LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN
April 11/08

Bible Reading of the day.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 6,44-51. No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draw him, and I will raise him on the last day. It is written in the prophets: 'They shall all be taught by God.' Everyone who listens to my Father and learns from him comes to me. Not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who is from God; he has seen the Father. Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your ancestors ate the manna in the desert, but they died;  this is the bread that comes down from heaven so that one may eat it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world."

Free Opinions, Releases, letters & Special Reports
The facts of the Syrian-Israeli flirtation-By Michael Young 10/04/08
Iran is playing all the strings on the Iraqi lyre.By David Ignatius 10/04/08
A Poor Critique of Syria-By: Hazem Saghieh 10/04/08
What's at Stake for the West in Lebanon?By: David Wurmser. 10/04/08

Latest News Reports From Miscellaneous Sources for April 10/08
Rice: No Deals with Assad on Tribunal-Naharnet
Siddiq Hiding in Europe-Naharnet
Jamil Sayyed: I Was Asked to Get Syrians to Find Someone to Confess-Naharnet
European Parliament: MPs Urging to Brand Hizbullah Terrorist Organization-Naharnet
Saniora Ends Arab Visit-Naharnet
Tueni: Agreement is Now Impossible Due to Syrian-Iranian Pressure on Opposition-Naharnet
Mubarak, Abdullah: Lebanon is Key to Improvement of Ties with Syria-Naharnet
Lebanon's next president appeases Hezbollah & Opposition-Ya Libnan
The facts of the Syrian-Israeli flirtation-By Michael Young 10/04/08
Iran is playing all the strings on the Iraqi lyre.By David Ignatius 10/04/08
King Abdullah visits Egypt for talks on Arab crises-Daily Star
Siniora hinges progress in Lebanon on new president-Daily Star
Murr says delaying election of head of state is unacceptable-Daily Star
France says Siddiq went missing a month ago-Daily Star
Riyadh accused of role in Mughniyeh assassination-Daily Star
UFL warns against settling Palestinians in Lebanon-Daily Star
Abu Zeinab: Political situation is stagnant-Daily Star
Bazzi says France backs Berri's call for talks-Daily Star
Aridi insists dialogue must be led by president-Daily Star
Spain joins efforts to boost development-Daily Star
Egypt, Saudis says ties with Syria depend on Lebanon-Reuters
SYRIA: Shocker from Iran about militant's death-Los Angeles Times
European Parliament torn over Lebanon crisis-Monsters and Critics.com
Report: Ex-US president Carter to meet with Hamas leader in Syria-Ha'aretz
Solidere denies plan to demolish synagogue-Daily Star
For many families, Nahr al-Bared crisis is still here and now-By Inter Press Service
UNDP to blitz media with heartwarming local tales-Daily Star
Television series deals with problems of the Arab House-Daily Star
Bojka Designs makes propaganda you can sit on-Daily Star
Lebanon's performance under the program supported by Emergency Post-Conflict Assistance-Daily Star
Mughniyeh Stands Across the Barbed Wire with Israel-Naharnet
Siddiq Left Paris Home on March 13-Naharnet
Syria Plans Emergency Drill amid Fears of War with Israel-Voice of America
Jumblat Snubs Russia Over Jailed Generals-Naharnet
Saniora: Arab Leaders Realize the Importance of Tackling Lebanese-Syrian Relations-Naharnet
'I Won't Ruin the Nation,' Outcries Independent Michel Murr-Naharnet
France Accused of Killing Siddiq, Report-Naharnet
Gemayel Meets Berri: Any Aimless Dialogue is Fruitless-Naharnet
UN troops step up patrols in southern Lebanon-ReliefWeb (press release)
Livni To Visit Qatar on Sunday-Naharnet
Bellemare Seeks Extended Mandate, Says Search for Justice Can't be Rushed-Naharnet
300 Hizbullah Members Fly to Iran Each Month for Military Training-Naharnet
Saudis Believed behind Mughniyeh's Murder, Report-Naharnet
Kouchner Hammers Hizbullah, Berri and Says Siddiq 'Disappeared'-Naharnet
U.S.: Iran, Syria Pursuing Lebanization strategy in Iraq-Naharnet
Jewish Group: Hizbullah May Get Additional Missiles from Swiss-Iran Gas Deal-Naharnet
Qabalan for Cooperation with Syria and Berri-Sponsored Dialogue-Naharnet
Saniora Discusses Lebanon Crisis With Saudi Monarch-Naharnet
Syria Boasts 'Cooperation' with Hariri Tribunal-Naharnet
HRW Says CIA Sent 14 Terror Suspects to Jordan, Amman Denies-Naharnet
Syrian Poet Sentenced to 4 Years for Publishing Article on Lebanon War-Naharnet
France For Reinforced Sanctions on Iran-Naharnet
 

'I Won't Ruin the Nation,' Outcries Independent Michel Murr
MP Michel Murr on Wednesday, declaring a stand to salvage Lebanon, called for the speedy election of Army Commander Gen. Michel Suleiman president, reiterating that he is not affiliated with any political faction.
Murr, addressing a packed press conference, said: "We've decided to pressure MPs into electing a president."
He urged legislators to "grab the chance available today because it might not recur." He warned that blocking presidential elections for more than six months "could become a precedent for future practices by any faction that might oppose the election of a head of state. "The first step to settling the crisis is the election of a president, after which all other issues could be tackled … in a month time," Murr noted. He declared support for a general elections law based on the concept of a county-constituency principle "with some amendments." Murr also outlined that "our stands are in line with stands adopted by Maronite Patriarch Nasrallah Sfeir and Maronite Bishops."He expressed "hope" that Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa would "succeed in his mission." "We would maintain our independence in politics. I've never been member of a party or bloc and I'll maintain my independence so that my decision-making won't be controlled by anybody," he said. "I'll listen only to my people and carry out their guidance."Addressing heads of municipalities in his power base of the Metin Province, Murr said: "I won't follow what others want and ruin the nation. I won't do that." Beirut, 09 Apr 08, 16:22

European Parliament: MPs Urging to Brand Hizbullah Terrorist Organization
Naharnet/The European Parliament stressed during a session devoted to discuss the Lebanon situation its full support for an Arab League initiative to end the ongoing political impasse that has crippled the country's institutions. The deputies of the Group of the Liberal Democratic Alliance in the European Parliament said during their meeting on Wednesday that the EU did not work sufficiently to find a solution to the situation in Lebanon. MP Jana Ken of the Liberal Group said the European Parliament did not "work well enough to thwart the influence of Hizbullah, an organization that contributes to the destruction of this country (Lebanon)." "It (Hizbullah) should be included in the list of terrorist (organizations)," Ken insisted. Ken stressed the need to "contain Hizbullah's influence and its activities in order to curb its power over the Islamic world. Beirut, 10 Apr 08, 12:44

Rice: No Deals with Assad on Tribunal
Naharnet/U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has ruled out any deal with Syria to keep President Bashar al-Assad's regime or family from being implicated in ex-Premier Rafik Hariri's Feb. 2005 murder. Senator Arlen Specter told Rice during a Senate committee's hearing Wednesday that Jordan's King Abdullah II recently told him that Assad was concerned about the international tribunal that will try suspects in Hariri's assassination.
Specter floated the idea of launching negotiations with Damascus to gain political progress in the region in exchange for reduced sentences in the case.
Abdullah "said that the item that is most on the mind of President Bashar Assad is the action of the international tribunal which could lead to his indictment and raised the possibility that that might be in the mix," he said. But Rice responded: "I don't think that it would be appropriate to suggest that we might be willing to limit the scope of this tribunal on the assassination of Rafik Hariri ... because it might somehow implicate either the regime or the Assad family." "I know that has been on their mind, but I think that would be a very bad step. I think it would be bad for Lebanon, and bad for international justice," she told the Senate Appropriations Committee. Rice recalled that the tribunal has not been formed yet and that Washington has to be careful not to politicize it.
"Our efforts have been not to focus the tribunal toward Syria, or about Syria, or about the Assad family, but rather to try and ensure the smooth .... working of the tribunal," she said. "I think that is the appropriate place for us to be. After all, the tribunal was created under a United Nations Security Council resolution and it needs to take place with integrity," Rice said. Specter said: "I am inclined to agree with you about that."(AFP-Naharnet) Beirut, 10 Apr 08, 02:39

Tueni: Agreement is Now Impossible Due to Syrian-Iranian Pressure on Opposition
Naharnet/Publisher of the leading An Nahar newspaper Ghassan Tueni accused Syria and Iran of exerting pressure on the Hizbullah-led opposition to prevent it from reaching agreement with the pro-government ruling majority. "A settlement to the Lebanon crisis should come into being" after negotiations among the various Lebanese sides, Tueni said in an interview with the Kuwaiti newspaper Al Rai. "But this understanding is now impossible due to Iranian and Syrian pressure (being exerted) on one side (opposition)," Tueni added. Labeling Syria a "side" in the Lebanon crisis, Tueni believed Kuwait can play a mediatory role in solving the crippling situation. "I hope Kuwait would urge Syria to help solve the crisis," he said. Tueni described as a "sin" the opposition's boycott of presidential elections in Lebanon.  He said the assassination of his son, Gebran Tueni, was a "security message" to Detlev Mehlis, former head of the international commission investigating the killing of ex-Premier Rafik Hariri. Tueni said foreign policy is not "charity organizations." "It is built on interests and it is only natural for super powers to have interests and struggle to achieve them and it is natural that this would affect on their behavior with other countries," Tueni explained. Beirut, 10 Apr 08, 08:23

Siddiq Hiding in Europe
A key Syrian witness in the probe into former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri's murder is hiding in an undisclosed location in Europe, a Kuwaiti newspaper quoted him as saying on Thursday. "I am living in a secret hideout, close to France and the international tribunal, and I am well," Mohammed Zuhair Siddiq told Al-Seyassah by telephone, after he left his Paris home and disappeared. Siddiq said he went into hiding to protect his life, adding that he sent several letters to the international tribunal and the Lebanese judiciary informing them that he had faced three assassination attempts. Siddiq, a former Syrian intelligence official, was detained in October 2005 in a Paris suburb in connection with the February 2005 assassination of Hariri. France refused to extradite him to Lebanon because it had not been given guarantees that he would not face the death penalty if convicted. Siddiq's family says it has had no contact with him for two months and his brother, in a Syrian newspaper interview published on Wednesday, accused France of involvement in killing him. Newspaper reports in 2006 quoted Siddiq as saying that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his then Lebanese counterpart Emile Lahoud ordered Hariri's killing in a massive Beirut car bombing.
(AFP) Beirut, 10 Apr 08, 10:36

Mubarak, Abdullah: Lebanon is Key to Improvement of Ties with Syria
Naharnet/Egypt and Saudi Arabia have said relations with Syria could improve if the Assad regime takes "concrete steps" to find a way out of Lebanon's ongoing political crisis. Cairo and Riyadh condition the improvement of ties with Damascus to "concrete steps" taken by Syria to resolve the deadlock in Lebanon, Egyptian presidential spokesman Suleiman Awad said Wednesday after President Hosni Mubarak and Saudi King Abdullah held talks in Sharm el Sheikh.
Arab League chief Amr Moussa also attended part of the meeting which dealt with the situation in Lebanon, Awad said.
Wednesday's talks came less than 24 hours after Premier Fouad Saniora, who is on an Arab tour to shore up support for an Arab foreign ministers' meeting on Lebanese-Syrian ties, held discussions with the Saudi king in Riyadh. Awad said that Mubarak and Abdullah considered the situation in Lebanon as the root of the current inter-Arab rift. Resolving the Lebanese crisis is "the key" to reduce tension in Arab-Arab relations, he stressed.
He said ties between the two regional heavyweights and Syria "are not at their best." Improvement in relations between Arab countries "is achieved through deeds not words…through concrete steps."He said Mubarak and Abdullah expressed grave concern over the situation in Lebanon, adding that the country "is plunging into a dark tunnel."Awad warned that all bickering Lebanese sides will pay a heavy price if the situation continues to deteriorate.
Beirut, 10 Apr 08, 05:36

Jamil Sayyed: I Was Asked to Get Syrians to Find Someone to Confess
Naharnet/A Lebanese general under arrest for his alleged involvement in the assassination of ex-Premier Rafik Hariri claimed in a letter that a U.N. investigator asked him to tell the Syrian government to find a Syrian to confess to the killing.
In a "memorandum" to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press, Gen. Jamil al-Sayyed said he and seven other Lebanese were arbitrarily arrested for political reasons and have been held for more than 2 1/2 years without being charged or confronted with any evidence.
Sayyed is one of four pro-Syrian Lebanese generals under arrest in the February 2005 bombing that killed Hariri and 22 others.
The U.N.'s new chief investigator into the assassination said he would not comment on the allegations. A previous investigator has said there were "indications" the generals were involved in the murder.
In the memorandum, Sayyed urged the U.N. chief to "defend justice and international norms by putting an end to this arbitrary and political detention as soon as possible." Otherwise, he said, the credibility of the U.N., the Security Council and the U.N. commission investigating Hariri's assassination "will be jeopardized."
The new chief investigator, Daniel Bellemare, briefed the U.N. Security Council Tuesday on the Hariri investigation and was asked by Russia about the continued detention of the four generals -- and later by journalists about Sayyed's allegations. The general sent copies of his memorandum to council members.
"I will not comment on allegations," Bellemare replied.
Sayyed claimed that three months prior to his arrest an investigator from the U.N. commission asked him to transmit a message to Syrian President Bashar Assad "which was meant to persuade him to present to the commission a Syrian victim of a certain caliber, who would confess to the crime and would eventually be found dead."
This would allow for an agreement with Syria similar to the one with Libya in the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Scotland in December 1988, he said.
A Libyan intelligence agent and a Libyan airline official were tried for the bombing and the intelligence agent was convicted, though a Scottish judicial commission said last June that new evidence indicates a miscarriage of justice may have occurred.
Sayyed said he told the U.N. investigator that he could not transmit such a message unless he was provided evidence "pointing in the direction of a Syrian involvement in the crime, otherwise the Syrians would consider that he is leading them to a trap."
The general said the investigator replied that the commission did not have such evidence and insisted that if he did not transmit the message for a Syrian to admit to the crime he would be blamed for the assassination.
Syria denies any involvement in the Hariri assassination, but the furor over the attack forced Syrian troops to withdraw from Lebanon after a 29-year presence.
Sayyed said the proposal to talk to Syria's Assad was made before and after his arrest on Aug. 30, 2005. "These facts are documented with evidence and proofs" which he said he gave the commission.
Bellemare said the generals' detention is the result of a decision by Lebanese judicial authorities, "pursuant to Lebanese criminal law." He said he has provided Lebanese authorities "with the evidence that we have" but he refused to disclose any of his discussions with the country's prosecutor general.
The U.N. commission's first chief investigator, German prosecutor Detlev Mehlis who is now a judge, defended the arrest of the four generals in an interview last month with the private Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation television as "legally and fully justified."
"Upon suggestions of my investigators, I recommended to the Lebanese authorities to put these four officers into provisional detention because we had strong indications that they were about to leave the country," Mehlis said. "We had indications that they were actively involved with the murder. So we felt to suggest to put them into provisional detention to have them available."
Yet, Mehlis said, "We always pointed out that until these persons were sentenced by a tribunal, they have to be considered as being innocent."
Sayyed claimed that Mehlis' successor as chief investigator, Belgian prosecutor Serge Brammertz who stepped down in December, reviewed the evidence for his arrest and determined it was "void." But the general said Brammertz was told by Lebanon's prosecutor general that "political considerations" prevented him from releasing Sayyed.  Calls for the release of the generals have come from Lebanon's pro-Syrian opposition as well as Shiite and Christian spiritual leaders. But members of the anti-Syrian majority have said they are guilty and deserve death.
The four generals -- Sayyed, the General Security chief and probably the most powerful Lebanese under Syrian dominance, police chief Ali Hajj, the army intelligence chief Raymond Azar, and the head of the Presidential Guard Brigade Mustafa Hamdan -- allegedly met to plot the killing of Hariri.
Their arrests, however, were based on testimony of a key witness -- Syrian Mohammed Zuheir Siddiq -- who was later found to be not credible and was accused of participation in the assassination. He was living in France and an arrest warrant was issued for him, but France refused to hand him over because of Lebanon's death penalty. French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said Tuesday that Siddiq had disappeared, and Bellemare told reporters, "I don't know where he is."(AP) Beirut, 10 Apr 08, 09:33

Saniora: Arab Leaders Realize the Importance of Tackling Lebanese-Syrian Relations
Naharnet/Premier Fouad Saniora said Wednesday only an elected president could shepherd dialogue among the various Lebanese factions, stressing that Arab leaders realize the importance of tackling the strained relations with Damascus. Saniora made the remarks to reporters after talks in Doha with the Emir of Qatar Sheik Hamad Bin Khalifa al-Thani. Asked to comment on the outcome of talks he has held with Arab leaders during his ongoing tour, Saniora said: "They support Lebanon and the importance of holding president elections." The leaders according to Saniora, also realize "the importance of discussing the Lebanese-Syrian relations." He did not elaborate on the remark. In answering a question as to whether his government would ask for a specific meeting by Arab Foreign ministers to tackle the Lebanese-Syrian relations issue, Saniora said: "We are still in consultations. Setting the schedule (for a meeting) would depend on the outcome of the consultations and the appropriate time." "Electing a president is the priority," Saniora added. Commenting on a possible move by Parliament Spaker Nabih Berri to sponsor national dialogue, Saniora said: "The president, in line with the constitution, presides over dialogue."Referring to Berri, without mentioning him by name, Saniora added "Someone cannot proclaim himself a ranking leader of the opposition and would want to shepherd dialogue."Following his talks in Qatar, Saniora left for Manama for talks with the King of Bahrain. Beirut, 09 Apr 08, 18:20

King Abdullah visits Egypt for talks on Arab crises
Compiled by Daily Star staff
Thursday, April 10, 2008
The Daily Star/Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak hosted Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdel-Aziz on Wednesday for a summit that was expected to focus on the power struggle in Lebanon, the war in Iraq, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, and the paltry state of inter-Arab relations. The two US-backed leaders - both of whom boycotted the recent Arab League summit in Damascus to protest Syria's alleged meddling in Lebanese politics - met in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.
Riyadh and Cairo have also adopted similar stances over Iraq, where they have resisted US demands to open embassies because of the poor security situation, and Palestine, where they have placed most of the blame for the Hamas-Fatah split on the former.
As The Daily Star went to press, no details of the meetings had been released by the participants or their spokespersons.- The Daily Star

Riyadh accused of role in Mughniyeh assassination
Iranian news agency says syria's delay in announcing results of probe is due to 'arab pressure'
Compiled by Daily Star staff
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Saudi Arabia is believed to be behind the assassination of top Hizbullah commander Imad Mughniyeh, Iran's semi-official Fars news agency said in a report carried on Wednesday.
The report, carried by the Italian news agency Aki, said Fars quoted unidentified sources as saying Syria's delay in announcing the results of the probe into Mughniyeh's killing "cannot be explained other than by pressure exerted by some Arab states."
Fars, which is close to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, said the Syrian commission of inquiry was supposed to have concluded its investigation and the results should have been made public before the Arab League summit in Damascus March 29-30.
"Pressure by Kuwait convinced the government in Damascus to postpone everything until after the meetings in Damascus," Fars said.
It said further delay was due to pressure from Saudi Arabia.
Fars, according to the sources, accused the Saudis of being behind the assassination.
"Through a Syrian woman, a Saudi secret service agent who works in Damascus acquired two cars that were used by Israeli secret service agents to kill the commander Hajj Imad Mughniyeh," Fars quoted one source as saying.
Fars said Syria arrested a high-ranking Saudi Embassy official in connection with Mughniyeh's murder.
It identified him as a defense official working at the Saudi Embassy in Damascus.
The Iranian news agency said the official had links with a Syrian woman to whom the two bomb-laden cars used in Mughniyeh's killing were registered.
Fars said Palestinian, Jordanian as well as Syrian citizens were involved in "organizing the attack" that killed Mughniyeh in Damascus on February 12.
They said the former Saudi ambassador to Washington, Bandar al-Sultan, ordered the killing of Mughniyeh and that Riyadh carried out the assassination to avenge the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing that targeted a US Air Force apartment complex, killing 19 US citizens and wounding 371.
A group calling itself Hizbullah al-Hijaz claimed responsibility for the attack.
Fars said Qatar and Kuwait were trying to mediate between Syria and Saudi Arabia so that findings in Mughniyeh's probe are not made public or as a minimum to not include any reference to Riyadh.
In other Hizbullah-related developments, British daily The Independent reported Wednesday that up to 300 Hizbullah members travel to Iran each month for military training.
It said the operation has been running since November of 2006 and that 4,500 Hizbullah 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 war on Lebanon.
"Whether this frightening conflict takes place will depend on [US] President [George W.] Bush's behavior," The Independent said. "If America - or its proxy, Israel - bombs Iran, the response is likely to be swift and will come from the deep underground bunkers that Hizbullah has been building in the fields and beside the roadways east and south of the [Southern Christian town of] Jezzine."
Meanwhile, US military chief in Iraq General David Petraeus and US Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker accused Iran, Syria and Hizbullah of fueling the recent fighting in Baghdad and of seeking to "Lebanonise" Iraq.
Crocker said the Islamic Republic and Syria were using the same strategy in Iraq "as they did to destabilize Lebanon in cooperation with Shiite factions using Iranian weapons," in reference to Hizbullah. "Tehran and Damascus are using the same partnership, but with switched roles, because in Iraq, unlike Lebanon, Iran has much more influence than Syria," he added. - Agencies

Lebanon's next president appeases Hezbollah & Opposition
Thursday, 10 April, 2008
Beirut - General Michel Suleiman said the crisis had caused the Army to be "dragged into a situation of daily attrition, like the Lebanese people, who have had enough of politics and politicians, not to mention the difficult social and economic situation confronting them".
Noting that he saw "nothing inconvenient" about adopting the electoral law of 1960, the general said the Lebanese should not be treated like "closed blocs, at the service of such and such a confessional leader... the citizens have the right to have several choices before them, especially in regard to great national options".
The general indicated that the Lebanese had "lost a historic occasion to benefit from several great events which have marked our contemporary history, beginning with the liberation [from Israeli occupation] in 2000, passing to the demonstrations of March 2005, then to our victory in the war of July 2006 and war against terrorism at the Nahr al-Bared camp.
"Another country which had seen these kinds of events would have known how to benefit from them in order to consolidate national unity. We however have been dragged into a surfeit of internal dissensions".
After ruling out "a new Israeli attack against Lebanon", General Sleiman affirmed that in the event of such aggression, "the Army will stand alongside the Resistance".
Considering that "the Lebanese should stand fast and be calm", the general concluded, in reply to a question about a possible "white coup d'etat", he said, "Lebanon is not a country of coups or revolutions, but a country of consensus and compromise on the basis of the consolidation of coexistence, of national unity, and of the safeguard of Arab and international friendships, particularly with Syria and the other Arab countries".
His comments were seen as an ultimatum to the bickering rival camps to settle their differences over the Presidency or face a deeper political crisis. There were also fears that in the event General Sleiman withdraws from the race, this would bury an Arab League initiative to settle the crisis.
The Arab plan calls for Sleiman's election, the formation of a national unity government and a new electoral law. Lebanon has been without a president since November, when Emile Lahoud stepped down with no successor elected. Although the two camps support Sleiman as the consensus candidate, they remain at loggerheads over power-sharing in the future government.
The crisis, the worst since the end of Lebanon's 1975-1990 war, has led to a dangerous power vacuum that has at times spilled into the streets. Seventeen sessions of Parliament to elect a successor to Lahoud have failed since November. A new session is scheduled for April 22.
Beyond the political impact of the general's statement, Sleiman's early departure would cause a vacancy in another top post traditionally assigned to a Christian. The matter is especially delicate as Hizballah's general secretary, Hassan Nasrallah, has said his party would demand guarantees about Sleiman's successor. On this basis, it is unlikely that it would look favorably on the prospect of Shawki al-Masri, the chief of staff, leading the Army on a temporary basis until a new commander-in-chief is appointed, since Masri is seen as being very close to MP Walid Jumblatt, a leading member of the majority coalition.
Retired General Elias Hanna, a military analyst, indicated that replacing Sleiman would be difficult and that his departure might cause the paralysis of the military establishment.
"In principle", Hanna said, "there is no vacuum on the level of the state. The defense minister can appoint as commander-in-chief the officer who comes immediately after Michel Sleiman in the hierarchy". The difficulty, he said, lays in the fact that not only is Masri linked with Jumblatt, but that he is also a member of the Druze community, while the office of commander-in-chief is traditionally held by a Maronite.
"The departure of the Army chief will paralyze the military establishment" if the efforts to replace him fail, according to Sami Salhab, a professor of law at the Lebanese University. "Who will give the orders and direct operations if fighting takes place".
For the March 14 alliance, however, "August 21 isn't an immediate problem. There's enough time to see what transpires. Many things could happen between now and then", according to one majority MP.
For General Michel Aoun, leader of the Free Patriotic Movement, affiliated with the opposition, the conditions laid down by the opposition did not concern the Army, but only the majority.
"It's General Sleiman's right to evaluate the situation", adding, "Let's wait and see how things develop". Even if Sleiman were to retire, he could still be a candidate for the Presidency, Aoun told the BBC.
Another leading opposition figure, former Minister Sleiman Franjieh, told the LBC channel, "If the majority agrees to vote in Parliament for the electoral law of 1960, the election of Michel Sleiman will take place during the same session".
Source: Monday Morning

France says Siddiq went missing a month ago
Compiled by Daily Star staff
Thursday, April 10, 2008
A key Syrian witness in the probe into the murder of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri who has gone missing disappeared a month ago, officials in France said Wednesday. "All we know is that he left his home on March 13," said a Foreign Ministry spokesman. The comment came a day after Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner announced that French authorities no longer knew the whereabouts of Mohammad Zuheir as-Siddiq, who had been living in the Paris suburb of Chatou. French police sources said Siddiq had not been under police surveillance, was not under house arrest and was able to come and go as he pleased. Siddiq's brother, in a Syrian newspaper interview published on Wednesday, accused France of having either killed the witness or helped others do so. "The French authorities helped facilitate the disappearance of Mohammad Zuheir al-Siddiq with the aim of his being liquidated by another party or they liquidated him themselves," Imad as-Sadiq told the Syrian daily Al-Watan.
"My brother was under the protection of French authorities," he told Al-Watan, which is close to the Syrian government. Siddiq, who lives in Damascus, accused "Lebanese parties," including Telecommunications Minister Marwan Hamadeh, of having plotted "with the French to kill [my] brother." "The assassins want the finger of blame to be pointed at Syria, on the basis that it was the only party to benefit from his disappearance."
Daniel Bellemare, the head of the UN panel probing the Hariri murder, said Tuesday that Siddiq "is not in our custody, has never asked to be entered in [our] witness protection program." Siddiq, who was wanted by an international arrest warrant requested by a Lebanese prosecutor, was detained in October 2005 in a Paris suburb in connection with the February 2005 assassination of Hariri.
France refused to extradite him to Lebanon because it was not given guarantees he would not be sentenced to death here if convicted of a crime.
Newspaper reports in 2006 quoted Siddiq as saying that Syrian President Bashar Assad and his then-Lebanese counterpart, Emile Lahoud, ordered the Hariri assassination in a massive car bombing. He subsequently withdrew the accusation. The political crisis that has rattled the country since the murder is widely seen as an extension of the regional confrontation pitting the United States and its Saudi ally against Iran and Syria.
Bellemare on Tuesday cautioned against expecting early indictments and urged the Security Council to give his team more time to complete its work.
"While the preparatory steps for the establishment of the special tribunal [that will try suspects in the case] are continuing, I would request this distinguished council to consider extending the mandate of this commission beyond" next June 15, Daniel Bellemare told the 15-member body.
South Africa's UN ambassador Dumisani Kumalo, the council chair this month, later told reporters that members generally welcomed Bellemare's request for a six-month extension as well as the progress made in the probe. In his first appearance before the council since he took office last January, the Canadian former prosecutor also disclosed that indictments in the case would not be filed immediately after the UN-backed tribunal is established.
He said the time gap ideally "should be as short as possible" but he insisted that "the admissible evidence will have to be carefully and objectively considered in light of the applicable prosecution threshold."
"No one can predict or dictate how long this process will take," Bellemare said, stressing that he wanted to "send the clear message that the search for justice cannot be rushed: it must follow its course." Bellemare also sought to clarify points made in a UN report released late last month indicating a "criminal network" of individuals acted together to carry out the Hariri slaying. "The direction of the investigation has not changed and the commission is still investigating crimes that are politically motivated," he said. "What is new this time is that we now have the evidence of the existence of such a network and of its links," he added.
Bellemare was meanwhile asked by Russian UN delegate Ilya Rogachev why four Lebanese former security chiefs have been in jail for almost three years in connection with the Hariri murder even though they have not been indicted.
The UN chief investigator replied that the decision to detain Jamil al-Sayyed, the former head of Lebanese state security, and three others had been made "by Lebanese judicial authorities according to Lebanese criminal law." "It is not for me to second-guess their decision," he said, adding that he had discussed the case with Lebanon's prosecutor general but could not give details due to the confidential nature of their exchanges. In a statement on Wednesday, Sayyed said he had sent a letter through Investigating Judge Saqr Saqr to Public Prosecutor Saeed Mirza, holding them both responsible for what he calls the ongoing "judicial mockery" of the case of Siddiq, the main witness in the case. "They also bear responsibility for any assassination attempt against Siddiq," Sayyed said. "Saqr and Mirza granted Siddiq the freedom to move between different countries, despite the fact that former head of the International Independent Investigation Committee Judge Detlev Mehlis considered him the main suspect in the Hariri assassination," Sayyed added. - The Daily Star, with AFP

Siniora hinges progress in Lebanon on new president
By Hussein Abdallah
Daily Star staff
Thursday, April 10, 2008
BEIRUT: Prime Minister Fouad Siniora said on Wednesday that his main concern was holding presidential elections in Lebanon in a bid to revive state institutions and "lead the Lebanese toward the future." In his continued effort to hold an Arab foreign ministers meeting to discuss the strained ties between Beirut and Damascus, Siniora met Qatari Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani before heading to Manama to meet Bahraini King Sheikh Hamad bin Issa al-Khalifa.
Speaking to reporters in Doha, Siniora said electing a new president as soon as possible was the key to solving Lebanon's protracted political crisis.
The premier reiterated that Lebanon's boycott of the recent Arab summit in Damascus aimed to send a message to all Arabs that the country was not in a state of normalcy. He added that the purpose of his Arab tour was to explain to different Arab leaders the prevailing situation in Lebanon.
"We are not living under normal circumstances. The country has been without a president for the past five months, Parliament has not met once in the past 17 months," he said. "This is why we boycotted the Arab summit," he added. "We want to highlight that there is a problem between two neighboring Arab states; Lebanon and Syria.""The strained ties between the two states must be addressed by the Arab community." Siniora said that he was in the process of preparing for an extraordinary Arab foreign ministers' meeting dedicated to addressing the Lebanese-Syrian problem. Asked if his Arab tour was aimed at distracting attention from Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri's call for national dialogue, Siniora said that his efforts were not in conflict with Berri's efforts.
"I appreciate what Berri is doing if that would help in ending the ongoing crisis," he said.
Asked if he was against the holding of a national dialogue between the bickering parties in Lebanon, the prime minister said that he had always been an advocate of dialogue, but wondered about the purpose of the proposed dialogue. "The question is: What are we to discuss in such dialogue?" Siniora asked.
"We already have a consensus candidate that we should elect as president and then move forward to forming a national-unity government and drafting a new electoral law in accordance with the Arab initiative," he added. The three-point initiative calls for the election of commander of Lebanese Armed Forces commander General Michel Suleiman as president, the formation of a national-unity government, and the drafting of a new electoral law for the 2009 parliamentary elections.
The feuding parties have already agreed on electing Suleiman, but the opposition insists on not carrying out the election in the absence of a package deal that touches on the issues of the next government and the electoral law.

The facts of the Syrian-Israeli flirtation
By Michael Young
Daily Star staff
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Amid rumors that the political furniture is being moved around in Damascus, perhaps the strangest thing is how Syria has organically lodged itself between Iran and Israel, states that are otherwise mortal foes. The Iranian connection is well known, but less understood are the dynamics of the Syrian-Israeli relationship, and where they might lead.
Rarely a day goes by without someone in the Israeli press advocating a revival of Syrian-Israeli negotiations. The arguments are familiar: Syria has a "secular regime," therefore is worthy of Israel's attention; now is Israel's best chance to "break Syria off from Iran"; Syria alone can control Hizbullah; and so on. That each of these arguments has been explicitly contradicted by Syrian actions or statements is generally ignored. The fetish of "talking" is too strong for anyone to punch through the myths.
And yet the rationale for Syrian-Israeli peace talks rests on a bed of myths. Syria's regime may be secular, but it has built long-term alliances mainly with Islamist regimes and groups, such as Iran, Hizbullah, and Hamas. When possible, as in the case of Fatah al-Islam, Syria has created or overseen militant Islamist groups, while Al-Qaeda operatives caught in Iraq will routinely describe their training and passage through Syria, usually via networks linked to the country's intelligence services. Given all this, the Assad regime's "secularism" seems irrelevant.
What about Syria's purported willingness to break off from Iran? Syrian officials have repeatedly affirmed that Iran is more than an ally; it is a strategic partner. However, optimists on Syrian-Israeli negotiations write this off as a Syrian bargaining step, a case of upping the ante before an eventual divorce from Tehran. In fact nothing suggests Syria is lying. Assad is wagering heavily that Iran will emerge as the regional superpower, which is precisely why he has been so willing to risk his Arab relationships lately in Tehran's favor. Logic, too, indicates a Syrian-Iranian split is not in the cards. Its close ties with Iran are what make Syria sought-after. If those ties disappear, Syria's sway would markedly decline.
Which brings us to the third issue: control over Hizbullah. A sudden downgrading of the Syrian-Iranian relationship would indeed leave Damascus with little regional sway, except if one thing happens: Syria returns its soldiers to Lebanon, taking the clock back to where it was before 2005. Israel would have no problems with this, and was never enthusiastic about the so-called Cedar Revolution. The only thing is, the Israelis forget that Hizbullah built up its vast weapons arsenal under Syria's approving eye. Far from imposing its writ on Hizbullah in order to eventually disarm the group, Syria has every incentive to keep the Hizbullah threat alive as leverage so that it remains indispensible.
That leads us to an obvious but seldom considered truth. Syria will not engage in serious negotiations with Israel unless it first manages to reimpose its hegemony in Lebanon. Without Lebanon in hand, Damascus has no real cards to play when haggling with the Israeli government, which has already demanded as a precondition for peace talks that Syria end its affiliation with Iran, Hamas and Hizbullah. And without cards to play, how could Bashar Assad conceivably get what he actually wants out of negotiations, which is only what his father was on the verge of getting in 2000: a return to Syria of the entire area of the Golan Heights, as well as international recognition of Syria's long-term domination of Lebanon?
So what we are bound to see in the coming months, and probably beyond, is the foreplay of Syrian-Israeli contacts, without the real thing. Indirect exchanges are already taking place through the Turkish authorities. Other channels have been mentioned in the media. A recent report in Kuwait's daily Al-Jarida, citing sources in Jerusalem, went so far as to announce that Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni would visit Qatar on April 14 to "complete" secret talks with Syria. If that odd story is somehow true, the fact that it found its way into a newspaper could be an effort to torpedo the initiative. But such acts seem unnecessary. Israel has no impetus to give up the Golan without assurances that Syria will make major concessions in return; and the Syrians will not make major concessions before Israel assures them that it will hand back all of the Golan and look the other way on, even assist, a Syrian restoration in Lebanon.
One item receiving publicity last year was news of the unofficial channel the Syrian and Israeli governments allowed between a former Israeli Foreign Ministry official, Alon Liel, and a Syrian-American businessman, Ibrahim Suleiman. It lasted from September 2004 to July 2006, and a main objective of the Syrian regime was to use those contacts to start a dialogue with the United States. That endeavor failed, but Liel has tirelessly sought to revive the relationship, even visiting Washington a few months ago to lobby American officials. He apparently came away empty-handed, because the Bush administration refuses to approve of a Syrian-Israeli track that, it knows, would make it considerably more difficult to contain Syria and check its efforts to undermine Lebanese sovereignty.
During his Washington trip, Liel had some captivating things to say about his discussions with the Syrians. For example, those Lebanese who get so lathered about the settlement of Palestinians in their country might consider what he said at the Middle East Institute on the issue: "Part of our talks with the Syrians included the [400,000] Palestinian refugees in Syria and they indicated [a] willingness to consider nationalizing them. This will then ... likely make it easier to promote the same in Lebanon."
Israel is unlikely to soon surrender anything serious to the Syrian regime, and the contrary is equally true. But the Israelis do prefer Assad to the unknown, which has bought the Syrian leader a good deal of breathing space in the face of Arab and American animosity. You have to wonder how long that can last. Once a new administration takes office in the United States, it may soon find that the situation in Iraq, relations with Iran, and Israel's negotiations with the Palestinians allow little room for maneuver. Syria may materialize as the one place where the Americans can effect a fundamental shift in the balance of power in the Middle East. Could Assad's Israeli friends remain as complaisant in that context?
**Michael Young is opinion editor of THE DAILY STAR.


Tour of duty
NOW Lebanon Staff , April 9, 2008
If Speaker Nabih Berri was sincere about national dialogue, sincere about finding a solution to the presidential crisis, he would fulfill his duty to convene the legislature. But Berri knows, of course, that such a move would marginalize him even further within the Hezbollah-led opposition. He also knows that, should all parties actually attend such a constitutionally-mandated dialogue session, the MPs present would be legally able to – God forbid – elect a new president at the same time.
As an opposition leader, both of the above are perfectly understandable reasons for Berri to continue obstructing the institution he was elected to convene. But they should also dash any lingering notions that Berri is qualified to impartially lead a national dialogue, regardless of where it is held.
Berri's calls for dialogue are empty. Several of his own allies have even spoken out against the idea, and the majority of his opponents are against it. Rather, the proposal is aimed at concurrently relieving pressure on Syria – particularly after last month’s disastrous Arab Summit in Damascus – and bringing Syria back into the discussion on Lebanon, while also bolstering Berri's domestic standing. Once the opposition's "negotiator," Berri's role has been overshadowed by Hezbollah-favorite Michel Aoun in recent months, and the speaker is keen to reassert himself as a major player.
It is worth noting that, so far, the tour undertaken by Berri to rally external support for his initiative has included only Syria. Berri has spoken of his desire to visit various other capitals, including Riyadh and Paris, but nothing has been confirmed, and his potential hosts have shown little enthusiasm. While some regional states are likely to receive Berri in the end for the sake of appearances, the reception will be decidedly lukewarm – in stark contrast to Prime Minister Fouad Siniora's, thus far, highly-successful regional tour. As Berri waits for invitations to follow up on what was, essentially, little more than a photo-op with Bashar al-Assad, Siniora has zipped from capital to capital, building support for an Arab foreign ministers summit to discuss the situation in Lebanon.
Ideally, the Lebanese crisis should be resolved internally, through dialogue at the parliament. What is the point of even having institutions if they are not respected? But given the apparent impossibility of convening the warring factions at the Place de l'Etoile, it is Siniora's tack that holds the most promise. As long as Syria and Iran continue to actively obstruct a solution through their Lebanese allies, like Berri, any domestic roundtable can be little more than a farce.
Once again, the Lebanese political situation is reflecting broader regional and international divisions – and vice-versa. Unfortunately, it is unlikely that one can be solved without the other. But we must not be distracted by Berri's disingenuous call for dialogue, one that appears to put Syria's interests ahead of Lebanon's. After all, if it were domestic, even-handed discussions that Berri were seeking, he'd simply unlock parliament's doors.

Iran is playing all the strings on the Iraqi lyre
By David Ignatius
Daily Star staff
Thursday, April 10, 2008
The language that General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker used Tuesday to describe the Iranian role in Iraq was extreme - and telling. They spoke of Tehran's "nefarious activities," its "malign influence" and how it posed "the greatest long-term threat to the viability" of the Baghdad government.
Iran was the heart of the matter during Senate testimony on the war. With Al-Qaeda on the run in Iraq, the Iranian threat has become the rationale for the mission, and also the explanation for our shortcomings. The Iranians are the reason we're bogged down in Iraq, and also the reason we can't pull out our troops. The mullahs in Tehran loom over the Iraq battlefield like a giant "Catch-22."
The order of battle in Iraq isn't likely to change significantly for the rest of the year. That was Petraeus' implicit message when he was asked about additional troop withdrawals after July, when American forces are to return to their pre-surge levels. He spoke opaquely about a 45-day period of "consolidation and evaluation," followed by an additional, open-ended period of "assessment." The translation was that he wants to keep the most robust possible force there, to prevent security from deteriorating on his watch. That's understandable for a commander, but it means the question of future troop strength will land squarely on the shoulders of the next president.
And inescapably, the issue of containing Iran will fall to the next American president, too. Can a new administration draw the malign adversary that Petraeus and Crocker described into a new security architecture for the region? Can America reduce its forces in Iraq, without creating a dangerous vacuum to be filled by Iranian Revolutionary Guards and Shiite militias?
Who will bell the Iranian cat? That was the question lurking behind Tuesday's testimony. US officials, even the most sophisticated ones such as Petraeus and Crocker, sometimes speak as if Iranian mischief in Iraq is a recent development. "The hand of Iran was very clear in recent weeks," said Petraeus at one point. But it has a long history.
Iran's covert campaign to reshape Iraq has been clear since the US invasion in March 2003. Iranian intelligence officers prepared lists of Iraqis for assassination in the weeks and months after the war; they sent Iranian-trained mullahs to take over the Shiite mosques of central and southern Iraq that had been smashed by Saddam Hussein; they pumped an estimated $12 million a week in covert financial support into their allies as the January 2005 election approached; they infiltrated all the major Shiite political parties, and many of the Sunni ones, too.
The Iranians have fixed the political game. They are on all sides at once. They have links to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and his Daawa Party; they funnel money to the Badr organization of Shiite cleric Abdel-Aziz al-Hakim, which is a key recruiting ground for the Iraqi Army; they provide weapons, training and command and control for the most extreme factions of the Mehdi Army. Moqtada al-Sadr, the Mehdi Army's nominal leader, is actually living in the Iranian holy city of Qom, suffering from what intelligence sources believe may be clinical depression. A useful ploy would be to invite him to come home, and see if he can be drawn into negotiations. The Iranians were able to start the recent trouble in Basra and Baghdad through one set of operatives, then negotiate a cease-fire through another. In short, they play the Iraqi lyre on all its strings.
Fighting a war against Iran is a bad idea. But fighting a proxy war against them in Iraq, where many key American allies are manipulated by Iranian networks of influence, may be even worse. The best argument for keeping American troops in Iraq is that it increases our leverage against Iran; but paradoxically, that's also a good argument for reducing US troops to a level that's politically and militarily sustainable. It could give America greater freedom of maneuver in the tests with Iran that are ahead. Somehow, the next president will have to fuse US military and diplomatic power to both engage Iran and set limits on its activities. A US-Iranian dialogue is a necessary condition for future stability in the Middle East. But the wrong deal, negotiated by a weak America with a cocky Iran that thinks it's on a roll, would be a disaster. Crocker has it right when he says, "Almost everything about Iraq is hard." That's especially true of the Iran problem. Petraeus and Crocker were taking the hard questions Tuesday, but soon enough it will be one of the presidential candidates who were dispensing sound bites Tuesday: John McCain, Barack ObamaClinton-and-Obama-Economic-Plans Mar-08 or Hillary Clinton.
**Syndicated columnist David Ignatius is published regularly by THE DAILY STAR.

A Poor Critique of Syria
Hazem Saghieh
Al-Hayat - 09/04/08//
Among the Lebanese critics of Syrian politics, there is a stupid and poor school whose teachings accuse Damascus of trying to reach peace with Israel, warn of Syria's continuous efforts to accomplish such peace, or hint at the treachery behind such efforts. In this respect, they believe they have caught Syria in the act as a result of Olmert's peace offers to Assad in association with the recent and current military maneuvers.
No matter how shocking this claim may be, no matter how much denial it may incite, Lebanon's problem with the Syrian regime - and in some sense with Syria - is that it is out of the question for Damascus to reach peace with Israel. To avoid any possible misunderstanding, we have to assert that this is not due to any alleged 'nationalist' stance or to any struggle-imbued trifle of the type that generally abounds in the discourse of the defiant camp. The Syrian regime is too clever to believe its rhetoric about struggle, defiance, and resistance. The Syrian regime is entrusted with the art of composing, while the defiant camp sticks to publishing and promoting.
The rejection of peace and settlement, on the other hand, puts the structural nature of the Syrian regime and perhaps society on the line. What good is it, as the famous Christian advice goes, to win the world and lose yourself? The path to a final peace demands confronting the reality and facts of Syria as they are without ornamentation. Consequently, it is more appropriate to say that those seeking peace should unite their efforts to oblige Syria to take back the occupied Golan Heights.
Lebanon, meanwhile, cannot enjoy stability or progress before this conflict comes to an end. From moral and political perspectives, it is better if this conflict is resolved by ensuring that each side is given its rights back. On the other hand, ending this conflict at any cost may be less expensive for all sides than letting it linger in the hope of getting the rights back. Lebanon, however, pays the price of the conflict because Syria has an interest in letting it continue. Ever since Egypt's exit from the conflict, Syria has been achieving its goals through arrogance and by flowing against nature, up to its recent Arab-crossing alliance with Tehran.
It is exactly in this point that the deep meaning of Harirism lies: How does the region head toward a solution that protects Lebanon and secures its prosperity, and how can this be impossible if Syria were not the gate to such a solution? Harirism, consequently, is about learning lessons from the May 17 experience, not by denying it, but rather by offering it double reinforcement: by Arabizing and expanding its scope on the one hand, and by the economy on the other hand. Hence, Lebanon's enticement of Syria works in a manner similar to Hong Kong's enticement of China. It is in this context that Harirism falls the victim to stumbling peace in the region, specifically the Syrian-Israeli peace.
Of course one may say: the rapprochement between the two neighboring countries can only take place at Lebanon's expense with many bitter years from the past to support this claim, which by the way, is a true assessment. Peace, however, is neither détente nor an understanding, but rather a prelude to building a regional system centered around nation-states and their sovereignties as a final and secure parameter through which progress can be achieved to eventually resolve the remaining problems of the Middle East.
If all this is done, and if Syria initiated the extremely difficult transformation into a civil and democratic society, both Lebanon and the Syrian society will be reaping benefits. This will be, at least in theory, a strategic and historical accomplishment that should not be impeded by tribal sensitivities, nor should it be weakened with the remnants of sick 'nationalist' discourse, such as saying that we will neither make peace with the enemy nor turn our backs to Arabism, the same Arabism that now expresses its apologies for torturing us, while in return we endlessly apologize for torturing it


France Accused of Killing Siddiq, Report
The brother of a Syrian witness in the probe on former Lebanese premier Rafik Hariri's murder accused France of involvement in killing the man, in a Syrian newspaper interview published on Wednesday. "The French authorities helped facilitate the disappearance of Mohammed Zuhair al-Siddiq with the aim of his being liquidated by another party or they liquidated him themselves," charged Imad al-Siddiq. "My brother was under the protection of French authorities," he told Al-Watan newspaper, which is close to the Syrian government. Siddiq, who lives in Damascus, accused "Lebanese parties," including Telecommunications Minister Marwan Hamadeh, of having plotted "with the French to kill (my) brother." "The assassins want the finger of blame to be pointed at Syria, on the basis that it was the only party to benefit from his disappearance."French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said on Tuesday that the witness, a former intelligence officer, had disappeared from his suburban home in the French capital. "But I do not know under what conditions and if there was a police presence to watch him," he said.
Siddiq, who was under an international arrest warrant requested by a Lebanese prosecutor, was detained in October 2005 in a Paris suburb in connection with the February 2005 assassination of Hariri. France refused to extradite him to Lebanon because it had not been given guarantees that he would not be liable to the death penalty here if convicted of a crime. Siddiq's family says it has had no contact with him for two months. Newspaper reports in 2006 quoted him as saying that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his then Lebanese counterpart, Emile Lahoud, ordered the Hariri assassination in a massive Beirut car bombing.
A political crisis that has rattled the country since the murder is widely seen as an extension of the regional confrontation pitting the United States and its Saudi ally against Iran and Syria.(AFP) Beirut, 09 Apr 08, 14:11

Gemayel Meets Berri: Any Aimless Dialogue is Fruitless
Former President Amin Gemayel on Wednesday discussed with Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri the ongoing political crisis in Lebanon. "Priority is to elect a President," Gemayel told reporters after the one-hour meeting at Berri's mansion in Beirut's Ain al-Tineh neighborhood. "Any aimless dialogue that lacks clear mechanism is fruitless," Gemayel said. Beirut, 09 Apr 08, 13:43

UN troops step up patrols in southern Lebanon
BEIRUT, Apr 9, 2008 (Xinhua via COMTEX) -- United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) troops maintained their increased patrol rate across southern Lebanon as Israel launched a five-day military drill near the border areas, The Daily Star reported on Wednesday.
The UNIFIL intensified their patrols in the South, hoping to alleviate fear of another war with Israel, said the report.
UNIFIL also stepped up coordination with the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) in the form of joint patrols covering the Wazzani, Khiam and Kfarkila areas leading up to the Blue Line near the Shebaa Farms, the report added.
Meanwhile, local daily As Safir reported on Tuesday that Lebanon's telephone network has been jammed by Israel following the drill.
The daily quoted security sources as saying that the move, which targeted both cell and regular phone lines, began on Monday afternoon.
A five-day nationwide exercise simulating air and missile attacks on cities, including by unconventional weapons, began on Sunday, the Israeli military said, adding that it is the biggest drill of its kind ever carried out in the Jewish state.
Lebanon's Shiite group Hezbollah kidnapped two Israeli soldiers and killed several others during a cross-border raid in July 2006, triggering a 34-day-long conflict with Israel. The fighting came to an end on Aug. 14 of the year 2006 when a UN-brokered ceasefire went into effect. Israel failed to retrieve the two soldiers.

Livni To Visit Qatar on Sunday
Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni will fly to the Gulf Arab state of Qatar at the weekend to attend the Doha Forum on Democracy, Development and Free Trade, a top Israeli official said on Tuesday. Livni will leave on Sunday for Doha, where she will also address delegates to the forum, said the Israeli official who requested anonymity. She will stay in Qatar for the duration of the meeting, which ends next Tuesday, April 15. Livni is expected to push for the release of Israeli conscript Gilad Shalit who was seized in a June 2006 cross-border raid from the Gaza Strip by militants including members of the Islamist Hamas, the Ynet website reported.
It said she would also raise the issue of Iran's controversial nuclear program. Qatar, like most Arab countries, does not have diplomatic relations with Israel. But the Jewish state has a commercial interests office in Doha manned by two diplomats, and representatives of both countries meet regularly. Last September, Qatar's emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani also met Livni in New York on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly.(AFP) Beirut, 08 Apr 08, 19:17

Bellemare Seeks Extended Mandate, Says Search for Justice Can't be Rushed
U.N. chief investigator Daniel Bellemare has cautioned against expecting early indictments in the case of ex-Premier Rafik Hariri's assassination and urged the Security Council to give his team more time to complete its work. "While the preparatory steps for the establishment of the special tribunal (that will try suspects in the case) are continuing, I would request this distinguished council to consider extending the mandate of this commission beyond" next June 15, Bellemare told the 15-member body on Tuesday. "I cannot tell you next year at this time, or in six months, or in three months I will have results," he later told a news conference. "I can tell you though that we'll use every possible effort and we will expedite the process."
South Africa's U.N. ambassador Dumisani Kumalo, the council chair this month, told reporters that members generally welcomed Bellemare's request for a six-month extension as well as the progress made in the probe. In his first appearance before the council since he took office last January, the Canadian former prosecutor also disclosed that indictments in the case would not be filed immediately after the U.N.-backed tribunal is established.
He said the time gap ideally "should be as short as possible" but he insisted that "the admissible evidence will have to be carefully and objectively considered in light of the applicable prosecution threshold." "No one can predict or dictate how long this process will take," the head of the U.N. commission investigating Hariri's murder said, stressing that he wanted to "send the clear message that the search for justice cannot be rushed: it must follow its course."
Bellemare was meanwhile asked by Russian U.N. delegate Ilya Rogachev why four Lebanese former security chiefs have been in jail for almost three years in connection with the Hariri killing even though they have not been indicted. The U.N. chief investigator replied that the decision to detain Jamil al-Sayyed, the former head of the general security department, ex-commander of the Internal Security Forces, Ali Hajj, former head of the presidential guard brigade, Mustafa Hamdan, and ex-commander of the army's intelligence service Raymond Azar had been made "by Lebanese judicial authorities according to Lebanese criminal law."
"It is not for me to second-guess their decision," he noted, adding that he had discussed the case with Lebanon's prosecutor general but could not give details due to the confidential nature of their exchanges. Kumalo also said council members understood the need to keep information confidential "to ensure the non-politicization" of the probe. Bellemare also sought to clarify points made in a U.N. report released late last month indicating a "criminal network" of individuals acted together to carry out the Hariri slaying. "The direction of the investigation has not changed and the commission is still investigating crimes that are politically motivated," he said.
"What is new this time is that we now have the evidence of the existence of such a network and of its links," he added.
Bellemare said his panel's priority was now to gather more evidence about what he called the "Hariri network," its scope, the identity of all its participants, their links with others outside the network and their role in the attacks.
The network or parts of it were also linked to other attacks against anti-Syrian Lebanese figures perpetrated between October 2004 and December 2005.
The U.N. report last month said the enquiry panel had gathered evidence indicating that this network existed before the slaying, conducted surveillance of Hariri before the assassination and was operative on the day it occurred. "At least part of the Hariri network continued to exist and operate after the assassination," it added. Bellemare succeeded Belgian Serge Brammertz at the head of the probe to uncover who was behind the death of Hariri and 22 others in a massive explosion on the Beirut seafront on February 14, 2005. Brammertz' German predecessor Detlev Mehlis had implicated senior officials from Syria, which for three decades was the power broker in Lebanon. But Damascus has strongly denied any connection with Hariri's death.
Responding to French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner's disclosure Tuesday that a key Syrian witness in the Hariri probe disappeared from his Paris suburban home, Bellemare said he was not aware of his whereabouts. Mohammed Zuhair Siddiq, a Syrian former intelligence officer who had been interviewed by U.N. investigators, "is not in our custody, has never asked to be entered in (our) witness protection program," Bellemare told reporters. "As far as (what) the impact of his disappearance is, this will have to be assessed." Bellemare is to become the special tribunal's prosecutor once the U.N. probe of the Hariri and related cases is completed.(AFP-AP-Naharnet)

300 Hizbullah Members Fly to Iran Each Month for Military Training
Naharnet/Up to 300 Hizbullah members travel to Iran each month for military training, a report carried by the British daily The Independent said. It said the operation has been running since November of 2006 and that 4,500 Hizbullah 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-Hizbullah war. "Whether this frightening conflict takes place will depend on (U.S.) President Bush's behavior," The Independent said. "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 Hizbullah has been building in the fields and beside the roadways east and south of Jezzine." Beirut, 09 Apr 08, 11:20

Saudis Believed behind Mughniyeh's Murder, Report
Naharnet/Saudi Arabia is believed to be behind the assassination of top Hizbullah commander Imad Mughniyeh, Iran's news agency, Fars, reported.
The report carried by the Italian news agency, Aki, said Fars quoted unnamed sources as saying that Syria's delay in announcing the results of the probe into Mughniyeh's killing "cannot be explained other than by the pressure exercised by some Arab states." Fars, which is close to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, said the Syrian commission of inquiry was supposed to have concluded its investigation and the results should have been made public before the Arab League summit in Damascus March 29-30. "Pressure by Kuwait convinced the government in Damascus to postpone everything till the day after the (Arab League) meeting ended," Fars said. It said further delay was caused by pressure from Saudi Arabia. Fars, according to the sources, accused the Saudis of being behind Mughniyeh's assassination. "Through a Syrian woman, a Saudi secret service agent who works in Damascus acquired two cars that were used by Israeli secret service agents to kill the commander Hajj Imad Mughniyeh," Fars quoted one source as saying. RTTNews, meanwhile, quoted Fars as saying that Syria arrested a high-ranking Saudi embassy official in connection with Mughniyeh's murder. It identified him as a defense official working at the Saudi embassy in Damascus.
The Iranian news agency said the official had links with a Syrian woman on whose name the two car bombs used in Mughniyeh's killing were registered.
Fars said Palestinian, Jordanian as well as Syrian citizens were involved in "organizing the attack" that killed Mughniyeh in Damascus Feb. 12.
The sources said they lived with their families in apartments in the Kfar Suseh neighborhood of Damascus "so as not to raise suspicion."
They said former Saudi ambassador to Washington, Bandar al-Sultan, ordered the killing of Mughniyeh and that Riyadh carried out the assassination to avenge the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing that targeted a U.S. Air Force apartment complex, killing 19 U.S. citizens and wounding 371.
A group calling itself Hizbullah al-Hijaz claimed responsibility for the attack which destroyed six high rise apartment buildings in the complex.
Fars said Qatar and Kuwait were trying to mediate between Syria and Saudi Arabia so that findings in Mughniyeh's probe are not made public or as a minimum do not include any reference to Riyadh. Beirut, 09 Apr 08, 08:43

Kouchner Hammers Hizbullah, Berri and Says Siddiq 'Disappeared'
Naharnet/French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner on Tuesday slammed Hizbullah as a non-domestic issue in Lebanon; and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri for lacking freedom of movement, stressing he is not invited to France. Kouchner also announced that Mohammed Zuhair Siddiq, the main Syrian witness in the 2005 killing of ex-Premier Rafik Hariri, has "disappeared" while under close watch in France. He told a press conference "with Hizbullah the issue has passed over the domestic stage in Lebanon." "I believe that the re-arming of Hizbullah that is known to everybody is a serious issue," Kouchner said, adding that the pro-Iranian party's stand in Lebanon also is "serious." He called for renewing dialogue with the Lebanese, noting: "It would be difficult." However, Kouchner hammered Berri for seeking to re-launch inter-Lebanese dialogue, asking: "Why dialogue is not held in Parliament? Why does Berri close parliament while he is speaker of the legally-elected house? Why doesn't he benefit from this place so that Christians, Druze, Sunnis and others can engage in dialogue?"The reason for that, according to the French foreign minister, is that Berri "lacks freedom of movement" and said the Lebanese parliament speaker is not invited to France. He also announced that Siddiq has "in fact disappeared. I'm sorry for that and I don't know the conditions for his disappearance." Siddiq, according to Kouchner, had been under "house arrest" in France, but he did not know if the Syrian witness was under surveillance when he disappeared. Beirut, 08 Apr 08, 16:29

U.S.: Iran, Syria Pursuing Lebanization strategy in Iraq
Naharnet/The top U.S. commander and the American ambassador in Iraq have accused Iran, Syria and Hizbullah of supporting armed Shiite groups, adding that the Islamic Republic and the Assad regime were pursuing a "Lebanization strategy" in the war-torn country.
General David Petraeus told the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday that Iranian support for the armed factions has emerged as the greatest long-term threat to a democratic Iraq. He also blamed Tehran for a flare-up of violence in Baghdad and Basra. The fighting erupted in response to an offensive by Iraqi government troops against Shiite militias in the southern port of Basra last month, upending what had been a months-long decline in violence. Petraeus said the fighting, which spread to Baghdad and other cities in the south, "highlighted the destructive role Iran has played in funding, training, arming and directing the so-called special groups." Petraeus said detentions of key figures in the armed groups had produced a clearer picture of the Iranian support, which he said was provided by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards' Quds Force with help from Hizbullah. "Four of the 16 so-called master trainers, for example, are in our detention facility," he said.
"Unchecked, the special groups pose the greatest long-term threat to the viability of a democratic Iraq," he told the Committee.
U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker charged that Iran and Syria were pursuing a "Lebanization strategy" in Iraq, co-opting elements of the local Shiite community to use as "instruments of Iranian force." "They're using that same partnership in Iraq, in my view, although the weights are reversed, with Iran having the greater weight and Syria the lesser. But they are working in tandem together against us and against a stable Iraqi state," the ambassador said.
The comments of Petraeus and Crocker before a packed Senate hearing room came as they sought to justify an indefinite pause in the drawdown of U.S. forces from Iraq once five "surge" brigades come out in July. Petraeus distanced himself from the inconclusive Iraqi-led offensive in Basra, telling lawmakers he had not recommended it and that it was "not adequately planned or prepared."But Crocker suggested that Iranian support for the armed groups, including Moqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army, had backfired politically. Despite promises by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to stop support for the special groups, Crocker said "nefarious activities by the Quds Force have continued and Iraqi leaders now clearly recognize the threat they pose to Iraq."Moreover, by taking on militias from his own sect, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki had gained unprecedented support from across Iraq's fractured political spectrum, Crocker said. Crocker and Petraeus both held out hope that the intra-Shiite fighting may lead the Iranians to rethink their strategy. The ambassador said the U.S. was prepared to hold a new round of talks with the Iranians and that the Iraqi foreign ministry has contacted Tehran to try to set it up.(AFP-Naharnet) Beirut, 09 Apr 08, 05:34

Jewish Group: Hizbullah May Get Additional Missiles from Swiss-Iran Gas Deal
Naharnet/A major U.S. Jewish organization has stepped up opposition to a multibillion-dollar Swiss-Iranian natural gas deal, saying Tehran's profits could boost military support to Hizbullah and Hamas. "When you finance a terrorist state, you finance terrorism," said the New York-based Anti-Defamation League in full-page advertisements in major Swiss newspapers and in similar ads in The New York Times, The International Herald Tribune and The Wall Street Journal.
The U.S. government and the World Jewish Congress have criticized Switzerland for the deal, saying it gives encouragement to Tehran's hard-liners.
The Anti-Defamation League said Tuesday in a statement on its Web site that it "is concerned that Iran's profits from the energy deal could help the regime to accelerate and complete its nuclear weapons program and provide tens of thousands of additional missiles to Hizbullah and Hamas, two terrorist groups and sworn enemies of Israel who routinely benefit from Tehran's largess."
The version of the ad in The International Herald Tribune on Tuesday began, "Guess who is the world's newest financier of terrorism? Switzerland."
The Swiss Foreign Ministry rejected the criticism.
Alfred Donath, president of the Swiss Federation of Jewish Communities, distanced himself from the ads.
Swiss Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey went to Iran in mid-March for the signing of the deal between the Swiss energy trading company EGL and state-owned National Iranian Gas Export Company. The deal is worth $28 billion-$42 billion.
The nationalist Swiss People's Party also has taken Calmy-Rey to task over a photo of the March 17 signing ceremony with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in which a smiling Calmy-Rey in a white head scarf is seated below a picture of the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Lars Knuchel said the deal is in conformity with U.N. and U.S. sanctions on Iran and that Switzerland is far down the list of countries buying exports from Iran. Donath, whose organization had already criticized the gas deal, said the accusations were "exaggerated."
He confirmed a report in the Lausanne-based daily 24heures that he was personally briefed by Calmy-Rey on her Iran visit and that she did not like having to make the trip. He said he held the entire government responsible. Calmy-Rey has said the contract is in line with Switzerland's rights as an independent country with its own strategic interests to defend. EGL plans to sell the gas to European customers that rely heavily on natural gas from Russia -- which in the past has used its monopoly to exert political pressure on its neighbors.(AP-Naharnet) Beirut, 09 Apr 08, 06:08

Qabalan for Cooperation with Syria and Berri-Sponsored Dialogue
Naharnet/Lebanon's highest Shiite cleric on Tuesday said cooperation with Syria would "treat plenty of issues." Deputy Chairman of the Higher Shiite Islamic Council Sheikh Abdul Amir Qabalan said a visit to Damascus by parliament Speaker Nabih Berri reflected the "beginning of good tides." He urged Berri to visit Saudi Arabia "as soon as possible so that his meetings and efforts would lead to settling Lebanon's problems."Qabalan said Berri, "being the constitutionally-elected speaker is the person capable of sponsoring national dialogue. Parliament is the proper place for holding this dialogue with the aim of settling differences." He urged both the majority and Hizbullah-led opposition to take part in dialogue. Qabalan rejected charges made to Berri for closing Parliament. Israel's ongoing drills, according to Qabalan, promote "caution against an Israeli war … We should be prepared to confront Israel." Beirut, 08 Apr 08, 18:57

What's at Stake for the West in Lebanon?
A briefing By: David Wurmser
March 6, 2008
http://www.meforum.org/article/1878 (includes an audio recording of this talk)
"Iran's Stake in the Levant"
Mr. Wurmser calls Lebanon a "key battleground between the West as a whole and the forces that seek to drag the Middle East down." The situation in Lebanon must be viewed in the context of the larger conflict in the region, which is becoming far more dangerous. Two years after the Cedar Revolution in March 2005, which was brought on by the assassination of Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri, the Lebanese are still living through a tragedy. The inability to install a new president today is indicative of the situation. It is because of the size and success of the popular demonstrations by the Lebanese, however, that Lebanon has become the focal point of the enemies of the West, namely Iran, Syria, and Hezbollah.
Mr. Wurmser focused on the Iranian strategy toward Lebanon, arguing that Iran is undergoing a transformation, not in the direction of reform as the West hopes, but from a pure theocracy toward a "theofascist state on the edge of an even more aggressive foreign policy." This transformation in Iranian politics, according to Mr. Wurmser, is being played out in Lebanon and in Gaza.
Top American officials have made statements to the effect that U.S. and U.N. sanctions have hurt the Iranian regime, and that the support for former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and other figures deemed "moderate" in the December 2006 elections indicated the weakening of the Iranian regime. Mr. Wurmser asserts that this perception is false because it ignores the real indicators. Rather, a new power structure is emerging in Iran that is closely aligned with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. For example, Ahmadinejad fired many government officials and replaced them with a group of hard-core members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Mr. Wurmser singled out Gholam Hossein Mohseni-Ejehei, whom Ahmadinejad placed in control of Intelligence, who espouses an aggressive anti-Western foreign policy and supports terrorism; and Saeed Jalili, whom Ahmadinejad appointed as head nuclear negotiator for Iran, is a veteran of the IRGC who was mutilated in the Iran-Iraq war.
Mr. Wurmser traced several of Ahmadinejad's actions to Jalili's 1990 book, Foreign Policy of the Prophet, arguing that Jalili's writings, though they describe the time of Muhammad, are a blueprint for Iran today. Jalili cites an episode in which Muhammad told his followers to proselytize, not negotiate. In this spirit, Ahmedinejad has fired ambassadors and replaced them with more proselytizing ones. Jalili wrote about how Muhammad and his successors sent letters out to other tribes telling them to "convert or you will face the sword," as well as to major powers in Byzantium and Persia. Mr. Wurmser linked this to Ahmedinejad's sending similar letters to President Bush. He pointed out how the "language is lifted straight out of Jalili's book, and that, in fact, "Jalili is the mind behind Ahmedinejad."

Mr. Wurmser analyzed tensions between IRGC officers and the ayatollahs whom the officers believe "betrayed the will of Allah" when they signed the treaty ending the Iran-Iraq war. A separate group of ayatollahs, based in Mashhad in northeastern Iran, sees itself as true believers. This group considers the current state of Islam to be weak, and it seeks to expose the West as "a collapsing, hollow tree." It expects the imminent return of the Twelfth Imam, the hidden Imam at the center of the Twelver Sh'ia movement of Islam. Its version of Islam is messianic and apocalyptic, and according to Mr. Wurmser, it provides the ideological basis for Iran's shift to a more aggressive and risk-seeking stance against the West.
He also identified a radical change in Iranian's notion of Islam. While the Iranian revolution defended Shi'ite interests and opposed Arab nationalism, over the past four years, "Iran has made a bold move to co-opt Arab nationalism." The Arab-Israeli conflict has become a key issue on which Iran can attempt to seize leadership of the Islamic world from the Sunnis and Arabs. A central part of Iran's national policy, Mr. Wurmser asserted, is to have an active war with Israel, be victorious, and seize leadership of the Muslim world. Iran's success at assuming the mantle of Islam is evident in that in the past two or three years, Muslim Brotherhood leaders have recognized that Shi'ites are true Muslims, a concept that they had vehemently opposed previously.
Mr. Wurmser argued that Iran needs Syria in order to co-opt Sunni politics and Arab nationalism. He called Syria a "geographic gateway for Iran to be a player in the Arab-Israeli conflict," and through this, to maintain the appearance of a successful Iranian revolution. Ahmedinejad came to power because it was thought that the Iranian revolution was weak. If Syria collapses, Mr. Wurmser thinks Iran will implode and that Syria is the avenue through which to attack Iran. Gaza is also a battleground for Iran, said Wurmser, citing that 80% of terrorist activity in Gaza is committed by a force trained in Iran that answers directly to Damascus and Tehran.
Mr. Wurmser considers things to have gone well for Ahmadinejad in the last few months. He compared Ahmadinejad's bold opposition to the West and accusations of cowardliness on the part of followers who urge a more cautious policy to the way Hitler galvanized his generals in the 1930s by accusing them of lack of will. Disturbingly, each crisis increases Ahmadinejad's reputation as his supporters rally round him.
In his recommendation for American foreign policy, Mr. Wurmser stressed that the United States must take into account how its policies are perceived in the Middle East. In 2003, when the United States acquiesced to the European acceptance of the Iranian regime as a legitimate interlocutor on nuclear issues, the Iranians read this as tacit acceptance and, therefore, weakness. During the same year, when the U.N. sanctioned the American presence in Iraq, Iran saw this as weakness on the American part because the superpower asked for permission to strike. Mr. Wurmser described the summer of 2003 as a "key moment, because the momentum the Iranian people were building against the regime was punctured by perceived American weakness."
On the question of what concrete things the United States can do to support democracy in Lebanon, Mr. Wurmser emphasized the need for swift response to the assassinations of Lebanese leaders. At least six government officials have been killed since Hariri, but the U.S. response has been slow and ineffective. Meanwhile, Hezbollah and Syria are "killing the Lebanese government out of existence." Mr. Wurmser concluded that "the United States can have an effect if we show we are committed to acting to preserve what happened in March 2005" when the Lebanese staged the Cedar Revolution.
***David Wurmser is a specialist on the Middle East and served as an advisor to Vice President Dick Cheney until recently. His prior positions included special assistant to John R. Bolton at the Department of State and a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. Wurmser is the author of numerous influential papers and three books, including Tyranny's Ally: America's Failure to Defeat Saddam Hussein (AEI Press, 1999). In 2000, he contributed to the Middle East Forum's Lebanon Study Group report, "Ending Syria's Occupation of Lebanon: The U.S. Role," which condemned Syria's occupation of Lebanon. He received a Ph.D. in international relations from Johns Hopkins University. Mr. Wurmser addressed the Middle East Forum on March 6, 2008 in New York City.