Monthly Archive for February, 2007

Page 3 of 4

Following suicide bombing in Eilat, Israel considers building fence along Egyptian border

Published on February 2, 2007

Good fencing does not necessarily make good neighbors. Too bad Israel will never learn that lesson.

Israel is considering building a fence along the Egyptian border following this week’s suicide bombing in Eilat.

Israeli officials said Wednesday that long-shelved plans to build a fence along the 100-mile desert frontier were being re-examined.

The terrorist who killed three Israelis in the Red Sea resort city is believed to have come from the Gaza Strip via the Egyptian Sinai. Cost estimates for an Egyptian border fence range from $120 million to $350 million, which could put a strain on Israel’s $12 billion defense budget. But some experts have speculated that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert could use other government funds for the project if it is approved.

In News and Events and Zionism

U.S.: Israel violated cluster-bomb pact

Published on February 2, 2007

And they only know about this now? Amazing how their sophisticated “intelligence’ failed to detect this earlier.

Israel probably violated the terms of its purchase of U.S.-made cluster bombs, U.S. officials say, but – unlike the last time Israel used the deadly munitions in Lebanon – it’s unlikely to face repercussions.

The Bush administration delivered a classified report to Congress on Monday on Israel’s use of the cluster bombs in civilian areas last summer in its war against Hezbollah.

The report was preliminary, but State Department spokesman Sean McCormack, despite his use of just about every qualifier in the thesaurus, made it clear that Israel probably was on the wrong side of the contract.

“It was the determination based on the facts that we in the preliminary finding – I have to emphasize ‘preliminary,’ it’s not a final judgment – that there may likely could have been some violations of that agreement,” McCormack told reporters.

He would not explain further, and spokesmen for Congress members who received the report were similarly circumspect, citing its classified status.

In News and Events

Israel’s Olmert Is Questioned In Probe of War With Lebanon

Published on February 2, 2007

Ehud Olmert facing the book over his war crimes in Lebanon. He has certainly much to account for, indeed. Seems that he can no longer boast about a “victory” in Lebanese soil now.

Prime Minister Olmert of Israel spent hours yesterday testifying before the commission investigating Israel’s conduct during its much-criticized war in Lebanon over the summer.

The Winograd commission was appointed in the fall to try to reconstruct the government’s decisions during the war with Lebanon’s Hezbollah guerrillas and to determine if anyone should be censured.

The government has been criticized for failing to meet its two main objectives — destroying Hezbollah and returning two Israeli soldiers whose capture by the guerrillas sparked the war. Reserve soldiers returning from the battlefield also complained of poor preparations and lack of food and ammunition.

Well we all know that the two soldiers were never returned and Hizbullah is not only alive and well, they are attempting to kick out the current government in Beirut.

In Beirut 2006 and News and Events

Israel escalates operations in W. Bank, killing three

Published on February 2, 2007

More violence escalated by Israel’s IDF. Three died in the occupied West Bank.

The Israeli army escalated its ground military operations in several West Bank cities on Thursday, killing three Palestinians, security sources and witnesses said.

Palestinian medics in the West Bank said that three Palestinians were killed by Israeli troops, two in the city of Nablus, and other one at an Israeli roadblock near Ramallah.

Security sources and witnesses said Israeli army forces, backed by jeeps and armored vehicles, escalated its ground military operations into the West Bank cities of Nablus, Jenin, Tulkarem, Hebron and Bethlehem.

In Nablus, residents said that Israeli soldiers stormed several neighborhoods, mainly in the old city area, and also stormed two surrounding refugee camps.

Heavy clashes erupted between the soldiers and members of Al- Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, armed wing of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah movement, leaving two killed and another two wounded, one in critical conditions, they added.

Moreover, Palestinian medics in Ramallah said that Israeli troops shot dead a Palestinian man at Qalandya checkpoint outside the city on the way up to Jerusalem on Thursday morning.

Witnesses said the man, whose identity was not immediately known, was taken to hospital.

In News and Events and Zionism

Israel convicts former justice minister of sex harassment

Published on February 2, 2007

Certainly such behavior is very revolting in the first place, to say the least. No further comment!

JERUSALEM – The kiss lasted a few seconds. The morality play it inspired lasted more than six months, riveting Israelis and their legal system on a single question: Did she or didn’t she want it?

The drama ended Wednesday when the Tel Aviv Magistrates Court ruled that the plaintiff, a 21-year-old female army first lieutenant “did not flirt with the accused, did not initiate the kiss, and did not consent to it.”

With that, a three-judge panel convicted Haim Ramon, a founder of the prime minister’s Kadima party and an architect of his ruling coalition, of violating Israel’s sexual harassment law by committing an “indecent act” while he was justice minister.

The unanimous verdict, which could send the 56-year-old divorced man to prison for up to three years, jolted Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s scandal-plagued government. Olmert had been confident enough in an acquittal that he was holding the justice post open for Ramon, who had resigned last August to face trial.

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In News and Events and Politics