LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN
April 08/08

Bible Reading of the day.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Mark 4,26-34. He said,"This is how it is with the kingdom of God; it is as if a man were to scatter seed on the land and would sleep and rise night and day and the seed would sprout and grow, he knows not how. Of its own accord the land yields fruit, first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. And when the grain is ripe, he wields the sickle at once, for the harvest has come." He said, "To what shall we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable can we use for it? It is like a mustard seed that, when it is sown in the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on the earth. But once it is sown, it springs up and becomes the largest of plants and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the sky can dwell in its shade."With many such parables he spoke the word to them as they were able to understand it.
Without parables he did not speak to them, but to his own disciples he explained everything in private.

Free Opinions, Releases, letters & Special Reports
Gadhafi is right to say Arab rulers are worthless - but so is he-The Daily Star 08/04/08
Here's how Iran is vulnerable: a view from Israel-By Yossi Sarid 08/04/08

Why A Terrorist Strategy? By: Barry Rubin Apr 08, 2008 World Security Network
Who will wake up the West. By: Colonel Gary H. Rice 08/04/08. World Security Network 

Latest News Reports From Miscellaneous Sources for April 09/08
Siniora brushes off Berri's call for dialogue-Daily Star
Jumblatt calls for disarming Hizbullah, respecting Taif-Daily Star
Official from UN's Hariri tribunal stresses 'irreversibility' of probe
Adwan wants Arab League to fix Lebanese crisis-Daily Star
Khreis backs opposition's right to Beirut sit-in-Daily Star
French 'preparing statement on 1701 at UN-Daily Star
Gemayel backs efforts of Berri, Siniora to end crisis-Daily Star
Fadlallah: Only dialogue will better relations with West-Daily Star
Hizbullah, Amal say Israeli military drill reflects defeat-Daily Star
Despite media buzz, war shows no sign of returning to South-Daily Star
Beirut pulls in a few good marks in cautious IMF report on economy-Daily Star
National Bloc chief, LOG head speak out-Daily Star
Perceived cronyism led to delay of FPM vote - source-Daily Star
Chouf farmers are going nuts for chestnuts-Daily Star
Some designers have a different way of being Lebanese-Daily Star
Azour touts growth of 'close to 4 percent' despite obstacles-AFP
Lebanon PM rejects Berri's terms for dialogue-Ya Libnan

Murr Quits Aoun, Supports Berri's Arab Tour-Naharnet
Israeli Minister Vows to Destroy Iran, Confront Hizbullah's Rockets-Naharnet
Saniora: Arab Umbrella Shadows Lebanon-Naharnet
Lebanon's Economy Grows by Four Per Cent-Naharnet

Pope laments killing of Iraqi priest Reuters
IRAQ: An endangered Christian community.Los Angeles Times
Religious Cleansing" In Northern Iraq; "Christians In Life Danger" BosNewsLife
An advocate for Iraq's displaced Christians-Los Angeles Times
Iraqi Christians shaken anew by Orthodox priest's murder-Catholic World News
Iraq: Christians “keeping faith” despite shock of Archbishop’s death.Aid to the Church in Need (press release


Murr Quits Aoun, Supports Berri's Arab Tour
Naharnet/MP Michel Murr officially announced on Monday that he broke away from the Change and Reform Parliamentary bloc to "maintain my independence."
"I am neither with the opposition, nor with the majority," Murr told reporters. "I've been independent ever since I started my political career … I support any side that can promote a settlement," Murr added. He declared support for the separate Arab tours launched by Premier Fouad Saniora and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri. However, Murr said he has "high hopes" on the outcome of Berri's Arab tour. "Every body awaits the outcome of Speaker Berri's Arab tour, especially his visits to Damascus and Riyadh. These are the two major capitals and Speaker Berri can play a major role during this tour," Murr added. "If (Berri's) Arab tour was positive, and if Syria and Saudi Arabia dismantled major obstacles … that would reflect positively on dialogue," Murr said. Beirut, 07 Apr 08, 17:20

Jumblatt calls for disarming Hizbullah, respecting Taif
By Maher Zeineddine
Daily Star correspondent
Tuesday, April 08, 2008
BEIRUT: Democratic Gathering and Progressive Socialist Party (PSP) leader MP Walid Jumblatt said the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) should be the country's exclusive holders of arms in his weekly editorial for PSP-owned Al-Anbaa newspaper. Jumblatt denounced the gunfire which accompanies the television appearances and speeches of Lebanese leaders, saying that the Lebanese people have suffered and worried enough and that they didn't need more innocent victims and martyrs. He said the gunshots would "willingly or unwillingly" be seen as a provocation to the LAF and other security institutions who could only consider this as an insult to their hard work in trying to maintain stability. The Druze leader called on local figures to try and control their crowds by inflicting legal punishment in case of arms use. "We shouldn't give more political means for armed militias, whether it is the resistance or not; arms belong to the government and no one else," Jumblatt editorial said. The resistance was losing its "positive image" by using its arms for other purposes than protecting the country he said, adding these purposes are in contradiction with the "peaceful and democratic path taken by the ruling March 14 coalition."As for leaders' posters invading walls, Jumblatt said that not only did they ruin some neighborhoods, but they were also leading to tensions. Commenting on the recent Israeli military maneuvers, Jumblatt said that it was yet another proof that Lebanon is the arena of a number of conflicts. He added that Syria deployed its army on the Syrian-Lebanese border instead of sending its men to the Syrian-Israeli border, showing that "Israel and Syria want Lebanon to be the theater of their own interests."He urged politicians to avoid the possible "catastrophic open war" by revising and respecting the Taif agreement "that stipulates a truce with Israel." Regarding LAF commander Michel Suleiman's announcement that he will quit his post on August 21, Jumblatt said that Suleiman remains the consensus presidential candidate

Siniora brushes off Berri's call for dialogue
Parliament speaker says Syria 'has no conditions at all on an inter-Lebanese accord'

Compiled by Daily Star staff
Tuesday, April 08, 2008
Parliament Speaker and key opposition figure Nabih Berri issued a new call for dialogue between his country's feuding political factions on Monday but was swiftly rebuffed by Prime Minister Fouad Siniora. After a two-hour meeting with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Berri said Syria was putting "no conditions" on the inter-Lebanese talks which he has been trying to organize.  "I tell our people in Lebanon, the Arabs and the world, that our brothers in Syria have no conditions at all on an inter-Lebanese accord," Berri told reporters. "On the contrary, they are ready for any help they might be asked for."
But after talks in Cairo, the Lebanese prime minister said the time for internal dialogue was over and called for an urgent meeting of Arab foreign ministers on the crisis which has left Lebanon without a president for more than four months. In Damascus, Berri said his visit had provided him "with a new boost to launch a dialogue in Lebanon aimed at electing [head of the Lebanese Armed Forces] General Michel Suleiman to the Lebanese presidency."
Berri intends to gather Lebanon's political leaders for talks before April 22 when Parliament is due to convene for a fresh attempt to elect a president, his spokesman Ali Hamdan said. But Siniora rejected the idea outright after talks with Arab League chief Amr Moussa in the Egyptian capital. "The path to a solution through dialogue no longer exists in Lebanon at present," he said. The Western-backed Siniora has been touring pro-Western Arab capitals in a bid to shore up support for his beleaguered government. Two of his main Arab backers - Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Saudi King Abdullah - are to hold a summit on the Lebanese crisis in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm El-Sheikh on Wednesday, Egypt's official Middle East News Agency announced.
Both leaders boycotted an Arab summit in Damascus last month in protest at what they said was Syria's negative role in the Lebanese crisis.
After his talks with Berri on Monday, the Syrian president offered to help bolster security in Lebanon and voiced support for inter-Lebanese talks.
Syria "stands ready to provide all possible help which the Lebanese could request, to guarantee security and stability in Lebanon," Assad said, according to the official Syrian Arab News Agency. The Syrian president also expressed support for "an internal Lebanese dialogue" saying such talks between Beirut's feuding politicians would help resolve the crisis that has plagued Lebanon for more than a year.
The Lebanese government and opposition have both agreed on Suleiman as a consensus candidate for the presidency but continue to bicker about the make-up of a new Cabinet. Parliamentary sessions to vote for a new president have been postponed 17 times since last September.
After talks with Mubarak on Sunday, Siniora accused Syria - for decades the main powerbroker here - of holding his country hostage by blocking the election of a new president. The Reform and Change parliamentary bloc welcomed Berri's call for dialogue "as long as the goals of dialogue were clear and free from foreign intervention and conditions," according to a statement issued after the bloc's weekly meeting. The bloc said the government's decision to boycott the Arab summit, followed by Sinio-ra's meetings in capitals across the Arab world and request for an Arab foreign ministers meeting to solve the continuing impasse, was "requesting and rejecting the same thing." On behalf of the bloc, MP Ibrahim Kanaan said the Reform and Change meeting covered the recent Israeli maneuvers near its border with Lebanon. Kanaan said the possibility of a meeting between bloc leader MP Michel Aoun and Maronite Patriarch Nasrallah Butros Sfeir would be decided by the two parties involved.  MP Michel Murr said on Monday that he was never a member of Aoun's Reform and Change bloc but was rather "aligned with it."
"I am neither with the opposition, nor with the majority," Murr told reporters following a meeting with British Ambassador to Lebanon Frances Mary Guy.
"I have been independent ever since I started my political career ... I support any side that can promote a settlement to the crisis," Murr added.
The former deputy premier expressed his support for the separate Arab tours launched by both Siniora and Berri.
However, Murr said he has "high hopes" on the outcome of Berri's Arab tour. "Everybody awaits the outcome of Speaker Berri's Arab tour, especially his visits to Damascus and Riyadh. These are the two major capitals and Speaker Berri can play a major role during this tour," he added. "If [Berri's] Arab tour was positive, and if Syria and Saudi Arabia dismantled major obstacles ... that would reflect positively on dialogue," Murr said. Also commenting on recent political developments on the Lebanese political scene and Berri's call for dialogue, Lebanese Forces (LF) boss Samir Geagea said the ruling March 14 coalition has taken upon itself the responsibility of "saving Lebanon." "The March 14 Forces has taken the responsibility of saving Lebanon; nothing else can save it," Geagea said.
"The plan of adversaries and enemies at the present time is insidious and aims at diluting the situation, exhausting the people and disrupting everything to lead the people to desperation and frustration," Geagea added. "But we have to keep our faith that the battle will be victorious."
The LF leader said the future would prove the validity of his words adding that, "as a case in point, the group which enjoyed a 60 or 70 percent popularity [in the 2005 parliamentary polls] currently gathers not more that 20 or 30 percent," in reference to Aoun's Free Patriotic Movement.
Geagea said that if freedom and democracy could not be achieved in Lebanon, "then it cannot be achieved in any countries in the Middle East."
"Rest assured that this gray phase is transient ... We are taking all precautions to win our confrontation as soon as possible," he added. - The Daily Star, with AFP

French 'preparing statement on 1701 at UN'
Daily Star-Tuesday, April 08, 2008
BEIRUT: French diplomats at the United Nations have written up a draft of a new presidential statement on the implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1701, local newspapers reported on Monday. The draft statement calls on all concerned parties to intensify efforts and to cooperate with the UN secretary general over the implementation of Resolution 1701, which put an end to the summer 2006 war and also expresses the diplomats' concern for the fate of the two Israeli soldiers captured by Hizbullah on July 12, 2006.The draft statement also encourages the resolution of the issue of Lebanese detainees in Israel, and reiterates the diplomats' opinion that the Lebanese state should be the only body to possess weapons. It also mentions the continuing Israeli violations of Lebanon's airspace. The diplomats called for holding presidential elections in Lebanon without delay, adding, "The Security Council is concerned about the ongoing political crisis and calls for holding fair and just presidential elections without foreign interference

Perceived cronyism led to delay of FPM vote - source

By Anthony Elghossain
Daily Star staff
Tuesday, April 08, 2008
BEIRUT: The postponement of Free Patriotic Movement's (FPM) internal elections may be the result of in-house resistance toward perceived cronyism within the party itself, well-informed sources told The Daily Star on Monday. The FPM elections, initially scheduled to take place on May 4, were postponed for six months by FPM leader MP Michel Aoun for reasons that remain somewhat unclear. The postponement of the elections was initially reported by local newspapers over the weekend, and was attributed to the objection of FPM officials to expanded authorities given to Aoun's son-in-law, Gebran Bassil, who is currently the party's political relations officer. However, sources close to Aoun told Al-Hayat newspaper that the reasons for pushing back the elections were simply technical, having more to do with logistics than any political disagreement. The Al-Hayat report added that party members who objected to this expansion of authority simply favored a more institutionalized process, and were not objecting to Bassil's potential rise in principle.
But sources involved with the FPM have told The Daily Star that the reasons behind this postponement stem from dissatisfaction over Aoun's reported intention to appoint his son-in-law as deputy head of the party. "Selected members of the party, active in Lebanon for the past 20 years on behalf of [what is now] the FPM, some of whom suffered jail sentences and overt pressures during the Syrian domination of Lebanon, objected to this appointment during a meeting with General Aoun who, it appears, is taking some time to reconsider this decision," said the source. In the aftermath of the Lebanese Civil War, the FPM developed - first as a broad movement, then as a political party - in opposition to the Syrian occupation of Lebanon and in reaction to traditional rule, cronyism and corruption in Lebanon

National Bloc chief, LOG head speak out
Tuesday, April 08, 2008
Daily Star
BEIRUT: The National Bloc party and the Lebanese Option Group said on Monday that building a free and independent state can only be done through serious work. The leaders of the two factions, Carlos Edde and Ahmed al-Assaad, also called on MPs to elect a president with a simple majority vote

Hizbullah, Amal say Israeli military drill reflects defeat
By Mohammed Zaatari
Daily Star staff
Tuesday, April 08, 2008
BEIRUT: Hizbullah and the Amal Movement said on Monday "the background of the Israeli military exercises [which commenced Sunday] is hostile no matter what their causes are.""The exercises reflect Israel's hidden intentions to avenge its defeat during the July [2006] war," a joint statement issued by the two parties said. "They also reflect the field impuissance which the Israeli military institution is witnessing and constitute an attempt to raise its spirits."
"These maneuvers cannot erode our people's morale and their adherence to the choice of resistance," it added.
A five-day nationwide exercise simulating air and missile attacks on cities, including by nonconventional weapons, began on Sunday, the Israeli military said, and is the biggest drill of its kind ever carried out in the Jewish state.
Over the next few days emergency sirens will be sounded across Israel and schoolchildren will practice entering shelters and protected spaces in the event of chemical and biological weapons attacks. Also on Monday, resigned Energy and Water Minister Mohammad Fneish said that Israel "aspires for and tries to grab the opportunity to compensate for its loss and recover the role of its army."
"The fate of any Israeli offensive or adventure will not be less than that of the July 2006 hostilities," Fneish said during a ceremony for Hizbullah students and teachers in Hanawey. Tackling the ongoing political crisis, Fneish said the ruling party "does not believe that it is incapable of dealing with the country's affairs on its own." "The opposition has and is still making lots of concessions because it knows that the country's interest requires that we deal with those present in the political arena," he said. "If we want an authority in the country, we should be partners."Hizbullah's top man in South Lebanon, Sheikh Nabil Qaouk, said the Israeli maneuvers "reveal once again the deep fear of the Zionists' military and political leaderships."
"What the Israelis fear the most is that their army is no longer capable of providing them with protection and confronting the resistance in Lebanon," Qaouk said.
According to Qaouk, Israel's exercise and continuing violations of Lebanon's land and airspace confirm that the resistance in Lebanon is an "indispensable necessity.""The more the resistance is strong, the more the possibility of a war with Israel recedes," Qaouk added.
Hizbullah politburo member Ghaleb Abu Zeinab said that the Israeli military maneuvering cannot change anything in the present balance of power in the region and cannot eliminate the resistance. "The Israeli enemy does not have enough political power to take a decision to attack Lebanon, and it is aware of the resistance's readiness," Abu Zeinab said. "The enemy knows that any military adventure against Lebanon will lead to the end of its existence and that of its army," he added.
On the country's political woes, Abu Zeinab said the ruling party bears responsibility for blocking any solution to Lebanon's crisis because it is following US orders.
Resigned Foreign Minister Fawzi Salloukh said Sunday that Israel's major missile attack drill was in violation of international law.
"Any maneuver along the border of any country is tantamount to war against that country," Salloukh told reporters in South Lebanon.
He said the Lebanese Army, Hizbullah, as well as Lebanon's entire population were "ready" for any attack.
"There is full cooperation between the Lebanese Army and UNIFIL in order to thwart any Israeli violation of the Blue Line," Salloukh added.
He said he hoped the Israeli exercise is not an "excuse" by the Jewish state to launch a new offensive on Lebanon

Fadlallah: Only dialogue will better relations with West

Daily Star staff
Tuesday, April 08, 2008
BEIRUT: An honest dialogue is the only way for Islamic-European relations to improvem senior Shiite cleric Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah told Norway's visiting vice foreign minister on Monday. Raymond Johansen told Fadlallah that different parties were sparing no effort in order to establish a proper dialogue while some groups were working hard to create divisions between Muslims and Westerners, adding that "a lot of problems can be easily solved."
"We must find a solution to offenses toward religions expressed as freedom of speech," Johansen said. Referring to the controversial Danish cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad published in several European countries, Fadlallah said it was unacceptable to allow such offenses and disrespect toward Islam and the Muslim community by pretending that it is a matter of freedom of speech, adding that both Muslim and European parties should initiate a clear and honest dialogue. "If Muslims worked on an objective and scientific 'Holocaust' movie, would the countries that have allowed the cartoons' publication, broadcast it?" he asked. The sayyed accused some Westerners of handling the situation the wrong way by calling for economic boycotts which, he said, could only increase the actual tensions. Fadlallah praised the reaction of "responsible" Arab and Muslim communities living in Europe. Meanwhile, vice president of the Higher Shiite Council, Abdel Amir Qabalan, called on the Lebanese to unite in order to save the country from its ongoing crisis. This message also concerned politicians "as they should open up to each other and resolve conflicts," he said. "While different countries should work with each other in order to fulfill their interests, Lebanese people should start doing this within Lebanon so they can save the country by removing existing tensions," he was quoted as saying. Moreover, Qabalan highlighted the increasing poverty in the country as he summoned those who can afford it to help their fellow citizens.  In separate developments, Maronite Patriarch Nasrallah Butros Sfeir met with Democratic Gathering MP Wael Bou Faour, with whom he discussed the continuing political deadlock in the country. "The presidency is being held as a hostage" he said. Bou Faour denounced the opposition's "wasting of time" and insisted on the importance of electing a new president, adding that the presidential vacuum is suppressing an entire religious community's political role. - The Daily Star

Gemayel backs efforts of Berri, Siniora to end crisis

Daily Star staff
Tuesday, April 08, 2008
BEIRUT: Former President Amin Gemayel confirmed on Monday his support for the efforts of both Speaker Nabih Berri and Prime Minister Fouad Siniora in recruiting Arab support to reach a solution to Lebanon's 17-month-old political deadlock. After a regular meeting of the Phalange Party that he heads, Gemayel announced that he intended to work to ensure communication among all Lebanese parties.
The former president said former Interior Minister and Marada Movement leader Suleiman Franjieh's request for the adoption of the 1960 electoral law was "positive as it limited the demands of the opposition." "However," he added, "the law needed some amendments."In an interview last week, Franjieh said he would accept presidential elections if the 1960 law were passed in a parliamentary session prior to voting on a president. He also stressed the need to grant the opposition one-third of the cabinet posts to ensure that decisions of significant importance were made according to the national interest. March 14 MP Butros Harb also responded to Franjieh's comments, saying that he supported the proposed packaging of the presidential election with an electoral law decision, despite the fact that such a linkage is technically unconstitutional (Parliament may only convene for the purpose of electing a president if there is a vacuum), because he considers it "a step toward a solution to the crisis." Franjieh also stirred controversy by comparing the role of of Maronite Patriarch Nasrallah Butros Sfeir to the "rule of the jurisprudent" model in Iran, arguing that the pro-government factions' claims that Hizbullah sought to set up such a model in Lebanon ignored the fact "that the patriarch is becoming like [Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali] Khamenei."The presidency has been vacant since November 23, and the government is currently functioning without the formal participation of opposition ministers. - The Daily Star

Adwan wants Arab League to fix Lebanese crisis

Daily Star-Tuesday, April 08, 2008
BEIRUT: Lebanese Forces MP Georges Adwan said on Monday that the problem in Lebanon lies with two diverging points of view. "The first is the group pressing toward the establishment of a state, while the second is the group rejecting this idea and keeping Lebanon an open ground to foreign intervention," Adwan told the Saudi daily Al-Yawm. "I hope an Arab meeting will be dedicated to the situation in Lebanon, as Lebanon is a founding member of the Arab League," he added. He added that Lebanon needs the Arabs to help work out Lebanese-Syrian relations

Official from UN's Hariri tribunal stresses 'irreversibility' of probe
'There will be no room for political bargaining'

By Michael Bluhm
Daily Star staff
Tuesday, April 08, 2008
BEIRUT: The UN Special Tribunal for Lebanon will not need "years" before it begins trying suspects in the assassination of former Premier Rafik Hariri, said a senior official from the UN Office of Legal Affairs, which is establishing the tribunal. "Nobody is talking about years; nobody is talking about tomorrow" for a trial to begin, Radhia Achouri, senior communications adviser to UN Undersecretary for Legal Affairs Nicolas Michel, Monday told a group of journalists in Beirut. "Ultimately, there will be people who will be named" in indictments for Hariri's killing, she added. The UN Security Council formally created the tribunal last May 30 in Resolution 1757, after the dormant Lebanese Parliament never met to vote on the bilateral agreement between the UN and Lebanon to form the tribunal.
The tribunal has become another element dividing the country's polarized political camps, with many in the March 14 governing coalition having long blamed Syria for the assassination of Hariri and other anti-Syrian figures, while members of the March 8 opposition have voiced concerns that the tribunal could be wielded as a tool in the US-led isolation of Damascus. Syria has denied any involvement. Last Monday, Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem told ANB television Damascus had received and rejected "bargain offers" to terminate the tribunal in exchange for expediting a presidential election in Lebanon. Without mentioning Moallem, Achouri said the tribunal would not be put on hold or become fodder for political deals. "There will be no room for political bargaining," she said. "There will be no backtracking on it. The tribunal itself is a reality. They have put an end to any doubt that this track might be reversed. It is irreversible."
Although acknowledging the deep rifts in Lebanese society, Achouri said she thought a "large consensus" here wanted to unveil Hariri's killers, and she mentioned how the national dialogue in the spring in 2006 had expressed unanimous support for the tribunal. Speaker Nabih Berri told Michel Parliament's inability to function was not connected to the tribunal and he did not have any objections to the tribunal, Achouri said.
Achouri, however, did not say when the commission investigating Hariri's assassination and the other political violence would be ready to submit an indictment. The office of UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon is coordinating the work of the commission, headed by Canadian prosecutor Daniel Bellemare, with the establishment of the tribunal by the Office of Legal Affairs, she added.  Achouri said Michel and his department do not know anything more about the findings of the investigation than what the commission publishes in its regular reports. Bellemare will meet the Security Council on Tuesday in New York - in a public meeting and a private consultation session - and then hold a news conference on the report he released on March 28. Bellemare will later slide from his role as commission chief to become the tribunal's first prosecutor, although Ban will officially start the tribunal only after the investigation makes sufficient headway and the UN consults with the Lebanese government, Michel has repeatedly said. As for the nascent operations of the tribunal, the next major steps will be when tribunal registrar Robin Vincent takes office and the tribunal's judges meet to lay down rules of procedure and evidence, Achouri said.
Achouri said Vincent commencing work at the tribunal's headquarters in Holland's The Hague represented a significant milestone, as the British citizen will function as something like the tribunal's CEO. Vincent will take office before the summer, Achouri added, and will be responsible for all the tribunal's administrative matters, as well as sorting out which countries may be willing to imprison anyone convicted by the tribunal.
The UN has selected judges for the tribunal, but it will not announce their names until security can be assured for the individuals, Achouri said.
In addition, the tribunal's management committee will meet next month to ratify the budget for items such as renovation of the former Dutch intelligence building which will house the tribunal, she said. She added that the position of the management committee has spurred many questions about whether the body will exercise political influence and interfere in judicial matters, but the committee's "role will be only financial and administrative."
Aside from the UN, Lebanon and tribunal host the Netherlands, the management committee includes major donors to the tribunal such as the US, which doubled its donation from $7 million to $14 million on February 14, the third anniversary of Hariri's killing. Giving money to the tribunal does not "entitle" countries to political influence over the tribunal's work, Achouri added. Contributions for the tribunal have topped $60.3 million, enough to cover the tribunal's first years of operations, Michel said on March 28. The management committee exists to oversee the use of funds, while the model of a tribunal funded by voluntary contributions with a management committee reflects the international community's move away from "very expensive" international tribunals such as those for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda in the 1990s, said Marieke Wierda, head of the prosecutions program at the International Center for Transitional Justice.
Lebanon's tribunal, like that of Sierra Leone, follows a "push to economize" after the tribunals for Yugoslavia and Rwanda, which were paid for by part of the mandatory contributions each UN member state must annually make, she added. Aside from the financial aspect, Lebanon's tribunal differs in other ways from the models of the international courts for Yugoslavia and Rwanda, as well as the "hybrid" tribunal for Sierra Leone, Wierda said.
Lebanon's tribunal is based on the UN-Lebanon agreement, meaning the provisions of the UN Charter's Chapter VII - which requires all member states to cooperate - do not apply, she added. Although the structure of Lebanon's tribunal more closely resembles the Sierra Leone hybrid, it differs in that its headquarters are located outside Lebanon, while Sierra Leone was able to provide greater security than Lebanon can, Wierda said

Gadhafi is right to say Arab rulers are worthless - but so is he

By The Daily Star -Tuesday, April 08, 2008
Editorial
In the aftermath of the Arab League's 20th summit in Damascus late last month, a number of Arab commentators and editorialists have criticized the regional body's chronic failure to break away from its two-decade-long pattern of impotence and inaction. Much like the 19 aimless meetings that preceded this year's gathering, the Damascus summit was marked by poor attendance, even poorer progress on substantive issues, and an abundance of made-for-government-owned-media rhetoric. And as was the case with several previous summits, the highlight of last month's show - at least in terms of entertainment value - came in the form of Libyan leader Moammar Ghadafi's annual diatribe. Many of the criticisms that Gadhafi heaped on his fellow Arab leaders - that they lack unity, that they practice hypocrisy, that they never accomplish anything noteworthy and that they bow to the whims of Washington - resonated on the Arab street, where the idea that the league might one day achieve something worthwhile was long ago abandoned.
Many of Ghadafi's most scathing appraisals, however, can easily be directed right back at Gadhafi himself and the Libyan regime. Unless one counts comic relief as a contribution to the advancement of Arab causes, Gadhafi has done nothing to improve the lot of the more than 300 million Arabs who reside in this region. Sadly, he has done even less to better the lives of more than 6 million Libyans in his own country. After nearly 40 years with Gadhafi as its leader, Libya has become a firmly entrenched authoritarian state, where nepotism and economic stagnation are the laws of the land, where the most innocent forms of political expression are punishable by death and where even the most peaceful dissidents are routinely jailed or murdered.
One must ask, then, whether Gadhafi fancies himself immune to all of his own criticisms, or whether he intends to actually begin to practice what he preaches. Any number of the Arab world's problems could benefit from the active and energetic engagement of one of its leaders - including the territorial dispute between Iran and the United Arab Emirates, an issue that Gadhafi himself raised at the Arab summit in Damascus. Dealing with complicated issues such as these, however, would require that Gadhafi contribute something more substantive than entertaining quips. Regrettably, Ghadafi's failure to offer the Arab world anything other than an annual comedy routine has made him the epitome of the ineffectiveness that he so often criticizes.
It is precisely because large parts of the Arab world are such a mess and so many of its leaders are terminally inept that Gadhafi's cutting remarks tend to hit home with so many ordinary people around the region. Still, this part of the world has been plagued with the same problems for so long that Gadhafi's jokes are getting less and less funny each year

Here's how Iran is vulnerable: a view from Israel

By Yossi Sarid -Daily Star
Tuesday, April 08, 2008
In the previous decade, toward the end of the 20th century, it appeared for a moment as if the world had learned a lesson and was becoming a better place: No more war crimes and crimes against humanity without the criminals being brought to justice; no more cases of genocide and ethnic cleansing without the murderers paying a price for their deeds. But in the last few years we have become wiser; the shortcomings of the international community are increasingly obvious in Darfur, Tibet, Burma and other God-forsaken places. Perhaps instead of "shortcomings" we had best say: too many vested interests; too many profit and loss calculations.
The international community's weakness is revealed in all its shame when it comes to Iran and that country's nuclear option, which is slowly but surely taking shape. Iran's provocative policy is unusual in its severity: There are many conflicts and confrontations in the world, but no other country save Iran is threatening the destruction of another country.
It is doubtful whether there really is a military option - American, Israeli or combined - for destroying Iran's concealed, dispersed and well protected nuclear installations. But even if there were, the war in Iraq has effectively eliminated it. The American military's strength has been exhausted in Iraq and Afghanistan and the leading superpower has no force left to devote to a particularly dangerous third front. This is perhaps the greatest damage done by the Bush-Cheney adventure in Iraq, where after five years there is no end in sight. The United States may be stuck in Iraq for years to come, regardless of who the next president is. And Israel may end up as the main victim of that adventure, just as Saddam Hussein had hoped before he himself was eliminated.
The principal actors responsible for the weakness of the international community are Russia and China. But they are not alone. Were the nations of the world to really seek to stop Iran's nuclear program they could do so without firing a single cruise missile. But the global community is apparently not all that willing, insofar as stopping Iran comes at a high cost. For a period of time, oil prices may rise yet further beyond their current record levels. Even Western leaders might prefer to risk a bomb in the future rather than monstrously expensive oil in the present. Oil drives people crazy, particularly if they are world leaders. It was oil that caused the American president and vice president to launch the Iraq war and it is oil that now prevents them and their colleagues from removing the bomb from the stalls of the Persian market.
International sanctions are a very efficient tool for dealing with "crazy states" and "leper states," particularly when those states' leaders are only pretending to be crazy. Sanctions have already proven their efficacy in North Korea, Libya and Iraq itself - if only they had been given a chance; if only Bush had waited and allowed them to do their job before launching his holy war. Isn't it strange that thus far not a single truly painful and serious economic sanction has been leveled against Iran?
Here are some sample warning and punitive steps. Iran may be one of the largest producers of oil but it is a big consumer of refined petroleum products that it does not itself produce. One can only imagine what would happen in that country, which suffers from serious domestic problems, were it to be denied refinery products in one fell swoop. Iran is also a huge importer of car parts. Within a single month, traffic could be brought to a total halt throughout the country. Iranian officials and businessmen travel the world to negotiate, buy and sell; why not send them all home? Unrest would only increase at home, while President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his ayatollahs would lose their urge to act crazy.
The West fears Iranian retaliation. But Iran's capacity to react is limited if not negligible. What would it do? Stop exporting oil? Oil is its principal source of income, its sole source of support; without oil sales it cannot exist. What could the ayatollahs do? Splash around in a sea of oil? Drink it? More likely they would prefer to dispense with Ahmadinejad and his nuclear policy rather than lose their regime.
Conceivably even the sanctions might be superfluous were Iran to become convinced that the intention to impose them is serious. The threat alone might suffice for the uranium enrichment centrifuges to be taken out and dumped. But Iran has learned thus far from experience that the threats are empty; it knows the international community is a paper tiger that, once it smells oil and big business deals, loses its sense of direction and particularly its sense of responsibility.
The global community is hesitating and real sanctions are lagging, but it is still not too late. To all those who fear a spiraling rise in oil prices we say: A nuclear-armed Iran can in any case play with oil prices at will, raising and lowering them, but by that time it will be far more difficult to bring it down to earth. There is today no more serious threat to the earth than the marriage of extremist fundamentalism in the mosque with a bomb in the basement.
***Yossi Sarid was a member of Israel's Knesset, a minister of education and a minister of the environment. He is currently an author, a columnist at the Haaretz daily newspaper and a lecturer in national security at the Herzliya Interdisciplinary Center. This commentary first appeared at bitterlemons-international.org, an online newsletter publishing contending views of Middle Eastern and Islamic affairs

Lebanon's Economy Grows by Four Per Cent

Naharnet/Lebanon's economy grew by about four percent last year despite a long-running political crisis and increased sectarian tensions, Finance Minister Jihad Azour said on Monday. "The International Monetary Fund (IMF) will publish a report next week confirming that Lebanon saw a growth rate of close to four percent and an inflation rate of 4.4 percent in 2007," Azour told AFP. "The political situation weighed down the economy but could not bring it to a standstill," he said. In 2006, the Lebanese economy contracted by five percent and inflation shot up to 7.03 percent amid a devastating 34-day summer war with Israel.
"In 2007, we tried to remedy the effects of the war in 2006," Azour said. "In spite of the battles in Nahr al-Bared and the assassinations, we were able to improve our financial standing," he added, referring to an uprising by Islamist militants in a northern refugee camp and a series of killings of Lebanese opponents of neighboring Syria. The IMF report is also set to highlight a falling budget deficit and reduced levels of foreign debt, the minister added.
The costs of reconstruction after the 1975-91 civil war helped push Lebanon's public debt to a massive 41.3 billion dollars in May last year.
In January 2007, France hosted a conference of Lebanon's international creditors which offered a new package of assistance in return for pledges of reform, most of which have yet to be honored. "The government is still committed to reform but parliament's failure to meet has an impact on a large portion of the laws necessary for reform," Azour said. Parliament has not convened since November 2006 when six pro-Syrian ministers quit the cabinet.(AFP) Beirut, 07 Apr 08, 16:38

Israeli Minister Vows to Destroy Iran, Confront Hizbullah's Rockets

Naharnet/Israeli National Infrastructure Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer said Monday the Jewish state would respond to any Iranian attack by destroying that country, and accused Iran of provoking Israel by arming Lebanon's Hizbullah. "An Iranian attack against Israel would trigger a tough reaction that would lead to the destruction of the Iranian nation," Ben-Eliezer said in remarks of rare virulence. "Iranians are aware of our strength but continue to provoke us by arming their Syrian allies and Hizbullah," he said during a meeting at his ministry. Ben-Eliezer, a member of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's security cabinet, stressed however that the Iranians were unlikely to attack as "they understand the meaning of such an act." Last month, Defense Minister Ehud Barak told visiting U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney that "no option" would be ruled out in Israel's bid to stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. Israel, along with its ally the United States and other Western powers, accuses Iran of pursuing the development of a nuclear bomb under the guise of its civilian nuclear program -- a charge Tehran denies.
Israel considers Iran its top enemy following repeated calls by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for the Jewish state to be wiped off the map.
Ben-Eliezer also stressed that an ongoing five-day home front defense exercise was not meant to threaten Israel's neighbors, but stressed that "the scenarios considered in the exercise could be reality tomorrow." He said Israel could one day find itself in a situation in which hundreds of rockets rain down on Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. "Nowhere would be safe from Syrian and Hizbullah rockets," Ben-Eliezer said. The scenario for Monday's drill had Israel coming under simultaneous attack from Syria and the Lebanese Hizbullah militia in the north and from Palestinian militants in Gaza to the south. The exercise, which started on Sunday, comes amid media reports of heightened tensions along Israel's heavily guarded border with Syria and just days after Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Saniora put his armed forces on alert.(AFP-Naharnet) Beirut, 07 Apr 08, 16:27

Why A Terrorist Strategy?
written by: Barry Rubin, 07-Apr-08
http://www.worldsecuritynetwork.com/showArticle3.cfm?article_id=15700&topicID=34
Many years after September 11, despite more than 10,000 terrorist attacks by radical Islamist groups alone, there is still an amazing amount of confusion and falsehood over what should be a very simple point: What is terrorism all about?
The answer is politics and, to be specific, revolutionary politics. Most obviously, terrorism is a tactic used by political groups but, most importantly, it is a strategy. Defining who and what is "terrorist" should be neither a moral judgment nor a propaganda exercise. It is a simple use of political analysis.
There are many incomplete or misleading concepts of terrorism. Often, terrorism is conceived as evil and its perpetrators as irrational criminals. While, of course, terrorism is evil in moral terms the problem with this approach is that it feels no need to go further in understanding what is going on.
Partly as a reaction to that concept, terrorism is presented as a matter of opinion. In today's world, of course, repressing women, denying freedom, and murdering dissenters are often presented in democratic countries as a mere cultural choice, an aspect of local color. It should be remembered that when the Communist USSR made an alliance with Nazi Germany the Soviet foreign minister explained that fascism was merely a matter of taste.
Leaving all that aside, though, once the issue is defined in moral terms then it is being depoliticized. The media thinks of itself as neutral. Consequently, the English-language Western media often calls people who commit terrorist actions "militants" or "extremists." That may be a good thing since it indicates a radical and implies a violent orientation. But it only educates up to a point.
Here's what you need to know: There are arguably good reasons for having a terrorist strategy, not as a reaction to poverty or oppression but as a way to seize state power and transform societies.
Why does an ideology or movement decide that its best course is deliberately murdering the maximum number of civilians? The choice of terrorist strategy is a judgment particularly about one's goals, enemy, and constituency.
Only a despotic goal pursued by a totalitarian movement can sustain a terrorist strategy which, in turn, further reinforces an anti-democratic, intolerant orientation. A radical Islamist dictatorship in which the ruling elite's whim is rationalized as divine will is the shining hell that is the movement's utopian dream. This replaces the Marxist dictatorship of those claiming to embody the proletariat's needs with that of those pretending to interpret divine desires.
To be deserving of mass murder or even genocide, the enemy must be defined as simultaneously demonic and weak. Pure evil, so to justify its being massacred but also cowardly to explain why the revolutionaries will triumph. We have reached the point where many non-radical Muslims agree that criticizing radical Islamism is punishable by death.
Unfortunately, a large part of the West seems to be acting in a way that seems to embody the predicted weakness but that, too, is another story. More relevant here, though, is the fact that the terrorist strategist may make a tactical adjustment in the face of a tough opponent. The reason that Muslim Brotherhoods in Egypt and Jordan do not presently engage in terrorism has nothing to do with their worldview and everything to do with fear of repression. In contrast, Hamas and Hizballah--very parallel movements in every way--can go all-out because there is no government of their peers that is going to flatten them for doing so.
Especially important is the terrorist strategist's assessment of his constituents. He must believe that terrorism will be relatively popular among those he wants to win over. Terrorism appeals as a revolutionary strategy largely because the violence used against Israel, Iraq, Lebanon, and Western targets is largely cheered among Arabs. Only a minority are radical Islamists but a majority is pleased, at least at their work in nearby places. The fault lies with the fans in the stands rather than the victims in the arena.
This is the problem presented by terrorism and radical Islamism. Crazy people can be given therapy, misunderstandings can be cleared up with dialogue; honest grievances can be resolved by mutual concessions. With determined, ideologically clear, mass-based revolutionary movements you can only defeated them or surrender. Holding them off, that is preventing them from winning for a very long time until they are truly worn down, is another option. Refer here to the history of Communism.
Finally, a new twist is added, not for the folks at home but for the suckers out there. "The communists disdain to conceal their aims," wrote Karl Marx in 1848. Since then, the public relations' industry has flourished. Terrorist movements and supporters learned to feign innocence (and moderation), accusing their victims of being terrorists. With a lot of help from prestigious Western news organs they have turned the tables.
Arab leaders spoke in 1948 and 1967 of repeating the Mongol massacres and driving the Jews into the sea. This has not completely changed. Hizballah chief Hasan Nasrallah said recently, "The Zionist entity can be wiped out of existence." But there is no end of commentators around to explain that he doesn't really mean it seriously.
Instead, the sophisticated talk is of "collective punishment" and "excessive force." Even a young gentleman of the old school like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has many saying he was misquoted about seeking to wipe Israel off the map.
Consider this 1993 exchange between two founders of the U.S.-based, Hizballah-supporting Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR):
Omar Ahmad: "There is a difference between you saying, 'I want to restore the '48 land' and when you say 'I want to destroy Israel..."
Nihad Awad: "Yes, there are different but parallel types of address. There shouldn't be [a] contradiction. Address people according to their minds. When I speak with the American, I speak with someone who doesn't know anything. As for the Palestinian who has a martyr brother or something, I know how to address him, you see?"
Yes, I see. But I wish everyone else did, too.
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Barry Rubin is Director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center, Interdisciplinary Center university. His latest book, The Truth about Syria was published by Palgrave-Macmillan in May 2007. Prof. Rubin's columns can be read online at: http://www.gloriacenter.org/index.asp?pname=submenus/articles/index.asp.

Who will wake up the West?

written by: Colonel Gary H. Rice, 31-Mar-08
http://www.worldsecuritynetwork.com/showArticle3.cfm?article_id=15689&topicID=34
On September 12, 2001, for the first time in its history, the North Atlantic Council invoked NATO's cornerstone article, the "all for one" pledge to defend any member subject to aggression. The NATO nations were not prompted by nostalgia or brotherly love. They knew that at some point, al Qaeda would target them. And they knew that unless they supported America in its hour of need, the United States could hardly be expected to respond if and when another of its members needed the weight of American power. America's cause was shared by the Western alliance strategically, politically and morally. Six years later, however, NATO stands divided, unable to commit to a cohesive and comprehensive strategy to defeat the ongoing common threat and ready to risk failure of its proclaimed and singularly important mission in Afghanistan.
The uncivilized, unprovoked acts of terrorism committed by al Qaeda in New York City, Washington and Pennsylvania, and in the tourist spots of Bali, the London subway and in Madrid have shaken NATOs resolve. Last fall's Riga Summit signalled to al Qaeda that the Alliance that could stand together and win the fifty-year Cold War no longer has the stomach to fight, and win.
This inability collectively to confront the existential threat now facing all liberal democracies says that the time has come to begin thinking about a new global alliance. An Alliance comprising like-minded nations prepared to share the burden of defeating the relentless attacks of Islamo fascism, jihadism, and al Qaeda.
The 20th Century is characterized by unparalleled social upheaval, unprecedented health, scientific and technological advances as well as the emergence of mass communications and the movement towards a global economic order. It is also distinguished by its repeated and mutually ruinous internal conflicts and wars. It was an era that brought with it almost unequalled bloodshed and the wide scale displacement and slaughter of innocent civilian populations, the destruction of nation states, the fall of royal dynasties and the emergence of new national polities. Its closing decade saw a realignment of long standing global spheres of economic and military power and, with some major exceptions, the rejection and abandonment of unworkable and humanly oppressive ideologies and regimes.
During the 1930's and1940's, when the world's liberal democracies faced the grim prospect of either standing alone and being destroyed and enslaved by the expansionist, totalitarian regimes of Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy and Imperial Japan, or coming together to collectively confront and defeat them, they wisely chose to unite. More than any other act, it was likely this single commitment that ultimately allowed the allied nations, after six long years of war, to emerge triumphant in 1945.
The determination in the 1930's to act collectively to overcome the common threat was a replay of the same successful strategy adopted by the Western Allies in 1914 that led to the successful conclusion of the Great War in 1918. It should surprise no one, therefore, that the leaders of the West chose a similar strategy in 1949, when faced with the advance of global Communism. Although the resulting struggle to defeat Communism lasted for fifty long and sometimes perilous years, the wisdom of uniting to preserve western democracy for future generations was a policy that worked. Communism was rejected by the peoples of Eastern Europe and with the resulting collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989 freedoms again emerged in its former vassal states.
Nevertheless, these epochal decisions did not occur by chance. In the 1930's they were crystallized by two prescient national leaders gifted with the wisdom and the moral courage to take a personal stand against external forces and their own populations - forces that if left unchallenged, unchecked and ill informed would change the course of humankind. Who were these key leaders? How did they persuade the doubters that an enemy was at the gates? How did they rally the West?
In August 1941, almost two full years after the Nazi German invasion of Poland, and less than four months before Imperial Japan's attack on Pearl Harbour, British Prime Minister Churchill, and United States President Roosevelt, convened the Atlantic Conference and held secret meetings aboard the heavy cruiser USS Augusta and the battle cruiser HMS Prince of Wales in Newfoundland's Placentia Bay.
The outcome was the forging of the Anglo-American alliance that would ultimately lead to victory in the Second World War. Over the remarkably short span of only four days these two exceptionally gifted leaders and statesmen, and their accompanying politico-military staffs, devoted their energies to fashioning a grand strategy for the conduct of the war against the Axis Powers, the conduct of future military operations, rallying other liberal democracies to their cause, and the drafting of an "Atlantic Charter,"setting out the shared principles and policies on which Great Britain and the United States based their hopes for a better future for the world.
The wisdom of Atlantic Charter lay in its clarity and frankness in stating that neither the United Kingdom nor the United States had any aggrandizement, territorial or other aims; wanted no territorial changes that did not accord with the freely expressed wishes of the peoples concerned; respected the right of all peoples to choose the form of government under which they will live; wished to see sovereign rights and self government restored to those who had been forcibly deprived of them; to further the enjoyment by all States, great or small, victor or vanquished, of access, on equal terms, to the trade and to the raw materials of the world which are needed for their economic prosperity; their desire to bring about the fullest collaboration between all nations in the economic field with the object of securing, for all, improved labour standards, economic advancement and social security; and after the final destruction of the Nazi tyranny, their hope to see established a peace which will afford to all nations the means of dwelling in safety within their own boundaries, and which will afford assurance that all the men in all lands may live out their lives in freedom from fear and want; that such a peace should enable all men to traverse the high seas and oceans without hindrance; and their belief that all of the nations of the world, for realistic as well as spiritual reasons must come to the abandonment of the use of force.
The Atlantic Charter concluded with a statement of Churchill and Roosevelt's belief that no future peace can be maintained if land, sea or air armaments continue to be employed by nations which threaten, or may threaten, aggression outside of their frontiers; pending the establishment of a wider and permanent system of general security, that the disarmament of such nations is essential; and a resolve to aid and encourage all other practicable measure which will lighten for peace-loving peoples the crushing burden of armaments.
In short, the Atlantic Charter clearly identified the threat, presented a set of human values and a dream for the future that would resonate with peoples round the globe, and outlined the means of overcoming the common enemy.
Remarkably, by today's standards, within a scant five months, by January 1942, some twenty-six like-minded nations stood in support of the principles enunciated in the Atlantic Charter by Messrs Churchill and Roosevelt during their brief seaborne sojourn aboard ships in Placentia Bay. Counted among the nations acknowledging that the time had again come either to hang together or be hanged one at a time, was the United States, United Kingdom, Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, China, Australia, Belgium, Canada, India, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, and South Africa.
These nations, and the other fourteen signatories of this unprecedented declaration subscribed to the common program of purposes and principles embodied in the Atlantic Charter, voiced their conviction that complete victory over their enemies was essential to defend life, liberty, independence and religious freedom, and to preserve human rights and justice in their own lands as well as in other lands, and signalled to the rest of the world that they were engaged in a common struggle against savage and brutal forces seeking to subjugate the world.
Without reservation, each of the twenty-six national governments pledged to employ its full resources, military or economic, against the members of the Tripartite Pact (Germany, Italy, Japan) and its supporters, to cooperate with the other signatories, and not to make a separate armistice or peace with their enemies. By March 1945, nineteen other nations had also signed on to the declaration and agreed also to render material assistance and contributions in the struggle for victory.
The trans Atlantic alliance of two English-speaking nations, one a constitutional monarchy, the other a republic, which had begun with an unprecedented act of moral courage by their elected leaders in the face of seemingly hopeless odds, had grown from two states to forty-five. Very different from the situation in the year 2007 that finds members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the United Nations (UN) deeply divided and unable to acknowledge the common threat, let alone formulate, a common grand strategy to deal with the existential threat of Islamo-fascism and jihadism.
Between 2000 and 2007 some nations in the West have fought in two undeclared wars and many more regional skirmishes, yet the Islamo-fascist and jihadist threats remain as great as it was in 2001 when its aims became clear. Totalitarianism, this time wrapped in the religious disguise of Islam, is again on the march. Its goal is the same as the defeated Nazis and Communists regimes that preceded them. Under the cloak of Islam, the Islamo-fascist leadership seeks to impose its will on the liberal democracies of the West, subjugate its peoples, deny the enlightenment of western democracy, and turn back the clock to establish a pseudo religious state reminiscent of Islam's seventh century caliphate.
The Islamo-fascists' will to win remains unbroken and they have yet to flee the field. In short, today's threat remains essentially the same as it was on September 11, 2001, when America was first attacked on its own soil. So what must the West do if it is to avoid another century of war like the last one?
Following the 1941 declaration of The Atlantic Charter it took the Allied Nations who had signed on to it a further three years to develop the capability to strike the blows on the Eastern Front and against the Atlantic Wall that led to their final defeat. We are now ending the sixth year since 9/11 and the free nations of the West have yet to evolve a cohesive and coherent grand politico-military strategy to defeat the threat of Islamo-fascism.
Nothing perhaps exemplifies this dangerous situation better than the inexplicable behaviour of some of NATO's European member states. In the wake of the Islamist's bombing of Madrid's Atocha railway station, Spain - the same courageous nation that in modern times could overthrow the brutal dictatorship of Francisco Franco and reestablish democracy, and had fought incessantly for 800 years to defeat and expel its Moorish conquerors - decided it had enough, threw in the towel, and withdrew its troops from the fight in Iraq.
Similarly, Nations such as France and Germany, who owe their present day freedom and prosperity to the willingness of other nations to sacrifice their sons and daughters, and their nations' wealth, in World War Two to defeat and throw out their Nazi occupiers, see nothing wrong with placing 'caveats' on how they may employ their soldiery in Afghanistan, while other nations within the same alliance continue to pay the price in blood and treasure.
The defence of the West demands that when you will the ends - the political objectives that require the use of force - you must also will the military means. If you will the military means, you must also will the financial means. A nation, or an alliance, unclear about why it is fighting, or what victory means, is usually on the proverbial road to ruin. In a war where one side (the jihadists in the Middle East, for example) has huge numbers willing to die, while the other (the West - including NATO) has small numbers mainly unwilling to die, the result cannot be long in doubt. Those who have the will to win will prevail.
Is Canada at war? Is its closest allies, Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States at war? The answer appears unquestionable: Of course we are. Yet if this is true, then why have none of these nations ever made a formal declaration of war? Their leaders have repeatedly reminded their fellow citizens ,and the world at large, that their country stands firm in its resolve to prevail in what is popularly called the Global War on Terrorism (GWOT).
In this regard, perhaps none have been more consistent than our own Prime Minister, Stephen Harper. In his maiden speech at the United Nations in New York he emphasized the importance of Canada's mission to the GWOT. Immediately following last September's visit of Afghan President Hamid Karzai's and his appeal for Canada's continued military involvement in his war-torn country, Mr. Harper told a rally on Parliament Hill in support of our troops in Afghanistan:"We don't start fights, but we finish them."
And in a televised address to mark the five-year anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks he observed that: ". . . because of this war of terror, people around the world have come together to offer a better vision of the future for all humanity." And then he elaborated: "For this vision to take hold, the menace of terror must be confronted. And these horrors cannot be stopped unless some among us are willing to accept enormous sacrifice and risk to themselves." Has Prime Minister Mr. Harper begun to exhibit the prescience and moral courage of a Churchill or a Roosevelt? Has President Bush or Prime Minister Blair? Perhaps. But why then has neither Canada, nor any of its major partners, decided not to enact a formal declaration of war, even though it is taken for granted that all are now fighting one? Is it because Canada and its allies lack the political will?
Or are there perhaps other reasons? There was no hesitancy in 1939 and 1941 as to what had to be done when German Nazism, Italian Fascism and Japanese Imperialism presented the world's democracies with the choice of either confronting and destroying them, or looking the other way and awaiting their own inevitable defeat and subjugation.
Who among today's world leaders will wake up the peoples of the West? Who among them will come forth and display the same moral courage and wisdom that motivated Churchill and Roosevelt to become the architects of victory in World War Two? Who will be the architects of a Global Charter for the 21st Century? Who will fashion the essential but missing grand strategy that they will need to defeat the steadily gathering threat of Islamo-fascism and al Qaeda? Who will wake up the West?

Hizbollah turns to Iran for new weapons to wage war on Israel
Independent
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/fisk/hizbollah-turns-to-iran-for-new-weapons-to-wage-war-on-israel-805763.html
By Robert Fisk in Teir Dibba, south Lebanon
Tuesday, 8 April 2008
The Shia "martyrs" of this hill village are normally killed in the dangerous, stony landscape of southern Lebanon, in Israeli air raids or invasions or attacks from the sea. The Hizbollah duly honours them. But the body of the latest Shia fighter to be buried here – from the local Hashem family – was flown back to Lebanon last month from Iran.
He was hailed as a martyr in the village Husseiniya mosque but the Hizbollah would say no more. For when a Lebanese is killed in live firing exercises in the Islamic Republic, his death brings almost as many questions as mourners. Yet it is an open secret south of the Litani river that thousands of young men have been leaving their villages for military training in Iran. Up to 300 men are taken to Beirut en route to Tehran each month and the operation has been running since November of 2006; in all, as many as 4,500 Hizbollah members have been sent for three-month sessions of live-fire ammunition and rocket exercises to create a nucleus of Iranian-trained guerrillas for the "next" Israeli-Hizbollah war.
Whether this frightening conflict takes place will depend on President Bush's behaviour. If America – or its proxy, Israel – bombs Iran, the response is likely to be swift and will come from the deep underground bunkers that the Hizbollah has been building in the fields and beside the roadways east and south of Jezzine.
For months, Sayed Hassan Nasrallah, the Hizbollah leader, has been warning Israel that his organisation has a "surprise" new weapon in its armoury and there are few in Lebanon who do not suspect that this is a new Iranian-developed ground-to-air missile – rockets which may at last challenge Israel's air supremacy over Lebanon. For more than 30 years, Israel's fighter-bombers have had the skies to themselves, losing only two aircraft – one to a primitive Palestinian SAM-7 shoulder-fired missile, the other to Syrian anti-aircraft guns – during and after its 1982 invasion.
After its 1980-88 war with Iraq, Iran introduced a new generation of weapons, one of which – a development of a Chinese sea-to-sea missile – almost sank an Israeli corvette in the last Hizbollah-Israeli war in 2006.
Can the Hizbollah shoot Israeli jets out of the sky in the event of another conflict? It is a question much discussed within the 13,000-strong United Nations force in southern Lebanon – essentially a Nato-led army, which contains French, Spanish and Italian troops as well as Chinese, Indian and sundry other contingents – which would find itself sandwiched between the two antagonists.
There are no armed Hizbollah fighters in their area of operations – Nasrallah respects the UN resolution which placed the peacekeepers between the Israeli border and the Litani in 2006 – but the UN mission, along with its soldiers, will be gravely endangered in the event of another war.
If its aircraft could no longer bomb at will over Lebanon without fear of being destroyed, would Israel stage another costly land invasion – highly unlikely after the bloodying its troops took in 2006 – or use its own ground-to-ground missiles on Lebanon? For if the latter option were chosen, it would bring a whole new dimension to Lebanon's repeated wars. Long-range missiles have proved hopelessly inaccurate in Middle East conflicts and the Iran-Iraq war. But whatever political sins they still commit, the Lebanese – despite their current crisis – appear to have rejected any return to civil war. In such a war, no one could repeat the old lies about "pinpoint accuracy".
The government of Fouad Siniora may be trapped in its own "Green Zone" in central Beirut – it even refused to attend the Arab League summit in Damascus – and parliament is suspended after 17 vain sessions to elect a president. A series of prominent Lebanese MPs and journalists have been murdered or attacked since 2005 but Syrian troops have left and the Lebanese army still manages to keep a form of order on the streets. However, the Syrian intelligence presence has been maintained in Lebanon – and Syria is Iran's only ally in the Arab world. This does not mean that war is inevitable.
So the future of Lebanon remains – as it did in 2006 – in the hands of the United States and Iran. Just as the Israelis constantly warn of war, so the Hizbollah still promises revenge for the car-bomb murder of its former intelligence officer Imad Mougnieh in Damascus in February. Regularly, the Israelis warn that they will respond to attacks but that they will "choose the moment and the place and the means".
And sure enough – following the Hizbollah's pattern of using Israel's own words – Nasrallah said on 24 March that the Hizbollah would "choose the moment and the place and the means" to retaliate for Mougnieh's death.
And each month, the Hizballoh improves its new bunkers north of the Litani. Some now sprout aerials but they may be "dummies" for Israel's pilots to attack. Deep underground telephone land-lines have been laid to those which are visible and to those others which are beneath the surface. The Hizbollah learned a lot from the 2006 war. Then its secret bunkers were air-conditioned with beds and kitchens attached. But when Israeli troops discovered a handful of them, they also found copies of their own Israeli air force reconnaissance photographs, complete with Hebrew markings.
The Hizbollah had obviously bribed or blackmailed Israeli border guards for the pictures – from which they could tell at once which bunkers the Israelis had identified and which remained unknown to them.
Which is how, in 2006, its guerrillas sat safely through days of air bombardment in the latter, while allowing the Israelis to blitz the "known" fortresses to their hearts' content. Who knows if the Hizbollah has not since collected a new batch of photographs for the coming months?


Pope laments killing of Iraqi priest
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Benedict lamented on Sunday the killing of an Iraqi priest during a drive-by shooting in Baghdad, the latest attack on Iraq's Christian community.Adel Yousif of the Syrian Orthodox Church was killed on Saturday near his home in central Baghdad's Karrada district.
"(The Pope) prays that all people will follow the ways of peace in order to build a just and tolerant society in the beloved land of Iraq," the Vatican said in a telegram, signed by Secretary of State Tarcisio Bertone.
Last month, Iraq's Christians mourned a Chaldean Catholic archbishop, Paulos Faraj Rahho, who was kidnapped by gunmen and later found dead. It was not clear how Rahho, who was known to suffer from poor health, had died.

Peter A. Huff: With the murder of Archbishop Paulos Faraj Raho, Iraq's descent into hell appears near total
April 7, 2008
http://www.shreveporttimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080407/OPINION0106/804050324/1058/OPINION03
Recent news of the murder of Archbishop Paulos Faraj Raho confirms some of our worst fears about Iraq. After five years of war, occupation, and unrelenting civil strife, Iraq's descent into hell now appears near total. It may be irreversible.
The full toll of the war currently surpasses the grasp of even the most astute observer. Over time we may come to terms with its far-reaching social, economic, and political consequences. It will take decades to atone for the lost treasures of art and architecture that once served as precious links to the cradle of civilization. A lifetime will not be enough to mourn the more than 4,000 fallen American soldiers or grieve for the innocent civilian dead, now measured in the tens of thousands.
A unique casualty of the war has been the historic Christian community in Iraq. Christian beliefs and institutions have profoundly shaped cultural life in the Americas for 500 years. Iraqi Christianity dates back 2,000 years, to the age of the apostles. Christians in Iraq preserve the Aramaic language of Jesus in their ancient modes of worship. Christ's distinctively Asian worldview lives on in their Mesopotamian mores and sensibilities.
For centuries, the Christian minority in Iraq lived peaceably under Islamic rule. Medieval Baghdad witnessed some of the most brilliant examples of Muslim-Christian dialogue in global intellectual history. Christians regularly served in the Iraqi government before 2003.
Since the U.S. invasion, violence against Christian targets has become tragically routine. Insurgents have bombed churches, and terrorists have singled out clergy from Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant traditions for cruel attacks. Victims include Catholic priest Ragheed Ganni and Protestant minister Mundhir al-Dayr.
Archbishop Paulos Faraj Raho was abducted by unknown assailants on February 29, after presiding at a Stations of the Cross service in Mosul's Catholic Cathedral. His companions were killed immediately. For days, government leaders and church officials, including Pope Benedict XVI, appealed to the kidnappers for mercy and the international community for assistance.
Iraqi authorities discovered the body of Archbishop Raho in a Mosul street on March 13. He was buried the following day.
T. S. Eliot's classic "Murder in the Cathedral" tells the story of another churchman's confrontation with injustice: St. Thomas Becket, England's 12th-century Archbishop of Canterbury, killed at the altar by knights from the court of King Henry II. Written partly as a response to the rise of European fascism during the 1930s, the play uses King Henry's shocking assassination of Becket as a warning to viewers who may underestimate humanity's seemingly unlimited capacity for evil. In one scene, set in the winter of 1170, Archbishop Becket preaches a Christmas sermon on the uncommon topic of martyrdom. "On earth the Church mourns and rejoices at once," he says, "in a fashion that the world cannot understand." The final scene, after his brutal murder, concludes with the somber refrain of the Chorus: "Lord, have mercy upon us. Blessed Thomas, pray for us."
In war-torn Iraq, Archbishop Raho never had the chance to preach an eloquent homily on martyrdom. Nor was a dramatic Chorus on hand to place his murder in poetic perspective.
His church may share his fate.
Blessed Paulos, pray for us.
*Peter A. Huff holds the T. L. James chair in religious studies at Centenary College of Louisiana.

Iraqi Christians shaken anew by Orthodox priest's murder

http://www.cwnews.com/news/viewstory.cfm?recnum=57664
Baghdad, Apr. 7, 2008 (CWNews.com) - Iraqi Christians joined in mourning after a Syrian Orthodox priest was murdered in Baghdad on April 5.
Father Yusef Adel was shot and killed by unidentified gunmen in the Iraqi capital. The killing occurred than 3weeks after the death after Chaldean Catholic Archbishop Faraj Raho was found dead, after having been kidnapped from outside his cathedral in Mosul.
Syrian Orthodox Bishop Matti Shaba Matoka presided at the funeral for Father Adel, with Chaldean Catholic Patriarch Emmanuel III Delly and the apostolic nuncio, Archbishop Francis Chulikatt, representing the city's Catholic leadership. The AsiaNews service reported that the new killing caused "great fear" among Iraq's Christians, who have seen a drive by Islamic militants to drive the religious minority out of the country. The campaign of violence and intimidation against Christians has taken an enormous toll. The number of Christians living in Iraq today is estimated at under 500,000-- roughly half what it was before the start of the war in 2003. In a message of condolence to Syrian Orthodox leaders, Pope Benedict XVI (bio - news) promised his prayers, "that all people will follow the ways of peace in order to build a just and tolerant society in the beloved land of Iraq."

Iraq: Christians “keeping faith” despite shock of Archbishop’s death
Posted by Press Release on 4/4/2008, 5:11 pm
Board Administrator
ACN News: Friday, 4th April 2008 – IRAQ
A LEADING Iraqi prelate has told how Christians have reacted with a show of defiance following the tragic death of an archbishop – an event which shocked the world.
Despite the ever-present risk of kidnappings and bomb-blasts, Easter Mass-goers have packed churches across the country both on Sunday, 30th March and the weekend before. At least two Iraqi priests, until now studying in Europe, have decided to return to Baghdad in a move bound to boost the confidence of the country’s dwindling Christian community. Discussing the Christians’ defiance in an interview with Aid to the Church in Need, Bishop Andreas Abouna of Baghdad said the people’s determination gave new cause for hope. Speaking from Baghdad, the auxiliary to the Patriarch of Babylon (Baghdad) of the Chaldeans, said: “Our people are used to being part of a persecuted Church – it’s all we’ve ever known, almost from the beginning starting barely 400 years after Christ.
“They know it is their life to go through this.” Bishop Abouna was speaking three weeks after the death of Archbishop Paulos Faraj Rahho, of Mosul in northern Iraq. The archbishop, 65, was kidnapped on the steps of his cathedral in an attack which left his driver and two bodyguards dead.
Archbishop Rahho died about two weeks later, apparently of natural causes, and was buried in a shallow grave in Mosul.
Meantime, reports have come in showing how Christians in the nearby Nineveh plains have held peaceful demonstrations calling for the arrest of Archbishop Rahho’s kidnappers.
Acting on an Easter appeal by bishops in Nineveh, Christians have taken to the streets with pictures of Archbishop Rahho and other ‘martyrs’ walking through villages including Karamles, where the prelate’s funeral took place on Friday, 14th March.
Bishop Abouna said there was still no further information about the kidnappers’ identity or motive. He refused to rule out the possibility of them striking again.
The bishop went on to stress how Christians were determined to “keep faith”.
The bishop said: “Many of the churches were packed with people – although in Mosul, it is different because until now the situation has been unstable.”
He said: “We – both us bishops and priests – have told the people that they have to stand by for anything and that they have to defend their faith. We have asked them not to lose hope in Christ.
“Christians in Iraq do not like being a persecuted Church but if persecution comes, we are ready.”
He spoke of his delight at the imminent return to Baghdad of the two priests, who cannot be named for security reasons. “This is wonderful news – a real sign of hope,” he said.
The return of the priests, who have received funding from ACN, will help allay fears that Archbishop Rahho’s death would spark another mass exodus of Christians from Iraq. Before 2003, Christians in Iraq numbered up to 1.2 million but it is now thought that almost two-thirds have fled abroad, especially to Syria, Jordan and Turkey.
Editor’s Notes:
Directly under the Holy See, Aid to the Church in Need supports the faithful wherever they are persecuted, oppressed or in pastoral need. ACN is a Catholic charity – helping to bring Christ to the world through prayer, information and action.
Founded in 1947 by Fr Werenfried van Straaten, whom Pope John Paul II named “An Outstanding Apostle of Charity”, the organisation is now at work in about 145 countries throughout the world.
The charity undertakes thousands of projects every year including providing transport for clergy and lay Church workers, construction of church buildings, funding for priests and nuns and help to train seminarians. Since the initiative’s launch in 1979, 45 million Aid to the Church in Need Child’s Bibles have been distributed worldwide.
For more information, please contact the Sydney office of ACN on (02) 9679-1929. e-mail: info@aidtochurch.org or write to Aid to the Church in Need PO Box 6245 Blacktown DC NSW 2148. Web:www.aidtochurch.org

An advocate for Iraq's displaced Christians
Stephen J. Carrera / For The Times
Robert DeKelaita leaves immigration court in Chicago with Anaam Merza Khoshaba, an Iraqi Christian who was left in legal limbo after her husband divorced her.
Robert DeKelaita, a U.S. lawyer who is himself a Christian born in Iraq, is on a mission to help others gain U.S. asylum. He would rather see them return to a safe homeland.
By David Zucchino, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
April 4, 2008
SAN DIEGO -- The immigration lawyer and his client sat huddled at the defense bench in federal court, whispering in a foreign tongue.
Robert DeKelaita, born and baptized Christian in Iraq and raised in the U.S., is a solidly built man who dwarfed his slender client, a frightened young Iraqi named Yousif Ibrahim. DeKelaita murmured assurances in a modern version of Aramaic, the language spoken by Jesus.
Ibrahim, 23, a Christian, had been jailed as a "deportable/inadmissible alien" since he walked across the U.S.-Mexico border at San Ysidro in May. Except for a phony Polish passport and a copy of his baptismal certificate, he arrived with only the clothes on his back.
Ibrahim wore a blue prison smock and baggy trousers. A court officer removed his handcuffs, and Ibrahim absently rubbed red welts on his left wrist, just below a tattoo of Jesus Christ.
Minutes later, DeKelaita described how Ibrahim's father had been burned to death in his home by Muslim insurgents in Iraq in January 2007 -- because he was a Christian working for the U.N, and because another son had served in the U.S. armed forces.
"Your honor, he cannot go back to Iraq. . . . He has established credible fear" of persecution, DeKelaita told the immigration judge.
The judge set a new hearing, giving DeKelaita more time to prove his case. DeKelaita whispered again to Ibrahim in Aramaic, promising that he would be a free man soon.
Over the last decade, DeKelaita has obtained asylum for hundreds of Iraqi Christians threatened with deportation. He travels the U.S. to counsel distraught, uprooted men and women who have fled religious persecution in Iraq.
But each new grant of asylum leaves DeKelaita feeling conflicted; his efforts inadvertently contribute to the slow dissolution of the once-vibrant Christian community in Iraq.
"My heart is really wedded to the idea that they should be safe and secure in their own homeland in Iraq," DeKelaita, 45, said inside his law office in Skokie, Ill., near Chicago. "What I'm doing is temporary. That's how I justify it to myself -- that they will one day all go back home safely to their homeland."
Repressed under Saddam Hussein, Iraq's Christian population has been decimated since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. Muslim extremists have murdered priests and burned churches and Christian-owned shops and homes. Priests in Iraq estimate that fewer than 500,000 Christians remain, about a third of the number as before 2003.
On March 13, the body of the archbishop of Mosul, Paulos Faraj Rahho, was recovered, two weeks after he was kidnapped while leaving Mass. The slaying prompted Iraqi Christians to consider worshiping in secret; church services have also been attacked. Christian leaders say some Christians have been abducted and killed after refusing to convert to Islam.
"No group was happier than Christians when Saddam fell," DeKelaita said. "But no group is more disappointed with the way things played out."
Anguished over mistreatment of Iraqi Christian family members and strangers, DeKelaita long ago decided to dedicate his law practice to defending them. He is among a handful of immigration lawyers nationwide who specialize in representing Iraqi Christians, though he represents other clients.
"I know their pain; I feel it," he said of Iraqi Christians. "These are my people. I don't even have to ask them what they've been through."
Each Christian released from federal custody is a blessing, he said. But for the most part, "I deal in misery, unfortunately."
In August, DeKelaita got a 3 a.m. phone call from his mother in Chicago telling him that her brother had been kidnapped in Kirkuk, DeKelaita's city of birth. The kidnappers demanded a $120,000 ransom, DeKelaita said. After a series of phone calls and e-mails to Iraq, his uncle was released. DeKelaita declined to say whether any ransom was paid.
DeKelaita did say, however, that he sent money to hire bodyguards for his uncle. He worries about his aunt, an interpreter for the U.S. military, whose position is known to Muslim insurgents, he said.
Unlike Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds, Iraqi Christians have no militia to protect them. Many are clustered in villages in the Nineveh plains north of Mosul, where their ancestors lived before the Islamic conquest.
DeKelaita's own family left Iraq for the U.S. in 1973, when he was 11.Baptized in the Assyrian Church of the East,DeKelaita spoke virtually no English but quickly learned the language in public schools in Chicago. He earned a master's degree in international relations from the University of Chicago and a law degree from Loyola University. He is married to an Iraqi Christian; they have taught Aramaic to their sons, ages 10 and 17.
Even as he delivers speeches and writes articles seeking support for Christians in Iraq, DeKelaita presses ahead on dozens of asylum cases every month.
More than 235,000 Iraqi refugees, most in Syria and Jordan, are seeking resettlement, according to the United Nations. Just 2,631 Iraqis were admitted for resettlement in the U.S. last year. (A spokesman for the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services said the agency did not keep statistics on Iraqi Christians who had sought or received asylum.)
For 2008, the U.S. has set a goal of 12,000 Iraqi resettlements, with a focus on Iraqis who have worked for the U.S. in Iraq. So far this year, 819 Iraqis have been admitted.
In Chicago recently, DeKelaita counseled Wesim Hanino, a Christian who has been seeking asylum since mid-2005. Hanino has lived in Detroit on a visitor's visa since fleeing Iraq after family members were killed by Muslim gunmen, Hanino said.
Hanino's relatives in Detroit had accused DeKelaita for weeks of dragging his feet. They persuaded Hanino to take time off from his liquor store job and drive to Chicago to see him.
At the Chicago immigration office, DeKelaita told Hanino what he had told his relatives: His case file was still stuck in Detroit. Hanino was convinced DeKelaita could break the impasse, telling him, "Robert, your hand is blessed."
But even after DeKelaita and Hanino met with a sympathetic immigration supervisor, they were told Hanino would have to wait for his case file to be tracked down. Hanino left the office a beaten man. "I spent a thousand dollars to come to Chicago for nothing -- no answers," he said.
It was a common setback, DeKelaita said: "Clients think I can work magic -- that I can wave my hand and have the federal government do as I say. It's a long, difficult process. And when things don't go their way, they -- and 20 or 30 relatives -- blame me."
But most cases, after considerable time and expense, end well.
Anaam Merza Khoshaba, a thin Christian woman, sat wringing her hands in a courthouse hallway in Chicago just after DeKelaita finished with Hanino. DeKelaita negotiated her asylum petition with a judge and a government lawyer inside a closed courtroom.
Khoshaba, 31, had fled Iraq in 2001. She had been detained briefly by Hussein's intelligence agents and accused of helping Christian missionaries. While a refugee in Jordan, she married an Iraqi American Christian.
The marriage gave her entry into the U.S. But her husband divorced her in 2004, leaving her in legal limbo. She missed the deadline for filing for asylum, forcing DeKelaita to seek an exception. Khoshaba was consoled by an in-law, Manal Solaqa, an Iraqi American Christian. Solaqa assured her that everything would work out -- that DeKelaita would prevail.
A few minutes later, DeKelaita emerged from the courtroom and told Khoshaba she would be granted an exception. She could refile in May for permanent residence. DeKelaita had persuaded the judge and the government lawyer that she deserved a second chance because she was employed (at a bakery) and was law-abiding.
Khoshaba covered her face with her hands and wept. "I've been praying every day for this," she said.
"You're very lucky," DeKelaita told her.
Solaqa shook her head. "It's not luck -- it's Jesus," she said. "He answered our prayers."
Khoshaba wiped her eyes and grasped a small gold medallion of the Virgin Mary that dangled from a necklace. She brought it to her lips in a kiss of gratitude.
Ibrahim's case was more problematic, but also more typical of Iraqi Christian asylum applicants: He arrived penniless after spending his savings on smugglers and forged papers, then spent months in federal detention while DeKelaita tried to persuade judges to grant asylum.
In court documents, Ibrahim described an odyssey that took him to Jordan, Turkey, Greece, Germany, Costa Rica, Guatemala and Mexico in an effort to reach his sister in Illinois. He said he paid a smuggler $1,150 for a visa to Turkey, spent $2,500 on a phony French passport in Greece, and gave $3,500 to a Syrian in Germany for the fake Polish passport.
He made his way to the U.S.-Mexico border, he said, because other Iraqis told him that was the easiest way to enter the U.S. At the border post, he approached an immigration officer, admitted his Polish passport was phony, and requested asylum as an Iraqi Christian.
"I fear that returning to Iraq, I will be subject to torture or even killed due to my religious beliefs as an Assyrian Christian," he told the officer through a translator. "I have nothing to return to except fear of death at any moment."
In the San Diego courtroom months later, Ibrahim whispered to a reporter that there was one more reason to fear returning to Iraq: His brother now works as an interpreter for the U.S. military at the Guantanamo Bay prison.
"It puts me in direct danger," he said in Aramaic.
A government lawyer fought the asylum application. He said all Iraqis faced possible death or kidnapping, not just Christians. He pointed out that Ibrahim was unable to say when he was baptized. DeKelaita countered that Ibrahim was baptized as an infant. Christians, the lawyer said, are specifically targeted by Muslim extremists solely because of their faith.
In November, Ibrahim was granted asylum and released. He lives with his sister outside Chicago and is looking for work. He can apply for a green card, and permanent residency, in a year.
For DeKelaita, it was a bittersweet victory.
"I wish he could go back to his homeland," he said, "and prosper."
david.zucchino@latimes.com

Iran debate heats up as testimony day approaches »

IRAQ: An endangered Christian community
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/babylonbeyond/2008/04/iraq-iraqs-enda.html
For the second time since February, an Iraqi Christian leader has fallen victim to religiously motivated violence. Yousif Adil, a priest in Baghdad, was shot to death Saturday in the capital's Karrada district, which has become an enclave of sorts for the city's few remaining Christians.
Last month, the Chaldean Catholic archbishop of the northern city of Mosul, Paulos Faraj Rahho, was found dead after gunmen grabbed him Feb. 29 outside his church after he had finished celebrating a prayer service. Rahho was the highest-ranking Christian leader to be targeted by armed groups in Iraq since the U.S. invasion of March 2003.
As the Los Angeles Times reported in this story Friday, Iraq's Christian community has been decimated and is estimated to number fewer than a half-million now, compared with more than twice that before the war. As the story pointed out, unlike Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds, Christians have no militia to protect them. Churches have closed, and many Christians have fled the country.
Many persevere, though. Last Christmas, as Baghdad enjoyed a relative lull in violence, thousands of Christians crammed churches to celebrate Mass. Last November, Iraq got its first Roman Catholic cardinal when Cardinal Emmanuel III Delly was elevated to the position.
This may have come too late to prevent Christians such as the ones we reported on last summer in this story from fleeing. It certainly did not help Adil, who was to be buried Sunday.
The Associated Press quoted an assistant to Adil as saying he was 40 years old and had moved to Karrada after being forced out of southern Baghdad's Dora neighborhood, the district profiled in the above-noted story. Adil ran a religiously mixed school for Christian and Muslim children and was married but had no children, according to AP.
At least 12 other people were reported killed in violence in Baghdad and elsewhere Saturday, on what passed for an unusually calm day in the country. The victims included three people inside a bus in central Baghdad that hit a roadside bomb; a police brigadier general shot to death in eastern Baghdad, and four government workers employed to protect oil pipelines who were abducted and murdered near the Iraq-Iran border east of Baghdad.
— Times staff writers