Al Jazeera’s panel highlights the unexpectedly good work by Dubai police.
Don’t believe the hype: Israel has survived such flaps “with very few repercussions” in the past.
Israel wants to know: What was Mabhouh doing in Dubai? Why not investigate that?
Australia provides ans answer: Because Hamas wasn’t systemically abusing the passport system on which the global security depends.
Meanwhile: Get your Mossad T-shirt now!
The pleasant notion that the Israeli-Palestinian “peace process” will make “progress” has receded. PALESTINE CRY notes “newspapers from the region [outside of Israel] are in agreement that Israel is acting to escalate the conflict and foment a war in the region.”
Yossi Alpher sees “hypocrisy” all around the world in the Dubai hit story, a common enough sentiment in Israel. When Germany opened a “murder” investigation, Ynetnews put the word in quotes.
But the hawkish Alpher also notes a hard fact: Israel’s policy of extrajudicial assassination does very little to make Israelis more secure in the long run. Indeed, such tactics have reliably served to strengthen its most militant foes.
With assassination suspects possibly still on U.S. soil, the Dubai assassins have dragged America into row over fake passports, says Times Online in London.
With police investigations already underway in Australia, Ireland, and Germany, the Obama administration is going to deal with this. WashPost and NYT are still playing the story inside, appropriate in light of the fact that there has been no official U.S. reaction, but that’s not going to last long.
For the Obama administration, this is where the rhetoric of the president’s Cairo address meets the realities of Middle East decisionmaking. Of course, Israel has the right to defend itself, and of course the U.S. assassinates al-Qaeda leaders every day. But the leaders and the publics of Arab countries (like the United Arab Emirates, where the hit took place) that are open to peace with Israel (and some of whom want U.S. help to deter Iran) are not going to be satisfied by the talking points that go over well in Washington and on cable TV.
From Iran’s state-controlled PressTV.
Nasrallah says Hezbollah will hit Tel Aviv airport if Lebanon is attacked.
There is an element of bluff in this. Hezbollah’s ability to take the battle so deep into Israeli territory is questionable. More likely, this is an in-kind response to Hillary Clinton’s pressurizing on Iran (understood among U.S. foes as a pro-Israeli position) that should not be underestimated. The Hezbollah leader’s ability to wage asymmetrical warfare to advance his group’s political agenda is proven. There’s not much doubt that Hezbollah’s position in Lebanon and the region is stronger today than it was before its 2006 mini-war with Israel.
Rafik Hariri, Lebanese businessman and political leader, slain in 2005. (Wapedia)
The politics of assassination are a more decisive factor than ever in Middle East politics.
This week thousands commemorated the fifth anniversary of the death of Lebanese billionaire Rafik Hariri who was killed in a huge bomb blast in Beirut on February 13th, 2005. But the United Nations investigation of the crime has since stalled and the feeling that politics is trumping justice is hard to avoid. Hariri’s assassination gave rise to Lebanon’s so-called March 14th Cedar Revolution which brought Syria’s foes to power. Now the demographic and political realities of Lebanon have thwarted the movement and created a new status quo. Hariri’s son, Saad, who followed his father into politics, is calling for reconciliation with the government of Syria, the prime (but not the only) suspect in his father’s murder. As al Jazeera noted:
Re-emerging Syrian influence, the persistence of Hezbollah’s role and internal divisions have all dealt steady blows to the alliance that was brought together by opposition to Damascus.
Is justice possible? Continue reading »
Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal stokes speculation of a regional war, and Israel’s Ynet News plays the story big.
Electronic Lebanon tamps it down:
Even through the threat of war with Israel is ever-present, neither Israel nor Hizballah seem to have the appetite for another war in the short term.
Analysis: If there is a war, Hamas doesn’t want to fight Israel alone as it got punished in the Gaza war. Meshaal said as much. The Lebanese prefer not to be testing ground for Israeli experiments in “deterrence,” which usually (not always) involve civilian casualties, said to be inadvertent.
None of which means there won’t be war.
Israel upholds legality of Jews-only housing complex in Jaffa–Haaretz.
The petition, filed by Jaffa residents and human rights groups, challenged a decision by the Israel Lands Administration and the Tel Aviv municipality to lease the land in question to B’Emuna, a company specializing in housing complexes for the religious Zionist community. Its plan is to build three apartment buildings at the site.
Will Israel attack? asks Ya Libnan. Maybe. Maybe not. But everybody in Lebanon is preparing.
Who took the elaborate care necessary to carve the symbol of Jewish statehood into Palestinian turf?
The Jerusalem Post doesn’t investigate.
