) reader of Yedioth Ahronoth wrote this, related to the attack:

"Hizbollah: An equal opportunity murderer   
       
Our far Left readers will be glad that Hizbollah is carrying on the tradition of Stalin, Mao and Noam Chomsky and other genocidal apologists, in killing everyone on an equal basis; Jew, Arab, Christian, Druze, Sunii, Shiite.." 
 
..HARRHARR