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There are numerous occupied people around the world seeking statehood or national liberation, including Kurds, Tibetans and Turkish Armenians. The only group that has received official recognition by the UN, including observer status and the right to speak and participate in committed work, is the same group that invented modern international terrorism – namely the Palestinians.

A huge oil spill in the eastern Mediterranean has caused colossal damage to Israel’s beaches, now gooey with clumps of tar that thousands of volunteers are laboriously picking out of the sand. It has been an unparalleled ecological disaster that has already done, and will continue to do, great harm to the coastal flora and fauna. It has devastated the local economy. For at least a year, and some estimates suggest much longer, tourists and locals will not be able to use the beaches; many will have to seek alternatives abroad. Coastal businesses in Israel, from vacation rentals to restaurants,...

Australia on Monday announced it had ended direct aid to the Palestinian Authority (PA) government over concerns the funds could be used to assist Palestinians convicted of political violence. Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said Australia would no longer be giving its yearly funding of A$10 million (€6.9 million, $7.5 million) to the World Bank’s trust fund for Palestinian recovery and development. “I wrote to the Palestinian Authority on May 29, to seek clear assurance that Australian funding is not being used to assist Palestinians convicted of politically motivated violence,” Bishop said in a statement. “I am confident that previous Australian...

Lebanon-based Hizbullah chief Hassan Nasrallah has rejected a call by visiting United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon for his terrorist organization to disarm, saying "The resistance is here to stay." Ban told a news conference Friday after meeting with Lebanese leaders, "I am deeply concerned about the military capacity of Hizbullah and... the lack of progress in disarmament," referring to the requirement for the terrorist group to disarm set forth in the ceasefire agreement with Israel that ended the 2006 Second Lebanon War. Instead, Hizbullah has increased its weapons arsenal to a level beyond that which it had prior to the...

The European Union (EU) on Friday offered to take charge of Gaza's border crossings and work to prevent illegal arms flows, according to The Associated Press (AP). The EU is prepared "to play a strong role" in managing the crossings while assuring that Israel's security is guaranteed, said the 28-nation bloc's foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton. The EU offered to reactivate and extend its monitoring of the Rafiah crossing with Egypt and other border posts, provided there will be a UN Security Council mandate for the mission and a sustainable cease-fire in place, according to AP. In addition, the EU...

Israel is calling for removal of two United Nations soldiers from Lebanon after photographs surfaced of the soldiers saluting the coffins of Hezbollah terrorists during a prisoner exchange Wednesday. Associated Press photographer Mohammed Zaatari captured an image of the troops paying homage to fallen Hezbollah fighters as trucks bearing their coffins drove through the city of Tyre in southern Lebanon. The blue-helmet U.N. troops, who operate under the auspices of the U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), are meant disarm Hezbollah in southern Lebanon and be an impartial buffer along the country’s border with Israel. Israel’s ambassador to the United...

Despite the 20,000 troops deployed in southern Lebanon, the United Nations admits that weapons smuggling from Syria continues unhindered. A German report finds UNIFIL does not patrol after dark. Hizbullah terrorists are free to roam at night without fear of being identified by the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), according to a report by the German paper Der Spiegel. UNIFIL commanders were interviewed by the paper, saying their function is to "observe changes in the behavior of the local population," with Spanish UNIFIL official Richard Ortax admitting that no patrols are carried out at night “because of the...

A UNIFIL officer said the Lebanese army has granted Hizbullah areas to patrol. One terrorist guerilla leader vows war by the summer. (IsraelNN.com) The Lebanese army has made a deal with Hizbullah terrorist guerillas, dividing up patrols in southern Lebanon, according to an officer of the United Nations Interim Forces (UNIFIL). Hajj Ali, a Hizbullah terrorist leader who lives in the village of Bint Jbil near the Israeli border, declared, "There will be another war in the summer. It is the beginning of the end for Israel; we are preparing." "Hizbullah still dominates the south, its security men policing the...

Israel: UNIFIL hiding info about Hezbollah from Security Council By Barak Ravid, Haaretz Correspondent Last update - 08:16 28/04/2008 www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/978382.html The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) is intentionally concealing information about Hezbollah activities south of the Litani River in Lebanon to avoid conflict with the group, senior sources in Jerusalem have said. In the last six months there have been at least four cases in which UNIFIL soldiers identified armed Hezbollah operatives, but did nothing and did not submit full reports on the incidents to the UN Security Council. The Israel Defense Forces and the Foreign Ministry are...

DURING THE RECENT month-long war between Hezbollah and Israel, U.N. "peacekeeping" forces made a startling contribution: They openly published daily real-time intelligence, of obvious usefulness to Hezbollah, on the location, equipment, and force structure of Israeli troops in Lebanon.UNIFIL--the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon, a nearly 2,000-man blue-helmet contingent that has been present on the Lebanon-Israel border since 1978--is officially neutral. Yet, throughout the recent war, it posted on its website for all to see precise information about the movements of Israeli Defense Forces soldiers and the nature of their weaponry and materiel, even specifying the placement of IDF...

www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1170359786340&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull Defense officials slammed UNIFIL and the Lebanese government Monday night, claiming that their "slackness" was what enabled Hizbullah to plant five deadly explosive devices along the border between Israel and Lebanon. IDF officials said it was possible that the bombs were planted as part of a planned kidnapping attack similar to the July 12 abduction of reservists Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser that sparked the war this past summer. Defense Minister Amir Peretz transmitted a harsh-worded message to UNIFIL command in Lebanon and urged the peacekeeping force to crack down on Hizbullah and prevent the guerrilla group from returning...

The European-led United Nations peacekeeping force in Lebanon known as UNIFIL is proof positive, if any were needed, of why Europe is unlikely to ever be a global superpower. When the 13,400-member force was scratched together following last summer’s 34-day war between Israel and Hezbollah, Europeans said their kinder, gentler “soft power” approach to peacekeeping would teach the United States a thing or two about global politics. While the United States starts wars, Europe ends them, or so they claimed. But today Lebanon is on the verge of political collapse, a defiant Hezbollah has rearmed to the hilt and rumors...

The United Nations peacekeeping force to be deployed in Lebanon is facing further criticism after the admission that its forces will not even be allowed to intercept shipments of arms to Hezbollah from Syria. Speaking in Brussels before heading to the region, Kofi Annan, pictured below, the UN Secretary-General, confirmed that the 15,000-strong force will not meet Israeli demands to police the routes used by the militia to smuggle missiles from Syria. "Troops are not going in there to disarm - let's be clear," he said. Instead, the Unifil force will only carry out interception missions if asked by the...

Though southern Lebanon swarms with thousands of United Nations soldiers, Hezbollah continues to rearm at breakneck speed. If the embarrassing oil-for-food scandal in Iraq and the botched UN operations in Liberia, Sudan, Rwanda, Columbia, Kashmir and Angola weren?t enough to convince you the United Nations is a decrepit organization, then what?s currently unraveling in Lebanon probably won?t. Like fire ants that just had their hill kicked over, Hezbollah soldiers are rebuilding, reshaping and restocking the infrastructure and arsenal that was destroyed and depleted this past summer. Tunnels and trenches are being redug; aid and supplies are flowing in; telecommunication lines...

srael’s Military Intelligence chief said Tuesday that the Lebanon-based terrorist army Hizballah has constructed a massive underground military infrastructure under the noses of U.N. observers, The Jerusalem Post reported. "The only thing that is different from the situation before the war is that Hizballah flags aren't being flown," said Brig.-Gen. Yossi Baidatz, head of Military Intelligence's Research Division. In the nearly two years since Hizballah's war with Israel, which was ended by a U.N. Security Council Resolution calling for the terrorist army's disarmament, Hizballah has doubled the size and scope of its rocket arsenal with weapons smuggled from Iran and...

CNSNews.com) - A Hizballah-based mortar attack, which fell short of its target in Israel on Sunday and injured three Chinese members of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), has received scant media attention and no reaction from U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan. Late last month, after four U.N. peacekeepers were killed in an Israeli air strike in southern Lebanon, Annan said he was "shocked and deeply distressed" at the "apparently deliberate targeting" of the outpost. While information about Sunday's incident was not immediately available from the United Nations in New York, news accounts in China reported that "A...

BEIRUT: The Lebanese Army on Wednesday dismantled drainage pipes installed by the Israeli Army near Kfar Kila to divert rainwater into Lebanon, as UNIFIL said that Israel had not violated Lebanese territory in the process. Troops from the Lebanese Army, in the presence of French and Spanish peacekeepers, removed the pipes and filled in ditches dug on Tuesday by Israeli troops after crossing the UN Blue Line in Adaisseh, near the Israeli-Lebanese border. The Lebanese Army Command released a statement on Wednesday outlining the operation. "A tall sand wall was built as a shield in response to the [Israeli] violation...

Two years ago, the United Nations Security Council passed resolution 1559, ordering the terrorist group Hezbollah out of Lebanon. Of course, they didn't mean it. This summer, when Israel started to kick Hezbollah out of Lebanon by force, the UN intervened to stop them. The UN hadn't done anything about Hezbollah rockets attacking Israeli towns, or Hezbollah terrorists kidnapping Israeli soldiers. They hadn't done anything about Iran and Syria supplying and training Hezbollah. But they moved quickly to stop Israel from defending itself and extirpating the thugs. For some reason, Israel agreed to the UN-brokered ceasefire. Perhaps it should not...

Concern follows France, Italy decide to withdraw significant number of troops from the UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon. Israel is growing concerned that UNIFIL, the multi-national peacekeeping force in Lebanon, is headed toward collapse with a French decision this week to withdraw a significant number of its troops. Following the Second Lebanon War in 2006, Israel succeeded in getting a number of European countries to contribute soldiers to the peacekeeping force, whose mandate was also beefed up as part of an international effort to prevent Hezbollah’s rearmament. The force was bolstered to include 12,000 soldiers in comparison to the few...

Friday's attack on a French contingent of UNIFIL was a message from Syria, former prime minister Saad Hariri said over the weekend. "Another #Syrian message," Hariri tweeted Saturday in response to a question seeking comment on the attack. "Another #syrian message from Bashar," he later said. Five French peacekeepers with the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon were wounded Friday when a roadside bomb ripped through their vehicle as they travelled in Bourj al-Shemali, near the southern coastal city of Tyre. The attack was condemned by Lebanese officials, including Prime Minister Najib Mikati, President Michel Sleiman and Hezbollah. Both the...