Clear and present danger

Now that the Iranians have reached a somewhat mysterious much ado about nothing deal with the Russians; which appears to be only an agreement on principle to reach an agreement if this Toronto Star article is accurate. Of course, the agreement to reach an agreement is off if Iran is referred to the UN Security Council on March 6, 2006 by the IAEA. What I want to know is Arafat negotiating from beyond the grave for the Iranians? I swear as each day goes by it’s like Arafat has a legacy that just keeps on giving.

Furthermore, I am hardly comforted by the fact that so much rides on the ability of the Russians to police Iran’s nuclear enrichment cycle. For give me for my bias but the country that did more than any other country to set the Iranians on the nuclear Armageddon is hardly the state I would place any trust in.

I found this latest pearl of warning in Ha’aretz:

If the United States launches an attack on Iran, the Islamic republic will retaliate with a military strike on Israel's main nuclear facility, an advisor to Iran's Revolutionary Guard said. The advisor, Dr. Abasi, said Tehran would respond to an American attack with strikes on the Dimona nuclear reactor and other strategic Israeli sites such as the port city of Haifa and the Zakhariya area. Haifa is also home to a large concentration of chemical factories and oil refineries.

So Washington farts and the Jews get it.

Lebanon has earned another condemnation from the UN reports Ha'aretz;

The Lebanese government publicly admitted recently, for the first time, that it had permitted the delivery of a convoy of arms from Syria to Hezbollah. The United Nations responded by issuing a condemnation.

According to Lebanese sources, Lebanese soldiers halted a convoy of arms-laden trucks from Syria at an army checkpoint in the Lebanon Valley on January 31. However, the Lebanese Defense Ministry ordered the soldiers to allow the convoy to proceed. A report on this incident then reached the UN's special envoy to the Middle East, Terje Larsen, in New York, and Larsen instructed his staff to investigate. Eventually, the Lebanese government admitted both that it had allowed the convoy to pass, and that the arms had been destined for Hezbollah.

The UN then published a statement condemning the Lebanese government for having blatantly violated UN Security Council Resolution 1559, which, inter alia, calls for disarming the country's militias. The arms in the convoy originated apparently from Iran. It is not known how many trucks were in the convoy or what arms they carried. Arms smuggling from Syria into Lebanon has been going on for years, seemingly with the knowledge of the Lebanese government. In this fashion, huge quantities of arms from Iran and Syria have reached Hezbollah in recent years, including massive quantities of Katyushas and other rockets that are stationed in batteries in southern Lebanon and are aimed at Israel.

However, this is the first time that the Lebanese have publicly admitted the existence of these convoys, much less that it has been authorizing arms deliveries to Hezbollah. The convoy's passage was apparently approved by the office of Defense Minister Elias Murr, in coordination with the office of Lebanon's pro-Syrian president, Emile Lahoud. According to a statement published by the UN on February 13, the UN forces in Lebanon were initially unaware of the convoy's passage, though reports of the incident reached them later. When the news reached Larsen, he demanded clarifications from Beirut, adding that if the reports were true, the action constituted a gross violation of Resolution 1559. Larsen's office is responsible, inter alia, for overseeing implemention of this resolution, which was passed in September 2004.

In response, Prime Minister Fuad Siniora's office confirmed the convoy's arrival, but did not specify for whom the arms were destined. At the same time, the UN contacted the Lebanese Defense Ministry, which informed it that the arms were destined for Hezbollah. The ministry added that the army permitted the transfer of weapons to the "resistance" forces - i.e. Hezbollah - in accordance with a decision made by the Lebanese government.

Following receipt of this information, the UN published a second statement, in which it condemned the incident as a grave violation of Resolution 1559, expressed concern and demanded that Beirut take steps to prevent a repetition. Hezbollah claims that it is not a "militia," and therefore, the resolution's demand that all Lebanese militias be disarmed does not apply to the organization. This interpretation has also been adopted by the Syrian government, Lahoud and several Lebanese cabinet ministers. As a result, Hezbollah has enjoyed preferential treatment compared to other Lebanese militias.

If Hezbollah is not a militia then I am the mother of all. The Cedar revolution will be still born until Hezbollah’s potential to threaten and bully all the neighbors ends once and for all.