Syria’s Answer to the UN decision to convene a Tribunal on former PM Hariri’s Assassination!
June 3, 2007
http://www.tribulationperiod.com/
The DEBKAfile Article, which follows, gives a good account of the fight being waged between the Lebanese Army and Fatah al-Islam radicals imbedded in the Palestinian Nahral-Bared.
If the Lebanese Army fails to win this battle, then it is likely it will mark the beginning of a steady decline in the Lebanese government. It will cause other radical terrorist groups in the Palestinian Refugee Camps sprinkled through Lebanon to rise up and take control of the camps. In the end, Lebanon’s pro-Western officials and their government will be subdued by whatever terrorist leader becomes the ruler of the terrorist wolf pack.
Daniel 7:24,25 – And the ten horns out of this kingdom are ten kings that shall arise: and another shall rise after them; and he shall be diverse from the first, and he shall subdue three kings.
[25] And he shall speak great words agains
t the most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most High, and think to change times and laws: and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time.
Begin DEBKAfile Article
Lebanese army-Fatah al Islam showdown in northern Lebanon threatens to spread to Palestinian camps in South
June 2, 2007, 11:45 PM (GMT+02:00)
DEBKAfile reports: After two weeks of fighting, the Lebanese army is still stalled in its effort to break through to the Palestinian Nahr al-Bared refugee camp and rout the Fatah al-Islam radicals holed up there. Two tough obstacles have not been overcome – even with the help of a US-Jordan-UAE airlift of military aid in the last ten days or the mobilization of Lebanese army commando units.
1. Fatah al-Islam are not fighting alone; they are backed by elite units of the Iranian-Syrian-backed Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestinian-General Command, which is commanded by Ahmed Jibril. These Palestinian units are highly trained in urban guerrilla warfare by Syrian commando battalion officers and Iranian Revolutionary Guards and have better skills than the Lebanese commandoes.
2. The radical fighters are getting as many guns and as much ammo as they need to ward off a Lebanese commando incursion into the camp.
To avoid tipping its hand, Damascus is holding back the pro-Syrian militias in northern Lebanon from direct involvement in the fighting. But they were heavily armed beforehand and are now diverting to the Fatah Islam everything they need to keep on fighting.
In the south, Islamist militants of Jund al-Sham (Al Qaeda in the Levant) went on maximum alert at the Ein al-Hilweh Palestinian refugee camp, ready to rise up if the Lebanese army overwhelms its fellow- radicals in Nahr al-Bared.
DEBKAfile notes: The failure of the Lebanese army to quell the Islamic group’s uprising would have grave consequences in Lebanon and outside.
Prime minister Fouad Siniora would be shown to be helpless to impose his government’s authority in the rest of Lebanon.
Because he is afraid to complain to the UN about foreign interference on the side of the Fatah al Islam, the Lebanese army is left looking as though it is no match for a mere 350 al Qaeda-linked radicals.
Another pro-US leader who looks bad is Mahmoud Abbas. He and his Fatah organization are formally responsible for security and law and order in the Palestinian refugee camps. A radical win in the Lebanese camp will further undermine Abbas’ position in Gaza and the West Bank and magnify the threat facing Israel.
The Hariri tribunal
1 June 2007
LEBANON continues to be the theatre where the region’s conflicts and bitter political enmities find centre-stage. As the UN prepares to set up a tribunal to try suspects in the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, a new round of domestic and regional friction is set to commence.
It will feature yet more estranged Lebanon-Syria relations, increased internal pressure on the Siniora administration, more prominent splits in the bickering government and further strains on the complex web of religious and political diversity that is found nowhere else in the region.
Syrian anger, condemning the tribunal as “against the interests of the Lebanese people and Lebanon as a whole”, was the first foreseen reaction, as was
the inability of the Lebanese parliament to ratify the tribunal, given the crucial pro and anti-Damascus representation.
And since Lebanon’s pro-Syria president and anti-Syria prime minister are unlikely to bridge the gap by UN’s June 10 deadline, the international body will go ahead with an independent tribunal on the lines of Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia.
Beyond this point, though, meaningful progress will be difficult. The UN investigation preceding the tribunal found ‘probable’ common cause in the Syrian and Lebanese intelligence agencies for Hariri’s assassination. But with Bashar al-Assad having already ruled out extradition, the UN’s initiative will run the risk of falling short of actually trying the suspects after having re-ignited region-wide political and social bitterness.
Of course, that is not to play down the importance of bringing Hariri’s killers to book. The self-made billionaire that leveraged his reach into the West’s financial institutions and Saudi princes to restore Lebanon’s erstwhile reputation as the Levant’s Switzerland deserves a fair and sincere investigation from the government he headed and seemed about to again. Also, for a region where unpunished political assassinations have long shaped the larger political direction, the tribunal will set a needed precedent.
In death, the former PM has already been able to evict the Syrians from Lebanon. Set to raise more tensions, the tribunal looking into his killing will nevertheless have the potential to usher in a new era of reformation in the polity, if, as his son pointed out on live TV, the people are able to unite. The most serious care will be needed to keep positive developments at least abreast of the downslide
FAIR USE NOTICE: This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law.
In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more detailed information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. You may use material originated by this site.
However, if you wish to use any quoted copyrighted material from this site, which did not originate at this site, for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner
from which we extracted it.