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| Syria-Lebanon-Iran |
| Iran nuclear crisis pushes up tension on Lebanon-Israel border |
| 2006-05-19 |
| RAMIEH, Lebanon (AP) - The calm on Lebanon's border with Israel feels increasingly fragile these days as the Iranian nuclear crisis heats up and the adversaries dig in. The threat of an attack on Iran's nuclear facilities, some 900 miles east of here, is being taken seriously enough for both sides to be speculating on what the ripple effect could be. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is calling for Israel's destruction, Israel is threatening to respond in kind, and there are fears that any attack on Iran could trigger an immediate war between the Israeli army and pro-Iranian Hezbollah guerrillas. Along the 49-mile border, an Arab-Israeli battlefield for decades, "There's been a lot of construction work on both sides," said Milos Strugar, a Yugoslav who serves as senior adviser to the commander of the U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon. "The issues we are dealing with on the ground are between Lebanon and Israel, but the regional context is important in that regard," he said. In a report to the U.N. Security Council last month, Secretary-General Kofi Annan linked Iran to instability in Lebanon for the first time, urging Tehran to cooperate in trying to restore Lebanon's political independence and disarm militias. A half-hour's drive east from the Mediterranean, at their outpost near the Israeli village of Zarit, Israeli troops are dug in behind stacks of concrete blocks and wire mesh to stop incoming rockets. An electronic fence runs the length of the border. A few hundred yards away, Hezbollah fighters are rebuilding positions destroyed by Israeli tanks and planes during an outbreak of fighting last November, reinforcing them with earthen mounds, carving new access roads and building new positions, U.N. officers say. Near Ramieh, a Lebanese farming village of tobacco fields and olive groves a mile north of Israel, Hezbollah guerrillas drive trucks with tinted windows and no license plates. Each side watches the other ceaselessly, while U.N. peacekeepers watch, report incidents and to try to sustain the cease-fire. Next Wednesday marks six years since Israel withdrew its army from South Lebanon, ending an 18-year occupation, and there hasn't been any shooting since February. But "the situation is still volatile," Strugar said in an interview. The Israeli army regularly goes on high alert over reports of Hezbollah plans to kidnap soldiers to trade for Arab prisoners. Israeli planes routinely violate Lebanese airspace and Hezbollah, which is armed with thousands of rockets, has occasionally targeted the Israeli army in Chebaa Farms, a disputed sliver of land where the borders of Syria, Israel and Lebanon meet. Hezbollah's Lebanese political opponents accuse it of doing the bidding of its backers, Iran and Syria. Hezbollah rejects the charge but doesn't discuss its military activities publicly. Shiite Muslim like Iran, it says it's working in Lebanon's interest, although its leader is ambiguous about what it would do if Iran were attacked. "We are friends of Iran but we are not lackeys," Sheik Hassan Nasrallah said in a recent speech. In a newspaper interview, he said discussing the matter was premature - that if he declared now that Hezbollah had no intention of responding to an attack on Iran, "I would be giving the Israelis and the Americans free words of comfort." Defense analyst Reuven Pedatzur of the Israeli newspaper Haaretz believes an attack on Iran could mean "legitimacy for Hezbollah to attack Israel from Lebanon on Iranian orders." Hezbollah is branded a terrorist organization by the United States and Israel. But in South Lebanon it is effectively in charge. Its yellow flags fly from rooftops and lampposts, and roads are marked with billboards bearing portraits of Hezbollah and Iranian leaders. A major attack from Lebanon would almost certainly provoke massive Israeli retaliation, and radical Palestinian guerrillas with bases in Lebanon could rise to Iran's defense as well. If either Syria or Iran is attacked, "we will not only be on their side, we will be in the forefront," warned Ahmed Jibril, a Palestinian guerrilla leader. But the guerrillas are in a political bind, pressured by a government in Beirut that is dominated by anti-Syrians. Hezbollah has rejected U.N. demands that it disarm, but is under domestic and international pressure to refrain from launching attacks on Israel. Caught in the middle of all this are the villagers of South Lebanon, who have known war on and off for nearly 40 years and are wondering how much longer this latest lull can last. "The events of Syria, Palestine and Iran are intertwined," said Ahmed Hussein, a gray-haired 45-year-old elementary school teacher. "But we wish for peace. We've had bitter experiences with wars. We want to be safe." |
| Posted by:ryuge |
| #1 "We are friends of Iran but we are not lackeys" - famous last words. |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2006-05-19 00:15 |