Dealing with the Devil: beware that UN resolution

[Skybird]

I agree with the better part of what is said here, although I am aware of the orientation of the author, and that is not completely my own. But all in all I go with the content of this text.

Dealing with the Devil
A diplomatic disaster in the making.

By Anne Bayefsky

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is on the brink of handing President Bush the worst diplomatic disaster of his presidency. She is poised to agree to two United Nations resolutions that will tie the hands of both Israel and the United States in the war on terror and, in particular, inhibit future action on its number one state sponsor — Iran.

The catastrophe is the brainchild of Secretary General Kofi Annan, who has effectively turned the United Nations into the political wing of Hezbollah. Rice and Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Nicholas Burns are working furiously to satisfy a timetable dictated by Annan, not by the interests of the United States.

How did the United Nations become the forum for producing peace between Israel and its neighbors, which have rejected the Jewish state’s existence for the past six decades? In the last three weeks, a multi-headed hydra of U.N. actors has risen to defeat Israel on the political battlefield in an unprecedented disregard of the U.N. Charter’s central tenet: the right of self-defense.

Existing Security Council resolutions have for years required “the Government of Lebanon to fully extend and exercise its sole and effective authority throughout the south, [and] ensure a calm environment throughout the area, including along the Blue Line, and to exert control over the use of force on its territory and from it.” A combination of Iranian aggression, Syrian support, and Lebanese impotence and malfeasance, has actively prevented the implementation of the existing resolutions.

But how did the U.N. respond to the aggression against the U.N. member state of Israel, which was launched once again from Lebanese territory and which continues to the present hour? By accusing Israel of murder, mass genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, the deliberate attack of children, and racism. U.N. actors have even denied that Hezbollah is a terrorist organization and analogized it to anti-Nazi resistance movements. In the last three weeks, we have heard:

Secretary-General Kofi Annan:
- Israel’s “excessive use of force is to be condemned;” Israel has “torn the country to shreds.” Israel’s disproportionate use of force and collective punishment of the Lebanese people must stop…
- Israel is “apparently” guilty of the murder of U.N. soldiers. The U.N. interim-force (UNIFIL) soldiers were killed by Israel after it responded to Hezbollah attacks on Israeli civilians. One of the soldiers had reported only days before he died that Hezbollah’s nearby actions meant Israel’s response “has not been deliberate targeting, but has rather been due to tactical necessity.” Yet without any investigation, Annan immediately called it an “apparently deliberate targeting” — an accusation he has yet to retract.
- Israel has “committed grave breaches of international humanitarian law” and “has caused, and is causing, death and suffering on a wholly unacceptable scale.”

Deputy Secretary-General Mark Malloch Brown:
- Hezbollah, the Iranian-proxy currently fighting Israel, is not a terrorist organization. “It is not helpful to couch this war in the language of international terrorism,” said Malloch Brown, claiming Hezbollah is “completely separate and different from Al Qaeda.”

Jan Egeland, under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs and emergency-relief coordinator:
“The excessive and disproportionate use of force by the Israeli Defense Forces…must stop.”

Louise Arbour, U.N. High Commissioner for human rights:
In comments Arbour directed at Israel, she said: “the bombardment of sites with alleged military significance, but resulting invariably in the killing of innocent civilians, is unjustifiable,” suggesting that Israel was perpetrating “war crimes and crimes against humanity” for violating the “obligation to protect civilians during hostilities”.

Ms. Radhika Coomaraswamy, U.N. special representative of the secretary-general for Children and Armed Conflict:
In comments directed “even-handedly” to Israel and Hezbollah, Coomaraswamy “strongly condemned the repeated attacks on civilians, and especially on children, noting that callous disregard for the lives of children has permeated this conflict from its start.”

Ann Veneman, executive director of UNICEF:
Veneman claimed Israel is engaged in “the continued targeting of civilians, particularly children.”

Agha Shahi, Pakistani member of the U.N. Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination:
“Would Israel have resorted to the bombing of civilian infrastructure if it were fighting a non-Arab force? It was a war between different ethnic groups, the Arabs and the Jews.”

Jose Francisco Calitzay, Guatemalan member of the U.N. Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination:
Commenting on events in Lebanon, Calitzay said “mass genocide was the highest level of racism that could exist, and they had to prevent that from happening in the present case.”

Mahmoud Aboul-Nasr, Egyptian member of the U.N. Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination:
Aboul-Nasr “objected to the designation of Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. Hezbollah was not a terrorist organization; it was a resistance movement that was fighting foreign occupation, just as there had been during the Second World War.”

In short, the United Nations — which to this day cannot define terrorism — did not come to the aid of a U.N. member under fire from one of the world’s leading terrorist organizations. It came to the aid of the terrorist by attempting to prevent the member state from exercising its right to hit back. The Geneva Conventions clearly state that combatants are prohibited from using civilians as human shields, but if they do so, the presence of civilians does not render the area immune from military operations. Israeli soldiers and civilians are paying with their lives daily as a consequence of Israel’s efforts to avoid disproportionate action — a dramatic exercise of restraint taken in order to reduce Lebanese civilian casualties.

But in the face of the U.N.’s obvious predilection to subvert Israel’s well-being and American foreign policy interests, to whom has Secretary Rice turned to save the day? The United Nations!

The result has been as predictable as it has been disastrous. The U.N.’s verbal assault on Israel is coupled with a three-pronged political agenda. The United Nations seeks to:
(1) protect Hezbollah from further Israeli attacks;
(2) produce a political win for Hezbollah by giving them the territorial prize of the Shebaa Farms ; and
(3) increase U.N. presence, oversight, and control of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Every element of this agenda is satisfied in the current U.N. resolution and is part of the declared intention of the second resolution to follow.

The resolution calls for a “full cessation of hostilities” and “the immediate cessation by Israel of all offensive military operations.” What offensive military operations? Has Israel been engaged in a single military operation offensive and not defensive in nature? Only according to Annan’s armed wing, Hezbollah.

The resolution reintroduces the notion that Israel occupies Lebanese territory, calling for action on “areas where the border is disputed or uncertain, including in the Shebaa farms area.” It completely contradicts the secretary-general’s own final determination of January 20, 2005, that the Shebaa farms is not Lebanese: “The continually asserted position of the Government of Lebanon that the Blue Line is not valid in the Shab’a farms area is not compatible with Security Council resolutions. The Council has recognized the Blue Line as valid for purposes of confirming Israel’s withdrawal pursuant to resolution 425 (1978).”

The draft resolution on the current crisis says the Security Council “expresses its intention…to authorize in a further resolution under Chapter VII of the Charter the deployment of a UN mandated international force to…contribute to the implementation of a permanent ceasefire and a long-term solution.” It calls for renewed involvement of UNIFIL, the U.N. troops that stood and watched Hezbollah rearm and plan its deadly assault on a U.N. member state for the last six years.
Such an international force is to be authorized under the first-ever Chapter VII resolution — a legally binding resolution that can be implemented through sanctions or the use of force — in the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict. In other words, Secretary Rice has approved of a U.N.-authorized and monitored force that has its sights set on Israel too, coupled with a claim that Israel is currently engaged in “offensive” operations. The very U.N. that accuses Israel of murder and heinous violations of international law is now to be charged with judging compliance with a legally binding instrument purporting to define the terms and conditions of Israel’s self-defense.

In addition, the draft resolution
- fails to call in its operative section for the immediate release of the kidnapped Israeli soldiers;
introduces the notion that settling the issue of all Lebanese prisoners detained in Israel — regardless of their crimes — will be the quid pro quo for the Israelis’ release;
- speaks of financial and humanitarian assistance only to the Lebanese people while ignoring restitution or aid resulting from the one million Israelis in bomb shelters over the last three weeks and the 300,000 displaced;
- lends credibility to another manufactured grievance, the return by Israel of “remaining maps of land mines in Lebanon” — though Israel has already returned maps of old mines years ago, and no mention is made of Hezbollah providing the U.N. with maps of its newly laid landmines;
- enhances Kofi Annan’s authority to judge Israel by extending an open-ended invitation to inform the Security Council continually about any action he believes “might adversely affect the search for a long-term solution” ;
fails to mention “Hezbollah” or terrorism even once, let alone stating that Hezbollah is directly responsible for the Lebanese civilian casualties it cynically promotes;
- omits entirely any reference to Iran or Syria, as if the address of the arms suppliers and bosses of their Hezbollah proxies are too sensitive to include.

There will be only one sure result of this move — the empowerment of terrorists whose ultimate target is the United States and all democratic values. Secretary Rice’s belief that there is a serious convergence between the United Nations agenda and American foreign-policy needs in the age of terrorism is a profound error in judgment for which democratic societies everywhere will be forced to pay a heavy price.


— Anne Bayefsky is a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and at Touro College Law Center. She is also editor of www.EyeontheUN.org.


http://article.nationalreview.com/pr...mM2YTRkOWRjYzE=

Note that I had to reformat the text and kill many hyperlinks to be found in the original, in order to meet board posting limitations.

The following is German language, I'm sorry but it is too long to translate it manually. The author sees the Lebanon war in a greater context: as a necessary preparation for war against Iran, and maybe also Syria. For Iran, Hezbollah also was a deterrant against a possible attack by the US and/or Israel, it makes sense to remove that deterrant before the attack against Iran takes place. The author quotes a Pakistani general who predcited a simulatneous american attack against Iran AND Syria in autumn 2006.

I have come over analysis by this author repeatedly now and have learned to respect this kind of systematical approach on subjects. Like his essay "Bombs on Iran?", that I had translated, this one again sees things in agreater context - and then it suddenly makes perfect sense.

http://www.heise.de/bin/tp/issue/r4/...286&mode=print

[scandium]

Originally Posted by Skybird

Louise Arbour, U.N. High Commissioner for human rights:
In comments Arbour directed at Israel, she said: “the bombardment of sites with alleged military significance, but resulting invariably in the killing of innocent civilians, is unjustifiable,” suggesting that Israel was perpetrating “war crimes and crimes against humanity” for violating the “obligation to protect civilians during hostilities”.

And? By the way, if you don't know who Louise Arbour is or think she's qualified to make such statements, here is her bio:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/arbour/

Supreme Court Justice Louise Arbour is best known as a chief prosecutor for tribunals into the genocide in Rwanda and human rights abuses in Yugoslavia in the 1990s. She earned an international reputation for courage and tenacity and gained the respect of United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan, as well as human rights groups around the world.

She was appointed to the Supreme Court of Canada in 1999. In February 2004, Arbour announced she would leave the Supreme Court to become the new UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. She replaced Sergio Vieira de Mello, who was killed in the bombing of the UN headquarters in Baghdad on Aug. 19, 2003

[Rockstar]

Israel must have the advantage, I can't imagine anyone calling for a cease fire if the tables were turned.

[TteFAboB]

Ah Skybird, doesn't this remind you of that time I said the USA would self-destruct like Europe?

You might still hold old-fashioned or theoretical views on the US. But Rice cannot go against the will of the people, and when all the militancy is in favour of the Hizbollah, when everybody is shocked and indignant and demands peace, policy follows through. Take the best example: war. Many did not want to join WW2, but then Pearl Harbor happened and all the talk and discussion ceased. Landon and Roosevelt started speaking the same language. Afghanistan and Iraq were only possible because of 9/11. And of course, you have this Israeli-Hizbollah war which smells like Vietnam.

What does the UN think Israel should do? React proportionally? Does that mean if the Hizbollah kills eight soldiers and kidnaps two Israel should do the same to them? So the Hizbollah will dictate the terms of the war?

Have you noticed by the last attack on Haifa, that even with all this heavy bombing the attacking power of the enemy has not yet been eliminated? The Lebanese government, now in the hands of the Hizbollah, will only accept a cease-fire if Israel immediately exits the country. Lebanon doesn't exist anymore, it has suffered a militaristic Coup d'èta and is now under control of the homicidal militia, seeing how the Hizbollah dictates the terms. Their objective being the complete destruction of their neighbor state.

But of course, America is shocked with Israel. Lebanese children do need protection, but so does the Israeli, and both mainly so from the hands of the Hizbollah which recruits 13 year olds! For the sake of the children from both sides of the border, the Hizbollah must be destroyed.

Their ambition is to one day be strong enough to wipe Israel off the map, which is also the ambition of the Iranian Ayatollah. A cease-fire which doesn't provide the destruction of the Hizbollah will only buy them time to fulfil their ambition.

[Skybird]

I hope that Meggle's essay will be translated into English, like his formidable Iran-essay was translated some weeks after the German first publishing, too. I just red it again, and noted that that early quoick-reading led me to misunderstand several details. I therefore must say that I agree with his situational analysis very much, leaving out all ethical and moral implications.

I repeatedly said that this war is not about two missing soldiers, but about destroying the thread potential of Hezbollah, and destroying any infrastructure that could lead to ressuplying Hezbollah via Syria or Iran.

I still do not like the minor and imo inadequate action on the ground, and think that they massively underestimated the capacities of Hezbollah. And that is very alarming: that there enemy was able to gain that firepower under the eyes of Mossad - and Mossad not realizing it. Hope the western authorities learn a lesson from this. Between 10 and 20 thousand troops are involved, they say - if I would have a say there, a general mobilization of all available reservists nationwide would have been finished three weeks ago, and minimum 100 thousand troops would be standing in Southern Lebanon right now, turning every rock, while artillery and airforce would be flattening every hilltop and filling every valley over there, until it all is smooth and even.

However, as Meggle argues, if the Israelis succeed in destroying most of Hezbollah'S arsenal, prevent their ressuply by destroying all infrastructure - and then get an international force being stationed there, the operation would be a huge success even if it fails to bring home two soldiers or wiping out Hezbollah or is even strenghtening their political and manpower support - all the latter factors are of no real strategic importance. Decisive is only that Iran cannot strike back via Hezbollah and open a second front in Israel in case Iran gets attacked. That's what it is about.

I wrote some days ago that the lebanon war in a way already is a war against Iran. Meggle's longterm strategy analysis confirms that view. I expected a war against Iran for reasons of the inner dynamic of the situation and the logic that drives both sides into the directions of their own national interests. The Lebanon war is the last signal I needed to be convinced by now that despite the high risk and questionable chance of success in killing the nuke program of iran by military means, a war against Iran and probably also Syria already is a decided issue. the UN has not really a say in this, it is a musical instrument that the solists are masterfully playing on. when Annan condemns Israel and demands an international force being deployed - he probably helps to fulfill Israel's strategical goal in this operation: getting Hezbollah out of range, and getting Western armies to guide their flanks against Iranian retaliation once the Iran issue gets hot.

It's all a chessboard out there.

Poor Kofi. If his brain would be made of chocolate, he wouldn't have enough to fill a smartie, but he's proud like a little boy to be the secretary general of at least "something". And if he doesnt get his will - he stomps his feet. Buy him a limo, he might get thirsty!