Liveblogging the War: Thursday July 27th

As Israel mourns the 9 soldiers killed yesterday - 8 in Bint Jbail, and 1 in Maroun Ras – it has been revealed that the troops had been ambushed by Hizbullah terrorists, as they approached several homes on the outskirts of Bint Jbail. Many of the casualties occurred during this initial encounter at close range. It is believed that anywhere from 15-50 terrorists were killed in the fighting.

“Just because no exact time frame was set for stopping the violence does not mean the summit failed. We discussed the important preconditions needed to reach a cease fire and there was an agreement on the necessity to deploy a mass international force in Lebanon, the details of which will be discussed next week,” Rice told reporters on the plane on her way to a meeting with South East Asian leaders in Malaysia.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper says Israel’s deadly attack on a UN observation post in Lebanon, which claimed the life of a Canadian soldier, was a “terrible tragedy” and he doubts whether the bombing was deliberate.

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The prime minister also said he wants to know why the post was still manned even though it was in the middle of an obvious war zone.

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UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has suggested Israel deliberately targeted the UN outpost despite repeated calls to stop the shelling.

 

But Harper said the facts suggest otherwise.

 

“I certainly doubt that to be the case, given that the government of Israel has been co-operating with us in our evacuation efforts, in our efforts to move Canadian citizens out of Lebanon and also trying to keep our own troops that are on the ground, involved in the evacuation, out of harm’s way,” he said.

 

“We want to find out why this United Nations post was attacked and also why it remained manned during what is now, more or less, a war during obvious danger to these individuals.”

We received emails from him a few days ago, and he was describing the fact that he was taking fire within, in one case, three meters of his position for tactical necessity, not being targeted. Now that’s veiled speech in the military. What he was telling us was Hezbollah soldiers were all over his position and the IDF were targeting them. And that’s a favorite trick by people who don’t have representation in the UN. They use the UN as shields knowing that they can’t be punished for it.

What makes Annan’s allegation so unforgiveable is that his UN Interim Force in Lebanon has been warning for days about what almost certainly caused this tragedy. Hezbollah fighters, who have already been firing behind screens of women and children, have also been shooting from behind and next to the UN positions, presumably hoping Israel will not dare shoot back and risk exactly this kind of propaganda disaster.

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UPDATE 3: Hezbollah is listed here and in the US and Canada as a terrorist group. Yet The Age today gave one of its spokesmen, Ali Fayyad, a senior member of Hezbollah‚Äôs executive committee, a quarter of a page to put his case against Israel. Am I alone in finding this shameful? I guess the paper at least ‚Äúbalanced‚Äù it by running alongside it a piece by an Israeli minister. Can someone older than I tell me if it was the habit of The Age in World War 2 to run pieces by Mr Hitler alongside ones by some Jewish spokesman not yet dead for the sake of a ‚Äúbalanced‚Äù argument?  We can‚Äôt be far from the day that The Age hires Mr Osama bin laden as a columnist. When Michael Leunig retires, perhaps?

In a highly symbolic gesture of friendship, the central Polish city of Lodz has offered to host a group of 15 youngsters from northern Israel for a
two-week vacation in Poland to give them a respite from the war in the North, Polish officials said Thursday.

 

The initiative, which was the brainchild of Lodz Mayor Jerzy Kropiwnicki, has been passed on to the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs for final approval, Polish Ambassador to Israel Agnieszka Magdziak-Miszewska said.

 

The all-expenses paid vacation will include relaxation and recreation in the Polish countryside for the youths from the northern coastal town of Nahariya and three of their educators after two-weeks of non-stop Hizbullah rocket attacks.

 

Relations between Israel and Poland are considered to be among the best in Europe.

Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah was to visit Damascus on Thursday to meet with Syrian President Bashar Assad and the head of the Iranian national security council, Ali Larijani, the Kuwaiti daily newspaper Al-Seyassah reported.

 

The report, which quoted Syrian sources, said Nasrallah would arrive in disguise and not wearing his customary traditional garb.

Lt. Col. Roee Klein, 31

 

In his community, friends told of how his most prominent characteristics were his gentleness, his peacefulness, and his ever-present smile.

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Those who knew him mention his quest for self-awareness, improvement and personal progress. “Anyone who looked at Roee saw before him a tender and quiet guy, but when he entered the fight, he demonstrated an outburst of strength and decisiveness that could not be withstood. His great love for his country and people is what drove him to invest so much of himself in his military service and, in the end, to sacrifice his life to protect them,” added other friends.

 

Shulik Leshem, from Mitzpeh Iron, knew Roee well. “I studied will him from about the age of 15, we later served together and traveled together in Africa.” Leshem tells: “He was a spectacular man, a go-getter with a great sense of humor, there’s no one who doesn’t remember his rolling laugh..”

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Eventually, he left the army and pondered whether to rejoin the army or go into academia. “He really debated over this. This was a moral and idealistic guy and, moreover, his family was important to him. He thought how he could best contribute to Israel and how to manifest himself in ways that would help those less fortunate. He was very intelligent; he wanted to learn in the university and his family background gave him a leaning towards academia. But he didn’t get the chance. He decided to return to the army because that’s what he loved and that’s what he wanted to do.”

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“He was striking, with his gravity, his charisma and his quiet nature. He was someone with a quiet presence.”

 

Capt. Amichai Merhavia, 24

 

“Amichai was head and shoulders above the crowd. One glance at his walk and manner of speaking was enough for anyone to recognize his leadership skills. His ever-present smile, good hear, and love for his friends and students made Amichai truly special,” said Ali residents.

 

Shimon Adega, 21

 

Shimon Adega, 21, from Kiryat Gat, arrived with his parents from Ethiopia 16 years ago. His last phone call with his family was Saturday night. His brother David tells: “Saturday evening he told us that they were going to Lebanon, and that he couldn’t give us details. He was drafted in March of 2004 and the IDF wanted to give him a desk job but he fought to be drafted to a combat unit. He was given a month of leave and, afterwards, was drafted to the Golani division.”

 

Shimon Dahan, 20

 

His friends told that “he was a special person, who loved to help and never complained about difficulties. Shimon was psyched about the army. He thought of signing on more when his three years were up. He loved army service and stood out during the squad commander course and the sergeant’s course.”

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Shimon’s cousin, talked of how much he loved the army. “A few months ago, Shimon got sick and had to stay home. The whole time, he stubbornly insisted on returning to the unit. In the end, he returned and made up the stuff that he’d missed. He loved to help people. When he came home one leave, he would volunteer in a charity organization and distribute food to the needy.”

 

Idan Cohen, 21

 

One of the neighbors said that “Idan was a modest boy, who wanted to join Golani. His parents worried about him a lot and left him a lot of messages, but didn’t manage to speak to him.” Another neighbor added “he was the sweetest boy you ever met, a good boy who was about to finish his service and had his whole life ahead of him.”

 

Idan’s friend, Eran Agison, told of their last conversation. “A second before he entered Lebanon he said to me ‘We’re going in. What’ll I tell me mom? I’ll tell her that it’s an exercise.’ I asked him if he was scared and he answered that there isn’t anyone who isn’t afraid, but that he has to do it.”

 

Sergeant Assaf Namer, 27

 

Sergeant Assaf Namer, 27, an Israeli youngster with an Australian citizenship, had left Israel with his mother and sister when he was 10 year-old and returned to Israel two and-a-half years ago in order to enlist in the army and serve in the Golani division.

 

Assaf was due to be discharged a month from now, and was planning to settle down in Israel with his girlfriend, Revital, who lives in Tel Aviv.

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Kiryat Atta’s mayor, Yaakov Peretz, visited the father on Wednesday night to offer his condolences. Peretz said that Assaf, who did not have to join the army, made it a pint to come to Israel in order to live her and serve. “Although his life was in Australia, he was a Zionist who chose to come to Israel in order to do his part,” he stated.

 

First Lieutenant Alexander Schwartzman, 24

 

Schwartzman moved to Israel with his family at the beginning of the ’90s from Ukraine.

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 ”He was the pride of the family,” told his neighbor, Larissa Shabtaib. “He was a quiet boy who liked to go to the gym. He always smiled and said ‘hello’ to anyone he passed on the street.”

 

Alexander’s friend, Alex Glutzky, said, “We learned together from elementary school through to the air force technical school. This September I am getting married and Alex was supposed to drive me to the wedding. I still am not processing what happened and don’t understand how within one moment I lost my best friend.”

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Alex was a role model for all the neighborhood kids as an ambitious young person, who from the streets of Akko got to a commanding position in Golani. It is hard for us to think about the difficult days the family and their friends are going to go through,” said one of the neighbors.

 

First Sergeant Ohad Klausner

 

“He was only 21 and a half,” said his mother, Orit, yesterday. “Every time I see bereaved parents speaking on television about how wonderful their children were. They are all wonderful and great. It really is true.”

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After finishing his studies at in Jerusalem, Ohad chose the combat track. A year and four months ago he enlisted. He was the youngest of three sons, one of the founding families of the settlement Beit Horon.

 

Yiftach Schrier, 22

 

Yiftach, 22, a paratrooper, was killed on Wednesday in battle near the village of Maroun al-Ras in Lebanon.

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“He was a sensitive child,” his mother said, and his father added: “He kept telling me ‚Äì ‘don’t worry dad, it’ll be fine.”

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Yiftach was born and raised in Haifa, went to the Hugim school and was a coordinator at the local Scouts branch. “They were the most handsome twins in Haifa. Everybody knew them, our youngest sons. I don’t know what Yarden will do now, without Yiftach,” Yaffa said about her two sons.

 

Yiftach’s parents said that “he loved the army, took care of his troops like a father. When a soldier was sick, Yiftach would phone him to see how he was. When we dropped him off at the base, one of the soldiers’ parents approached us and said: ‘We never saw anyone like your son before’.”

In a taped message broadcast by al-Jazeera television, Ayman al-Zawahri, second in command to Osama bin Laden, said the al-Qaida now saw “all the world as a battlefield open in front of us.”

You are viewed as a fraud risk and it is company policy not to support people whos government kill innocent civilians and children.
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Sending an international peacekeeping force into southern Lebanon without a commitment that Hizbullah guerillas will withdraw from the area would amount to a “suicide mission,” Australia’s foreign minister said Thursday.

 

“There’s no point in sending an international peacekeeping force on a suicide mission,” Downer said. “It’s only in the environment of a peace settlement that you can send in peacekeepers, otherwise of course you’re going to send them into the path of destruction.”

About the Author

An Australian immigrant to Israel, Aussie Dave has been blogging since early 2003.

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Tags: Middle East Conflict