Arabs silent as Israel launches total war on Gaza.
- Top Iraqi Cleric slams Arab silence on Gaza
- Iran: War on Gaza a countdown Israel's destruction
- Hezbollah: Arabs aiding Israel against Palestinians
--
Nasrallah condemns Israeli assault, 'Arab collaboration'
Sunday - 28 December 2008, Live TV Broadcast from Beirut, 18:05 GMT
Hizbullah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah led a chorus of Lebanese condemnations of a massive Israeli air campaign on the blockaded Gaza Strip over the weekend that killed at least 296 Palestinians and wounded hundreds more.
In a live televised address, Nasrallah pointed the finger at Arab regimes for conspiring with Israel against residents of Gaza.
"There is true and full collaboration between certain Arab regimes, especially those who have already signed peace deals with Israel, to crush any form of resistance," he told thousands of Hizbullah supporters in Beirut's southern suburbs.
The Israel-US alliance was trying to impose a "humiliating" settlement on Lebanon, Syria and Palestine, Nasrallah said. "Those Arab regimes are helping the Israelis," he said.
Nasrallah urged "the Egyptian regime specifically to open the Rafah crossing so that aid can flow into Gaza and help Gazans in their struggle."
"We are not asking in any way for Egypt to launch a war against Israel because in Gaza there are men able and ready to fight. All we ask is that Egypt does not exploit the war to put pressure on the Palestinian resistance. If you do not open the crossing, then you are partners in the crime," he said.
The Hizbullah Chief urged all Arabs to protest the Israeli military strikes. All Arabs states should help Gazans to remain steadfast in the face of Israel, he said, because "Israel cannot manage wars of attrition."
Nasrallah also said the Arab world had "the money and enough political power to stop the carnage in Gaza."
Lebanon has to remain vigilant of a possible Israeli attack, Nasrallah added, calling for a mass rally at 3 p.m. on Monday in Beirut's southern suburbs.
Israel launched on Saturday what it referred to as "calculated" air strikes against Hamas, the Islamist group which runs the strip, just days after a six-month cease-fire with Palestinian resistance groups expired.
--
Hezbollah Chief: 'Arab nations cooperating with Israel'
Leader of Hezbollah Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah attacked Arab nations - particularly Egypt and Jordan - in a televised speech Sunday and accused them of cooperation with Israel in its offensive in the Gaza Strip.
"There are some who speak of Arab silence, but this is wrong. There is full Arab cooperation, especially by those who have signed so-called peace agreements with Israel," Nasrallah said.
The Hizbullah leader called on Arabs everywhere to go out into the streets and demonstrate, in order to force their governments to stop the Israeli offensive.
Nasrallah condemned Egypt for casting the responsibility of the condition in Gaza on Hamas.
He attacked Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit, who in a Saturday press conference said that Hamas, which had been repeatedly warned by Egypt, must bear responsibility for the current situation in Gaza.
"Yesterday, we heard a high-ranking Egyptian leader cast the responsibility on the victim. Can we accept such things from Arabs? Casting the responsibility for this war on the Gaza resistance is embarrassing and saddening," Nasrallah added. "Our nations call on Egypt to help."
Nasrallah said that Israel needed such action on "an electoral level and to salvage the image of the Israeli army." But, he added, "We are not concerned or afraid... We are ready to face any attack on our country."
--
Nasrallah slams "Arab-Zionist collaboration"
Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah, leader of Hezbollah, has condemned the Israeli massacre of Gazans and points to the role of certain Arab regimes in conspiring with Israel.
Addressing a large crowd of Lebanese people, Nasrallah said it is very unfortunate to begin the new Islamic year at a time where a huge humanitarian catastrophe has led to the martyrdom of over 300 innocent people and the injuring of over 1,000 in the Gaza Strip by Israel tanks and air strikes.
He said Gazans have two options - Resistance or humiliating surrender - and they are resisting with perseverance.
Nasrallah likened the air strikes on Gaza to the 33-day war in the summer of 2006 that killed more than 1,200 people in Lebanon, most of them civilians.
But he said the situation of Palestinians is worse than the 2006 Israeli war with Lebanon.
"What is going on in Gaza right now is in a very clear way a permanent American and Israeli scheme in the region to impose a humiliating settlement with Israeli and American conditions on the rest of the Arabs. The Americans and the Zionists want a settlement for the Arab-Israeli conflict. They want it in their own form with their own conditions. The Palestinians, the Lebanese and the Syrians must give in to these conditions according to their plan. The Americans and the Zionists are putting their efforts to impose their conditions through pressure, isolation, blockades, internal divisions, assassinations and so on."
Meanwhile he pointed to the negative role of some Arab countries in what was happening in Gaza and said, "There are some Arab regimes who are truly partners of this project, especially those who signed peace treaties with Israel. They are supporting (the US-Israeli project) politically, psychologically, militarily and culturally through the media… They are contributing to impose the conditions of surrender on the rest of the resistance groups."
Nasrallah said that there are documents that show that some Arab regimes are calling on Israel to destroy Hamas and the Islamic Jihad.
He said he had heard today from some Israeli officials that the magnitude of Arab support for the destruction of the resistance in Gaza is even more than their support to destroy Hezbollah.
The Secretary General also said that certain Arab countries are responsible for some of the internal fighting among Palestinian factions. "These same Arabs armed the Palestinian factions to fight against each other."
He made it clear that the resistance in Palestine and Gaza would keep on saying that "Today the people of Gaza have made their choice - the choice of blood. They are resisting with firmness. Nothing will prevent them, without even anybody's help, from continuing with their resistance, despite bloodshed and martyrdom."
Nasrallah meanwhile criticized Arab media saying, "Some of these Arab satellite channels, which we can call them Hebrew channels and not Arab channels, were showing people in Gaza killed yesterday and today as like somebody killed in some traffic accident in India. Then they show the news going back to normal as if there is no Arab humanitarian catastrophe happening in Gaza."
"We as an Ummah, a nation, must work together to stop this Zionist campaign. We must work in order for this assault not to achieve its aims. We should be able to achieve victory in Gaza although there will be sacrifices of a huge magnitude".
"It is not only the responsibility of the people of Gaza, it is the responsibility of the governments in Arab and Islamic nations. It is the responsibility of the peoples to bring pressure on their governments, which remained silent, to take steps. There is no justification at all for the people to say we have regimes of oppression. We must go out into the streets and raise our voices, put pressure on our governments even if fire was opened on our chests. This is our duty, and who ever falls in this duty on the road to al-Quds is a martyr."
"In this period the United States of America and the Europeans are suffering from financial and economic crisis. But we in the Arab world, we have oil, we have money, we have political stands, our governments and regimes with very little effort, can very easily stop the Zionist assault on the people in Gaza," he said.
Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah strongly criticized the Egyptian government and added, "All of these Arab and Islamic people must head to the streets and call on the Egyptian government. The Egyptian position is the corner-stone in what is going on in Gaza. Nobody has called on Egypt to take up arms and go to war. We are only asking them to open their borders so that food, medicine and water can reach our people in Gaza."
"The Egyptian regime must politically help the people of Gaza so that the assault can be stopped without any preconditions. This is the Egyptian responsibility. The people of the Arab and Islamic world must call on the Egyptian regime to open the borders".
Nasrallah appreciated Syria's role in the 2006 Israeli war on Lebanon and asked for the same from Egypt. "
Syria had opened the borders for us although Israel bombarded the Lebanon-Syria border, and we thanked Syria for it. We are calling on Egypt now to open the Rafah border permanently for those who are alive, not only for those who are injured or martyred."
"We must tell Egypt very strongly this time that if you do not open the Rafah crossing to Gaza people, it means that you are partners in this siege and collaborating with the Israeli regime in the killing of innocent Palestinians. The Egyptian people must pour out into the streets in millions to force their government to open the country's border with the Gaza Strip. If the people took to the streets by the millions, could the police kill millions of Egyptians?"
The Hezbollah leader said that if Egypt did not open the Rafah Crossing to Gaza, it would be considered a partner in the Israeli killing of Palestinians.
He emphasized that if Egypt opens the Rafah crossing and food, water and money reach the people in Gaza, a repetition of what happened in Lebanon would occur. "
Although we are confident of this victory, the people of Gaza are living in hard conditions, and if Gaza stays on its feet, and shows perseverance, the assault will end. Israel cannot stand a long and exhausting war. This enemy will be obliged in the end to stop its assault and its goals will be cancelled."
Lastly, he reminded that Lebanon should remain vigilant to a possible Israeli attack saying, "I have asked the brothers in the resistance, in the south specifically, to be present, on alert and cautious because we are facing a criminal enemy and we don't know the magnitude of its conspiracies."
--
Iran: "Final count down" starts for Israel's collapse
The final count down has started for the collapse of the Zionist regime, Iranian government spokesman, Gholam-Hossein Elham said on Monday.
Speaking on the sidelines of a large rally held to protest the ongoing slaughter of the defenseless people in Gaza Strip by the Zionist regime, the spokesman said that Israel has "waged a war not only against the innocent Gazans but against the whole humanity."
"This is a battle not only in the Islamic lands but in the whole world and its threats would possibly spill over even to Europe," Elham said.
Elham said that Israel's savage attacks on Gaza Strip resulted from its increasing desperation regarding its weakness in the face of Palestinians public resistance.
"Bombarding defenseless women and children can no longer save the Zionist entity," said the spokesman. He also condemned the international community for their silence towards Israeli crimes.
--
Sistani condemns Arab inaction on Gaza
Top Iraqi cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani has called for decisive action by Arab states for an end to Israeli attacks on Gaza.
"Condemning what is going on in Gaza and supporting our brothers only with words is meaningless, considering the big tragedy they are facing,''
Sistani said in a statement released by his office in Najaf: "Arab and Islamic nations need to take a decisive stance, now more than ever, to end these ongoing aggressions and to break the unjust siege imposed on the brave people of Gaza."
Israeli air forces staged massive airstrikes against the Gaza strip on Saturday and Sunday, killing more than 300 people and injuring 1550 others.
Arab government's reaction, however, was similar to the stance they took after Israel attacked Lebanon in the summer of 2006.
Despite their condemnations, Israeli officials later revealed that some influential Arabs states had supported their attack on Lebanon as it was launched with the aim of destroying the country's resistance movement of Hezbollah.
Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called on the Muslim world to defend the people of Gaza.
"All Muslims are obliged to defend the defenseless people of Gaza in any way they can; those killed on such a sacred path are indeed martyrs.”
Khamenei slammed the collaboration of Washington and Tel Aviv, the silence of international bodies, and the indifference shown by some Arab countries which have paved the ground for such atrocities.
"Surely the Egyptian and Jordanian nations and other Muslims feel furious over these killings that follow the long-time blockade which banned food and medicine deliveries to Gaza."
Media reports suggest Cairo helped Tel Aviv mislead Hamas officials about Israel's intention to attack the impoverished region.
Egyptian Intelligence Minister Omar Suleiman had deceived Hamas into believing that Israel would not launch an attack on the Gaza Strip in the near future.
According to the reports, the misinformation prevented Hamas from evacuating its security compounds and headquarters.
Meanwhile on Sunday, the UN Security Council failed to pass a resolution demanding an end to the Israeli attacks, as the United States vetoed the motion, which was requested by members of the United Nations.
Since 1972, Tel Aviv's staunch ally the United States, has vetoed over 40 resolutions the council has tried to pass against the Israeli regime.
--
Editorial:
Hamas has been around for years. It regulary fires home made missiles into Israel. Israeli casulties are very low. Even if are to believe Israel's own figures, they amount to no more than 5 dead in the whole of 2008. Of cource, one is one too many. But we should consider the timing of Israeli assault on Gaza. Israel has only decided to go to war in Gaza at this time in order to prevent President Obama from talking to Iran - its mortal enemy. During his presidential campaign Barak Obama had vowed to hold unconditional talks with the Islamic Republic. America having a dialogue with Iran is something that Arabs dictators also do not want to see. Arabs feel threatened by Washington's peace a move with Tehran. They want to end Persian, and, especially its Shia brand of revolutionay Islam from gaining influence in the Arab world. For past five years Arab leaders spoke of a "Shia Crescent" rising over their domain. Israeli leaders have since 2004 been playing on the fears of shi'ites among Arabs. The west has also played part in this. Led by Tony Blair, the former British Prime Minister who visted Arab capitals and helped by fueling Arabs anxieties. He often spoke about Hezbollah and its "shi'ite allies" in Tehran. President Bush has even spoke of a "facist ideology" emerging in Lebanon during Israel's war on the country, clearly a reference towards Hezbollah's Shia faith. There was hope that once frightened, Arabs would help settle the Israel-Palestine conflict. Naturally, therefore, we witness the Salafist/Wahhabi Islam in cooperation with Zionists - a state still not recognised by most Arabs countries. Arab leaders are now seen accepting a lesser evil in a fight for survival. Hence, the recent deadly assault on Gaza seems to be both political and religious. Israel and Arabs aiming to finish their mutual foes. War on Gaza is launched as a diversion tactic by Israel. Israel is out to finish one enemy, and to derail the attempt by its friend to make peace with another. President Shimon Peres has been desperately trying to get Washington to postpone talks with Iran. He urged U.S. to delay talks with Iran until June 2009, the date of Iranian presidential elections.
No comments:
Post a Comment