John Sifton, the author of Human Right Watch’s latest report - No Blood, No Foul, as well as Iraqi War vet and friend Ben Allbright will be guests on Jim Lafferty’s radio program tonight on KPFK 90.7 FM out of Los Angeles. For those not in the Los Angeles area you can stream the program live from KPFK’s website.

Jonathan Wade of the UNHCR (Canada) contacted me today and asked me to bring attention to their fundraising efforts for the 600,000 plus people displaced by violence in Lebanon. Here is some background information from the UNHCR…

“UNHCR field teams in mountain areas outside Beirut are buying and distributing supplies of urgently needed items for displaced people while waiting for tonnes of relief goods to be delivered from Syria. Meanwhile, individuals, businesses and local organisations in the Lebanese capital are approaching the refugee agency with offers of financial help and other assistance.

“Since the start of the crisis, our staff have been up in the mountains mapping out the displaced and their priorities, as well as buying supplies. Mattresses, blankets, kitchen sets and supplementary food items such as tinned goods, coffee and jam, as well as milk and diapers are being delivered to schools where thousands of people are living in very cramped circumstances,” said UNHCR’s Arafat Jamal in the Lebanese capital.

Jamal said buying and distribution of these items would continue over the next few days while the UNHCR team awaits the despatch of more than 500 tonnes of emergency relief supplies by convoy from Syria to Lebanon. So far, more than 1,000 mattresses and 1,000 blankets have been purchased in Lebanon and are being distributed.

“It’s important for our relief convoys to get through from Syria as soon as possible. But, we can’t forget this is an insecure and hazardous place to operate, in which it is very difficult to guarantee the safety of anyone involved in the relief effort. Many local trucking companies are keeping their trucks off the roads because of the risk,” Jamal added.

UNHCR will also be sending bales of much needed clothing and blankets to the beleaguered southern coastal city of Sidon tomorrow, as part of a joint UN relief convoy.

An estimated 700,000 people have been displaced within Lebanon by the two-week-old conflict. More than half a million have fled to mountain areas, with about one third sheltering in schools and public buildings and the rest finding temporary homes with host families.

In the mountains north of Beirut, UNHCR and local authorities estimate there are 67,000 people living in 222 public buildings – 43,000 in the Aley valley, 2,500 in Baabda and the rest in Shouf.

The pressure on facilities and the local population is increasing daily. “In the overcrowded shelters, sanitation is a real problem and needs to be fixed quickly. In one school in the Aley valley – housing 400 people – there’s only one bathroom for women. This makes it really tough for people who are already traumatised, anxious and angry,” said Jamal.

The displaced are worried about their future and about how long the generosity of the local population will last. With the school year starting again in about a month’s time, finding alternative accommodation for the displaced will be important.

Apart from the mountain regions, UNHCR staff have also been determining the priority needs of the displaced in other locations in the north and south of Lebanon. In Sidon, 23,000 displaced people were reported as living in schools, with a further 35,000 finding temporary refuge in private homes. Many are being helped by national non-governmental organisations, with local kitchens and restaurants providing food and water.

But there is a great need for mattresses, undergarments and hygiene supplies for women and children. In the northern city of Tripoli, some 2,000 displaced people are spread out over 30 school locations where they are receiving daily meals from local sources. Blankets and mattresses are needed for new arrivals, and sanitation arrangements in schools require immediate upgrading to cope with the numbers of people.

In Beirut on Thursday, UNHCR was approached by individuals, businesses, foundations and organisations who wanted to support the refugee agency in helping the displaced people. “This was unexpected, spontaneous and moving, and we are working to channel these donations to the most needy areas, and to build up valuable partnerships with these generous and important donors,” said Jamal.

UNHCR’s emergency team in Lebanon is being strengthened with the expected arrival in Beirut on Thursday of five further members coming by convoy from Syria. They will join four others already in Beirut to reinforce some two dozen staff on the ground who have worked continuously throughout the crisis.”

I want to congratulate my friend Ruth Fowler on the impending publication of her book ‘Lapdogs’ by Harper Collins. She’s put in a lot of hard work over the last few years contributing to a variety of publications, notably the The Village Voice, not to mention her dedication to her blog, the well known Mimi In New York.

Congrats!

“An Israeli minister said world powers had given Israel the green light to press on by not calling for a halt.”

The world is a convoluted place, spherical proof in actuality that 2+2 is 5. Intentions are seldom what they seem, be they those of friends, family, lovers, husbands, wives, or even nations themselves. It would be wise for you to watch your step and mind yourself out there, there’s no telling what might be waiting to swallow you whole, smiling all the while. Those that would openly call us their enemy have never actually been the real worry, it’s those that wouldn’t that are the concern. Betrayals and deceits occur among us as if the repetition of a lit firecracker brick, ones cataclysmic enough to ruin lives, to push people to the edge of despair, sometimes to even hurl themselves beyond it. The problem, it seems, is to be found at the root, and yet they are seldom dug up. One day a best friend, the next a complete stranger – that is the understanding we have reached with our emotional conveniences. Like a wave built for hundreds of lonely miles out at sea, not until it’s about to make landfall is it seen for what it truly is.

Sometimes the headlines are arrows pointing in all directions but towards the most important one – ourselves. They can be contradictory, suspect, and even purposely misleading - Iran Calls For Ceasefire, Syria Calls For Ceasefire, Rice Warns Syria and Iran Not To Oppose Ceasefire.

Through the roots the nutrients to sustain a thing creep. Strike at the root and confront the truth. No weapon on earth save one can accomplish that objective. And then, no matter ones beliefs in branches or leaves, the whole thing is forfeit. Thus, best to forgo weapons and take our chances with homogeneity.

Last week, Chris Vallance of the BBC contacted me trying to get a hold of Samar to do an interview with her. They’ve since put it online and you can listen to the FiveLive audio here.

Also of interest is this website which shows the cost of the conflict using coffin graphics.

Updated:

» Rome: Mideast conference fails to reach truce deal.

» Gaza: Israeli military attacks in the Gaza Strip have killed 23 Palestinians, including several children.

» Jonathan Cook: Five Myths That Sanction Israel’s War Crimes. An excerpt…

“The first myth is that Israel was forced to pound Lebanon with its military hardware because Hezbollah began “raining down” rockets on the Galilee. Anyone with a short memory can probably recall this was not the first justification we were offered: that had to do with the two soldiers captured by Hezbollah on a border post on July 12.

But presumably Horowitz and his friends realized that 400 Lebanese dead and counting in little more than a week was hard to sell as a “proportionate” response. In any case, Hezbollah kept telling the world how keen it was to return the soldiers in a prisoner swap.”

An Israeli missile attack has killed four unarmed UN observers, one of them a Canadian, at a post in Khiyam. According to the CBC…

“Ireland’s Foreign Ministry said Wednesday that a senior Irish soldier working in south Lebanon warned the Israelis six times that they were putting the lives of UN observers in danger with their air strikes.

“On six separate occasions he was in contact with the Israelis to warn them that their bombardment was endangering the lives of U.N. staff in South Lebanon,” said a spokesperson for Ireland’s Department of Foreign Affairs.

“He warned, ‘You have to address this problem or lives may be lost.’ ”

Annan said Tuesday that Israel had given assurances to the UN that its positions would not be targeted by Israeli forces.

“I am shocked and deeply distressed by the apparently deliberate targeting by Israeli Defence Forces of a UN observer post in southern Lebanon that has killed two UN military observers, with two more feared dead,” Annan said from Rome.â€?

The Prime Minister has not, as of yet, commented on the death of the Canadian observer, though I won’t be surprised if he chalks it up to collateral damage and leaves it at that.

For a round up of today’s more pertinent information, check the front page at AntiWar.

First, Joshua Frank’s piece today entitled Kidnapped in Israel or Captured in Lebanon? Official justification for Israel’s invasion on thin ice is an absolute must read…

“The original story, as most media tell it, goes something like this: Hezbollah attacked an Israeli border patrol station, killing six and taking two soldiers hostage. The incident happened on the Lebanese/Israel border in Israeli territory. The alternate version, as explained by several news outlets, tells a bit of a different tale: These sources contend that Israel sent a commando force into southern Lebanon and was subsequently attacked by Hezbollah near the village of Aitaa al-Chaab, well inside Lebanon’s southern territory. It was at this point that an Israel tank was struck by Hezbollah fighters, which resulted in the capture of two Israeli soldiers and the death of six.â€?

Second, the phosphorus issue has reared its ugly head again.

Third, IDF radio asserted the following yesterday (via The Khleej Times)…

“The Israeli air force is under orders to blast 10 buildings in south Beirut, a Hezbollah stronghold, for every rocket the Shiite militant group fires at the Israeli port of Haifa, army radio said Monday.�

Fourth, Gordon Prather has some very interesting insights regarding the US’s ambassador to the UN, John Bolton.

Finally, Condoleezza Rice’s proposal to immediately deploy up to 10,000 Turkish and Egyptian troops under UN or NATO command following a ceasefire, to be replaced by a larger force of 30,000, has a few hitches…

“Support is building quickly for an international military force to be placed in southern Lebanon, but there remains a small problem: where will the troops come from?

The United States has ruled out its soldiers’ participating, NATO says it is overstretched, Britain feels its troops are overcommitted and Germany says it is willing to participate only if Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia that it would police, agrees to it, a highly unlikely development.

“All the politicians are saying, ‘Great, great’ to the idea of a force, but no one is saying whose soldiers will be on the ground,� said one senior European official. “Everyone will volunteer to be in charge of the logistics in Cyprus.�

There has been strong verbal support for such a force in public, but also private concerns that soldiers would be seen as allied to Israel and would have to fight Hezbollah guerrillas who do not want foreigners, let alone the Lebanese Army, coming between them and the Israelis.

There is also the burden of history. France — which has called the idea of a force premature — and the United States are haunted by their last participation in a multinational force in Lebanon, after the Israeli invasion in 1982, when they became belligerents in the Lebanese civil war and tangled fatally with Hezbollah.

They withdrew in defeat after Hezbollah’s suicide bombing of a Marine barracks in Beirut in October 1983, which killed 241 American service members and 58 French paratroopers.

Israel’s own public position toward an international force has been welcoming, but skeptical, insisting that it be capable of military missions, not just peacekeeping.�

In Why We Fight, Gore Vidal refers to what he calls ‘The United States of Amnesia’, or that bizarre condition that seems to allow those in progressive societies the luxury of ignorance with regards to the actions of their own governments both domestically and internationally.

Iraq, Afghanistan, al-Qaeda, Palestine, terrorism, 9/11 - it’s all become one big annoyance, and that’s precisely how many in this polyurethane paradise view it. For example, events last week in Iraq demonstrated rather blatantly that the civil war that we’re convinced isn’t happening continues not to.

I tend to agree with Vidal, which is why I wanted to mention that two more Canadian soldiers have been killed in a country that, according to droves of rightist cheerleaders, supposedly symbolizes the success of that old but seldom tired assertion that we’re successfully spreading an irreproachable, untainted ideology, and that every life spent is one honorably sacrificed at the alter of freedom. The very same country, by the way, that is basically ungovernable by its new democratically elected government – those parts of the country that actually adhere to the government in Kabul anyway.

To the west, the Israeli’s have, according to the BBC, said that they would be prepared to accept a ‘robust’ peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon, something that I’m sure will win them reprieve with regards to international opinion. And if a ceasefire can be reached, and an international peacekeeping force does occupy southern Lebanon, will the fact that Israel’s bombing of Beirut violated humanitarian law be disregarded?

Should the fact the force that’s being suggested occupy southern Lebanon be comprised of NATO nations be of concern? How can Hizbollah be condemned for fighting a proxy war when a NATO force mandated to neutralize them is comprised and funded by largely pro-Israeli nations? A strong Arab show of support will, of course, be required to calm dissenters, and I would look no further than the Saudis to play that role. In the end, this may turn out to be a hidden victory for the Bush administration, who, after three years of mixed European disfavor, may finally have a considerable multi-national European force in the region to help defuse focus on the United States.

Not that any of us will remember any of this come the morning.

Speaking of slipping under the radar…

I received an email from Samar earlier this afternoon saying that they had made it safely into Jordan. I also came across an interesting article on the BBC about Israel’s small anti-war movement.

Looks like the Canadian flag on top of the car worked. More later.

Updated: Samar has updated her blog from Jordan.

I received a brief email from Samar late last night. She’s leaving Lebanon and attempting to get to Jordan. She told me that she is going to try to keep updating her blog at Dose. I can only hope that she makes it out all right and no harm comes to her or her family.