Israel rules out United Nations role in peacekeeping force
Livni says she backs French offer for aid corridors in Lebanon
By Aluf Benn, Yoav Stern, Amos Harel and News Agencies
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said she was favorable to a French proposal to open humanitarian corridors in Lebanon and urged France to use its influence in the region to push for a full disarmament of Hezbollah.
"We accept (the proposal of humanitarian corridors) because we are not making war on Lebanon, nor on its government, nor on its civilian population," Livni was quoted as saying in an interview for Saturday's edition of Le Figaro daily, made available on Friday.
"We are making war on Hezbollah," she said.
France has pushed for corridors to be set up on both land and maritime routes to ensure that humanitarian aid reaches civilians in Lebanon.
Livni praised French diplomatic efforts in the region and urged the country to "finish its magnificent work in Lebanon" by pressing for the full application of UN resolution 1559 that calls, in part, for the disbanding and disarmament of all militias in Lebanon.
France, which has long-standing historic links to its former colony, Lebanon, helped broker the 2004 resolution and has taken a leading role in working to resolve the current crisis. It was the first country to begin large-scale evacuations of Lebanon, and the first to send a top official, Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin, to Beirut.
The UN humanitarian chief called Friday for a three-day truce between Israel and Hezbollah to evacuate trapped civilians and replenish supplies to areas cut off by the fighting.
Jan Egeland told reporters that thousands of children, elderly and disabled had been stranded after more than two weeks of war, while supplies of food and medicines are dwindling.
He said he hoped the three-day pause could be the start of a larger cessation of hostilities between the two sides.
Egeland said that, for now, he would ask the Israelis and Lebanese "for at least a 72-hour start of the cessation of hostilities, so that we can evacuate wounded, evacuate children, evacuate the elderly and the disabled from the crossfire in southern Lebanon."
He said that humanitarian workers were "stepping up" their work and, awaiting security guarantees and safe routes for convoys, will be able to provide 10,000 to 20,000 tons of food in Lebanon in the next month.
"But is only the cessation of hostilities that will end the suffering of the civilian populations," Egeland said.
UN to remove observers from Israel-Lebanon border
The United Nations will remove unarmed observers from their posts along the Israel-Lebanon border, moving them in with the peacekeeping force in the area, a spokesman said Friday.
The decision came after one of the posts of the observer force, known as
UNTSO, was destroyed by an Israeli airstrike earlier this week, killing four.
"These are unarmed people and this is for their protection," said Milos
Struger, a spokesman for UNIFIL, the peacekeeping force whose 2,000 members have light weapons for self-defense.
UNTSO has about 50 observers in four posts along the border, two of which have already been abandoned - the one that was destroyed at Khiam and a second near the village of Maroun al-Ras, which was abandoned after one of the observers was seriously wounded by Hezbollah gunfire on July 23, said Milos Struger, spokesman for the UNIFIL peacekeepers.
Staff were being removed from the remaining two posts to be placed at UNIFIL posts along the border, Struger said. He would not say whether the move had been completed.
UNTSO - the UN Truce Supervision Organization - was established in 1948 to observe the cease-fire following the war that followed Israel's creation.
UNIFIL - the UN Interim Force in Lebanon - was created after Israel's withdrawal from Lebanon in in 1978. It has over 30 observation posts and bases along the border, monitoring and reporting on violence in the region.
Israel rules out United Nations role in peacekeeping force
Israel's ambassador to the UN ruled out Thursday major UN involvement in any potential international force in Lebanon, saying more professional and better-trained troops were needed for such a volatile situation.
Dan Gillerman also said Israel would not allow the United Nations to join in an investigation of an Israeli air strike that demolished a post belonging to the current UN peacekeeping mission in Lebanon. Four UN observers were killed in the Tuesday strike.
"Israel has never agreed to a joint investigation, and I don't think that if anything happened in this country, or in Britain or in Italy or in France, the government of that country would agree to a joint investigation," Gillerman said.
He apologized for the strike that killed the four UN observers, but said the conflict was a war and that accidents happen.
"This is a war which is going on," he told reporters. "War is an ugly thing and during war, mistakes and tragedies do happen."
Gillerman, who spoke at an event hosted by The Israel Project advocacy group and later inside the United Nations, gave a heated defense of Israel's two-week campaign against Hezbollah militants. He said some diplomats from the Middle East had told him that Israel was doing the right thing in going after Hezbollah.
His refusal to conduct a joint investigation will be a slap to UN officials, who have specifically sought to partner with Israel to investigate the bombing.
Gillerman was highly critical of the current UN peacekeeping force, deployed in a buffer zone between Israel and Lebanon since 1978, saying its facilities had sometimes been used for cover by Hezbollah militants and that it had not done its job.
"It has never been able to prevent any shelling of Israel, any terrorist attack, any kidnappings," he said. "They either didn't see or didn't know or didn't want to see, but they have been hopeless."
Gillerman even mocked the name of the force - the UN Interim Force in Lebanon.
"Interim in UN jargon is 28 years," he said.
The flaws with the UN force make it imperative that any UN force come from somewhere else, though it could have a mandate from the United Nations, he said.
"So obviously it cannot be a United Nations force," Gillerman said. "It will have to be an international force, a professional one, with soldiers from countries who have the training and capabilities to be effective."
Any such force must have two main objectives. It must disarm completely and make sure Hezbollah has lost all its capacity as a terror organization, he said, and it should monitor the border between Syria and Lebanon "to make sure that no additional shipments of arms, rockets, illegal weapons, enter Lebanon."
Despite Israel's opposition to a UN force, Gillerman said Israel was not "excluding anybody," and that "the makeup, the composition and the countries which would supply the soldiers to that force still has to be decided."
Gillerman said Israel would welcome any information from the UN as it conducts its investigation, and will consider any UN requests for information.
UN Council expresses 'shock' over IAF attack on UN post
The UN Security Council adopted a statement on Thursday expressing shock and distress at Israel's bombing of a UN outpost in Lebanon that killed four unarmed UN peacekeepers.
China demanded Thursday morning that Israel apologize for the death of a Chinese UN observer in southern Lebanon on Tuesday. Three other observers - an Austrian, a Canadian, and a Finn - died in the air strike.
The policy statement, which carries less weight than a resolution, was weaker than one proposed by China and other nations, after more than a day of negotiations and objections from the United States, which wanted to make sure Israel was not directly blamed for the attack.
China, expressing frustration at the delay, earlier warned the United States that its opposition to the statement could could jeopardize UN negotiations on a resolution ordering Iran to stop its nuclear enrichment. One of the peacekeepers killed on Tuesday was Chinese. The other three came from Austria, Canada and Finland.
The final draft adopted by the 15-member council eliminated wording "condemning any deliberate attack against UN personnel" as well as a call for a joint Israeli-UN investigation, which UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan had asked for.
Instead, it called on Israel "to conduct a comprehensive inquiry into this incident, taking into account any relevant material from United Nations authorities."
It said the Security Council "is deeply shocked an distressed by the firing by the Israel Defense Forces on a United Nations Observer post in southern Lebanon on 25 July, 2006, which caused the death of four UN military observers."
Israel has apologized and called the incident a mistake.
UN officials said they asked Israel a dozen times to stop bombing near the post in the hours before it was destroyed.
Jane Lute, an American and an assistant secretary-general for peacekeeping, briefed the Security Council that the outpost came under Israeli fire 21 times, including four direct hits.
After the statement was adopted, China's UN Ambassador Wang Guangya said he was relieved action was taken even if the final draft was watered-down. He had previously said that he was frustrated by the U.S. position.
By Aluf Benn, Yoav Stern, Amos Harel and News Agencies
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said she was favorable to a French proposal to open humanitarian corridors in Lebanon and urged France to use its influence in the region to push for a full disarmament of Hezbollah.
"We accept (the proposal of humanitarian corridors) because we are not making war on Lebanon, nor on its government, nor on its civilian population," Livni was quoted as saying in an interview for Saturday's edition of Le Figaro daily, made available on Friday.
"We are making war on Hezbollah," she said.
France has pushed for corridors to be set up on both land and maritime routes to ensure that humanitarian aid reaches civilians in Lebanon.
Livni praised French diplomatic efforts in the region and urged the country to "finish its magnificent work in Lebanon" by pressing for the full application of UN resolution 1559 that calls, in part, for the disbanding and disarmament of all militias in Lebanon.
France, which has long-standing historic links to its former colony, Lebanon, helped broker the 2004 resolution and has taken a leading role in working to resolve the current crisis. It was the first country to begin large-scale evacuations of Lebanon, and the first to send a top official, Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin, to Beirut.
The UN humanitarian chief called Friday for a three-day truce between Israel and Hezbollah to evacuate trapped civilians and replenish supplies to areas cut off by the fighting.
Jan Egeland told reporters that thousands of children, elderly and disabled had been stranded after more than two weeks of war, while supplies of food and medicines are dwindling.
He said he hoped the three-day pause could be the start of a larger cessation of hostilities between the two sides.
Egeland said that, for now, he would ask the Israelis and Lebanese "for at least a 72-hour start of the cessation of hostilities, so that we can evacuate wounded, evacuate children, evacuate the elderly and the disabled from the crossfire in southern Lebanon."
He said that humanitarian workers were "stepping up" their work and, awaiting security guarantees and safe routes for convoys, will be able to provide 10,000 to 20,000 tons of food in Lebanon in the next month.
"But is only the cessation of hostilities that will end the suffering of the civilian populations," Egeland said.
UN to remove observers from Israel-Lebanon border
The United Nations will remove unarmed observers from their posts along the Israel-Lebanon border, moving them in with the peacekeeping force in the area, a spokesman said Friday.
The decision came after one of the posts of the observer force, known as
UNTSO, was destroyed by an Israeli airstrike earlier this week, killing four.
"These are unarmed people and this is for their protection," said Milos
Struger, a spokesman for UNIFIL, the peacekeeping force whose 2,000 members have light weapons for self-defense.
UNTSO has about 50 observers in four posts along the border, two of which have already been abandoned - the one that was destroyed at Khiam and a second near the village of Maroun al-Ras, which was abandoned after one of the observers was seriously wounded by Hezbollah gunfire on July 23, said Milos Struger, spokesman for the UNIFIL peacekeepers.
Staff were being removed from the remaining two posts to be placed at UNIFIL posts along the border, Struger said. He would not say whether the move had been completed.
UNTSO - the UN Truce Supervision Organization - was established in 1948 to observe the cease-fire following the war that followed Israel's creation.
UNIFIL - the UN Interim Force in Lebanon - was created after Israel's withdrawal from Lebanon in in 1978. It has over 30 observation posts and bases along the border, monitoring and reporting on violence in the region.
Israel rules out United Nations role in peacekeeping force
Israel's ambassador to the UN ruled out Thursday major UN involvement in any potential international force in Lebanon, saying more professional and better-trained troops were needed for such a volatile situation.
Dan Gillerman also said Israel would not allow the United Nations to join in an investigation of an Israeli air strike that demolished a post belonging to the current UN peacekeeping mission in Lebanon. Four UN observers were killed in the Tuesday strike.
"Israel has never agreed to a joint investigation, and I don't think that if anything happened in this country, or in Britain or in Italy or in France, the government of that country would agree to a joint investigation," Gillerman said.
He apologized for the strike that killed the four UN observers, but said the conflict was a war and that accidents happen.
"This is a war which is going on," he told reporters. "War is an ugly thing and during war, mistakes and tragedies do happen."
Gillerman, who spoke at an event hosted by The Israel Project advocacy group and later inside the United Nations, gave a heated defense of Israel's two-week campaign against Hezbollah militants. He said some diplomats from the Middle East had told him that Israel was doing the right thing in going after Hezbollah.
His refusal to conduct a joint investigation will be a slap to UN officials, who have specifically sought to partner with Israel to investigate the bombing.
Gillerman was highly critical of the current UN peacekeeping force, deployed in a buffer zone between Israel and Lebanon since 1978, saying its facilities had sometimes been used for cover by Hezbollah militants and that it had not done its job.
"It has never been able to prevent any shelling of Israel, any terrorist attack, any kidnappings," he said. "They either didn't see or didn't know or didn't want to see, but they have been hopeless."
Gillerman even mocked the name of the force - the UN Interim Force in Lebanon.
"Interim in UN jargon is 28 years," he said.
The flaws with the UN force make it imperative that any UN force come from somewhere else, though it could have a mandate from the United Nations, he said.
"So obviously it cannot be a United Nations force," Gillerman said. "It will have to be an international force, a professional one, with soldiers from countries who have the training and capabilities to be effective."
Any such force must have two main objectives. It must disarm completely and make sure Hezbollah has lost all its capacity as a terror organization, he said, and it should monitor the border between Syria and Lebanon "to make sure that no additional shipments of arms, rockets, illegal weapons, enter Lebanon."
Despite Israel's opposition to a UN force, Gillerman said Israel was not "excluding anybody," and that "the makeup, the composition and the countries which would supply the soldiers to that force still has to be decided."
Gillerman said Israel would welcome any information from the UN as it conducts its investigation, and will consider any UN requests for information.
UN Council expresses 'shock' over IAF attack on UN post
The UN Security Council adopted a statement on Thursday expressing shock and distress at Israel's bombing of a UN outpost in Lebanon that killed four unarmed UN peacekeepers.
China demanded Thursday morning that Israel apologize for the death of a Chinese UN observer in southern Lebanon on Tuesday. Three other observers - an Austrian, a Canadian, and a Finn - died in the air strike.
The policy statement, which carries less weight than a resolution, was weaker than one proposed by China and other nations, after more than a day of negotiations and objections from the United States, which wanted to make sure Israel was not directly blamed for the attack.
China, expressing frustration at the delay, earlier warned the United States that its opposition to the statement could could jeopardize UN negotiations on a resolution ordering Iran to stop its nuclear enrichment. One of the peacekeepers killed on Tuesday was Chinese. The other three came from Austria, Canada and Finland.
The final draft adopted by the 15-member council eliminated wording "condemning any deliberate attack against UN personnel" as well as a call for a joint Israeli-UN investigation, which UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan had asked for.
Instead, it called on Israel "to conduct a comprehensive inquiry into this incident, taking into account any relevant material from United Nations authorities."
It said the Security Council "is deeply shocked an distressed by the firing by the Israel Defense Forces on a United Nations Observer post in southern Lebanon on 25 July, 2006, which caused the death of four UN military observers."
Israel has apologized and called the incident a mistake.
UN officials said they asked Israel a dozen times to stop bombing near the post in the hours before it was destroyed.
Jane Lute, an American and an assistant secretary-general for peacekeeping, briefed the Security Council that the outpost came under Israeli fire 21 times, including four direct hits.
After the statement was adopted, China's UN Ambassador Wang Guangya said he was relieved action was taken even if the final draft was watered-down. He had previously said that he was frustrated by the U.S. position.
posted by shummer60 at Friday, July 28, 2006
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