Roundup: War in the Middle East

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JULY 26, 2006

All eyes are now on Syria, where SANA, the official news agency, is busy denying a Sky News report claiming Syria is ready to rat out Al Qaeda to the US and wants to mediate some deal between Bush and Iran. This seems pretty far fetched given that the high rollers among the neo-conservatives, currently savoring Israel’s seizure of southern Lebanon, want regime change in Syria on the way to overturning the ayatollahs in Iran.

The Death of UN Observers: “The BBC’s Daniel Lak at the UN in New York says that the observers had taken shelter in a bunker under their base because there had already been 14 Israeli artillery attacks on their position, causing a French general in charge of the UN observers to call Israel’s military asking them to desist. However, as they sheltered, the bunker was hit by a single heavy bomb from an Israeli war plane and four unarmed observers, from Austria, Canada, China and Finland, were killed. A UN rescue team also came under fire as it searched the rubble for survivors.”

Israel’s War Against Lebanon’s Shi’a: The two weeks of Israeli air and sea bombardment suggests Israel aims to play on Lebanon’s sectarian tensions to impel Hezballah’s disarmament, with potentially very dangerous consequences for Lebanon.

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