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FYI - Statement from the General Secretary of Hizballah His Excellency Sayyid Hasan NasrallahStatement from the General Secretary of Hizballah His Excellency Sayyid Hasan Nasrallah To the Nation, the Lebanese people, the resistance fighters, the Zionists, and the Arab leaders. Translated by Muhammad Abu Nasr 07/15/06 "Information Clearing House" -- -- ...In this first address that I give in these days following Operation True Promise, I would like to say a few words – a word to the Lebanese people, a word to the resistance fighters, a word to the Zionists, and a word to the Arab rulers. I will not offer words to the international community because I have never for one day believed that there is any such thing as an international community, just as many in our nation feel. First, I say to the Lebanese people: dear people – who embraced the resistance, by whom the resistance was victorious, and for whom the resistance won its victory on 25 May 2000 – this people who were the makers of the first victory in the history of the Arab struggle with the Israeli enemy, despite the basic inequality in forces, and in spite of the fact that the majority of our Arab brothers and the majority of our Muslim brothers abandoned us and despite the silence of the whole world, this Lebanese people made the miracle of the victory that stunned the world and humiliated the Zionists. Those Zionists look upon this people in a special, unique way because they accomplished in the history of the struggle with them a special and unique accomplishment. The battle today is no longer a battle over prisoners or the exchange of prisoners. It might be said that the Zionist enemy is responding any time there is any operation where men are captured anywhere in any part of the world, by any army or any state that has borders and regulations. What is taking place today is not a response to a capture of their soldiers; it is a squaring of accounts with the people, resistance, state, army, political forces, regions, villages, and families that inflicted that historic defeat on that aggressive usurper entity that has never accepted its defeat. Today, therefore, this is a total war that Zionism is waging to clear its whole account with Lebanon, the Lebanese people, the Lebanese state, the Lebanese army, and the Lebanese resistance, in revenge and reprisal for the victory they won on 25 May 2000. Dear steadfast, mujahid, and noble people, I know that the overwhelming majority of this people, in their minds, hearts, wills, culture, thoughts, love, passion, and sacrifice are a people of nobility, dignity, honor, distinction, and pride, not a people of servility, subservience, submissiveness, and surrender. I say to you that in this battle we are faced with two choices – not “we” as in Hizballah, or as in the resistance, the Hizballah resistance – but Lebanon as a state, a people, an army, a resistance, and a political power – we are faced with two choices: either to submit today to the conditions that the Zionist enemy wants to dictate to us all, using the pressure, support, and backing it has from America, from around the world, and, I’m sorry to say, from Arabs. Either we submit completely to its conditions, which means taking Lebanon into an Israeli age under Israeli domination – in total frankness this is the extent of the matter – or we stand steadfast. That is the other choice: that we persevere, that we persevere and confront.... During the Grapes of Wrath in 1996, or the clearing of accounts in 1993, in the beginning they had the upper hand and our situation was much worse. But today, the situation is different. Believe me, and I mean this, the situation now is different. All that we need is to persevere, stand steadfast, and confront them united, and I know and I will bet that the majority of our people are a people of steadfastness, a mujahid people who can sacrifice, who have no need for pep talks. What I’m saying now is only by way of completing the idea, and affirming the choice, and clarifying what this means. Now, as for my words for the resistance fighters, for my dear and beloved brothers: upon them rest the hopes of every Lebanese, every Palestinian, every Arab, every Muslim, every free and decent person in this world, every oppressed, tortured victim of injustice, every lover of steadfastness, courage, dignity, values, and nobility – the characteristics they embody by their presence on the field of battle and in their fight with this enemy... To the Zionists, to the people of the Zionist entity at this hour I say to them: you will soon discover how foolish and stupid are your new rulers, your new leaders. They do not know how to assess reality. They have no experience in this area. You Zionists say in opinion polls that you believe me more than you believe your officials. So now I call on you to listen well and believe me. Today we have persevered despite the attack that took place last night in the southern suburbs. However the attacks multiply in every village, neighborhood, street, and home in Lebanon, there is no difference between the south Beirut suburbs, the City of Beirut, or any home in south Lebanon, in the Beqaa, or the north, or Mount Lebanon, or any corner of Lebanon. The equation has now changed. I will not say today that if you strike Beirut, we will strike Haifa. I will not tell you that if you hit the south Beirut suburbs, we will hit Haifa. You wanted to get rid of that equation, so now we and you have got rid of it in actuality. You wanted open warfare, and we are going into open warfare. We are ready for it, a war on every level. To Haifa, and, believe me, to beyond Haifa, and to beyond beyond Haifa. Not only we will be paying a price. Not only our houses will be destroyed. Not only our children will be killed. Not only our people will be displaced. Those days are past. That was how it was before 1982, and before the year 2000. Those times have come to an end. I promise you those times have passed. Therefore you must also bear the responsibility for what your government has done, for what that government has undertaken. From now on, you wanted open warfare, so it will be open warfare. You wanted it. Your government wanted to change the rules of the game, so let the rules then be changed. You don’t know today whom you’re fighting. You are fighting the children of Muhammad, of Ali, of al-Hasan, of al-Husayn, of the Prophet’s family, the Prophet’s Companions. You are fighting a people who have faith such as no one else on the face of the earth possesses. And you have chosen open warfare with a people who take pride in their history, their civilization, and their culture, and who also possess material power, ability, expertise, knowledge, calm, imagination, determination, steadfastness, and courage. In the coming days it will be between us and you, God willing. As to the Arab rulers, I don’t want to ask you about your history. I just want to say a few words. We are adventurers. We in Hizballah are adventurers, yes. But we have been adventurers since 1982. And we have brought to our country only victory, freedom, liberation, dignity, honor, and pride. This is our history. This is our experience. This is our adventure. In the year 1982 you said and the world said that we were crazy. But we proved that we were the rational ones, so who then was crazy? This is something else and I don’t want to get into an argument with anyone. So I tell them simply: go bet on your reason and we will bet on our adventure, with God as our Supporter and Benefactor. We have never for one day counted on you. We have trusted in God, our people, our hearts, our hands, and our children. Today we do the same, and God willing, victory will follow. The surprises that I promised you will begin starting now. Now, out at sea off the coast of Beirut an Israeli military vessel that attacked our infrastructure, that struck the homes of our people, our civilians; you can see it burning. It will sink and with it dozens of Zionist Israeli troops. This is the beginning. There will be a lot more said before the end. Peace be upon you and the mercy of God! General Secretary of Hizballah, His Excellency Sayyid Hasan Nasrallah, to the Nation, the Lebanese people, the resistance fighters, the Zionists, and the Arab leaders. Translated by Muhammad Abu Nasr Friday, 14 July 2006. Arabic original at: Bookmark/Search this post with: 
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Kidnapping your son or daughter.
What would you do to this person if he kidnapped your son or daughter?
I would join 'Courage to Refuse'
Look who's been kidnapped!
Hundreds of Palestinian 'suspects' have been kidnapped from their homes and will never stand trial
Arik Diamant
It's the wee hours of the morning, still dark outside. A guerilla force comes out of nowhere to kidnap a soldier. After hours of careful movement, the force reaches its target, and the ambush is on! In seconds, the soldier finds himself looking down the barrel of a rifle.
A smash in the face with the butt of the gun and the soldier falls to the ground, bleeding. The kidnappers pick him up, quickly tie his hands and blindfold him, and disappear into the night.
This might be the end of the kidnapping, but the nightmare has just begun. The soldier's mother collapses, his father prays. His commanding officers promise to do everything they can to get him back, his comrades swear revenge. An entire nation is up-in-arms, writing in pain and worry.
Nobody knows how the soldier is: Is he hurt? Do his captors give him even a minimum of human decency, or are they torturing him to death by trampling his honor? The worst sort of suffering is not knowing. Will he come home? And if so, when? And in what condition? Can anyone remain apathetic in the light of such drama?
Israeli terror
This description, you'll be surprised to know, has nothing to do with the kidnapping of Gilad Shalit. It is the story of an arrest I carried out as an IDF soldier, in the Nablus casbah, about 10 years ago. The "soldier" was a 17-year-old boy, and we kidnapped him because he knew "someone" who had done "something."
We brought him tied up, with a burlap sac over his head, to a Shin Bet interrogation center known as "Scream Hill" (at the time we thought it was funny). There, the prisoner was beaten, violently shaken and sleep deprived for weeks or months. Who knows.
No one wrote about it in the paper. European diplomats were not called to help him. After all, there was nothing out of the ordinary about the kidnapping of this Palestinian kid. Over the 40 years of occupation we have kidnapped thousands of people, exactly like Gilad Shalit was captured: Threatened by a gun, beaten mercilessly, with no judge or jury, or witnesses, and without providing the family with any information about the captive.
When the Palestinians do this, we call it "terror." When we do it, we work overtime to whitewash the atrocity.
Suspects?
Some people will say: The IDF doesn't "just" kidnap. These people are "suspects." There is no more perverse lie than this. In all the years I served, I reached one simple conclusion: What makes a "suspect"? Who, exactly suspects him, and of what?
Who has the right to sentence a 17-year-old to kidnapping, torture and possible death? A 26-year-old Shin Bet interrogator? A 46-year-old one? Do these people have any higher education, apart from the ability to interrogate? What are his considerations? I all these "suspects" are so guilty, why not bring them to trial?
Anyone who believes that despite the lack of transparency, the IDF and Shin Bet to their best to minimize violations of human rights is naïve, if not brainwashed. One need only read the testimonies of soldiers who have carried out administrative detentions to be convinced of the depth of the immorality of our actions in the territories.
To this very day, there are hundreds of prisoners rotting in Shin Bet prisons and dungeons, people who have never been –and never will be – tried. And Israelis are silently resolved to this phenomenon.
Israeli responsibility
The day Gilad Shalit was kidnapped I rode in a taxi. The driver told me we must go into Gaza, start shooting people one-by-one, until someone breaks and returns the hostage. It isn't clear that such an operation would bring Gilad back alive.
Instead of getting dragged into terrorist responses, as Palestinian society has done, we should release some of the soldiers and civilians we have kidnapped. This is appropriate, right, and could bring about an air of reconciliation in the territories.
Hell, if this is what will bring Gilad home safe-and-sound, we have a responsibility to him to do it.
Arik Diamant is an IDF reservist and the head of the Courage to Refuse organization
http://www.ynetnews.com/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-3271505,00.html
...
vees, it is a great thing you published the "nasralah article". And it is very important to understand what that guy preaches. Maybe not for us, but for the ones making decisions. This is what ordinary people in Lebanon will hear.
I find it very stupid for Israel to go to such raids. What if they suceed in eradicating every Hezbollah member? New people will be drawn to the cause.
I hope nobody will declare me to be anti-Jew if I say that Arabs have full right to consider Israel its enemy which they should wage war against. After all, there was no Israel (as a state) 70 years ago. And it was taken by arms only to fulfill some murky (well at least to me) religious and ideological goals. Now, war itself is ugly and stupid, and terrorism is even more frigtening.
Frankly , I do not see a way out of this situation until the time both Arabs and Jews forget their history (probably never).
And the stupidest thing is that this affects the whole world, and even I am endangered if somebody gets to think that my life along with many others is less important than his bloody, explosive message to the world.
is this appropriate?
why this forum of a highly respected Debian users/programmers community wants to associate itself with a trerrorist clique, which kidnaps and kills civillians, and starts a screamy appeal to the entire world when being dealt with by a true military force? This leaves a bad taste in my mouth after tasting a true delicious content of this site. What connection is there between this topic and the debian? why should we read it here, if we visit this site for something else? It is really offtop and should be thrown away (nor does it fit into political economy - rather into demagogy, covardice, deception, perpetrating terror) -why would admin give a platform and disk space for this shit?:(
on a political forum? sure
Privet Andrei,
Ever heard of the concept of 'know your enemy'?
Hearing somebody's point of view does not automatically entail endorsing this view or the person expressing it. It just an opportunity to try to understand.
I posted this FYI - For Your Information. Since what is going on in the Middle East might well have far reaching consequences you might find it interesting to now what the parties to the conflit have to say. You can get Olmert's and Bush's point of view anywhere in the corporate press, I got Nasrallah's point of view only on http://www.informationclearinghouse.info . I thought that anyone interested by the political forum might be interested in understanding this conflict and that, in turn, mandates understanding the point of view of the parties to the conflict.
The corporate media publised plenty short quotes of Nasrallah's words, but nobody bothered translating it. If you prefer short quotes or hearing only one point of view - you can go to any corporate media outlets.
Cheers,
VS
Motto: chown -R linux:GNU world
Distros: Debian, Kanotix, Frenzy, Damn Small Linux
Privet VS, well the current
Privet VS,
well the current situation reminds me slightly of 9/11 - some small terrorist attack/kidnapping (in fact just the last one in a long row of hits over the years) and a full scale war in response.
There were also a lot of speeches by osama bin laden, on tape, in internet, whoever wanted to read or listen have found them.
Ok, they were not much different from the present speach of Nasrallah.
In that I have not understood a thing from it. Not very much different from christian preachers, not very much different from communist propaganda - I had enough of this brainwashing before.
The thing of the major importance for the discussed stuff - is the immediate cause leading to the loss by Lebanon of what it gained in the recent years. (actually discussed in the neighboring thread) - not clarified in the speach of nasralah
The thing I understood from 9/11 though - was that we are dealing with yet another corporation, who is in desperate fight for their market share... well they stepped into already saturated market.
And I do not listen to the corporations and their outlets, not the ones which spread Bush,Olmerts, etc. opinions, not the ones owned by osama,nasrallah&co
so we should be carefull not to give a stand to a newcomer corporation (and I understand corporation in a wide sense) which perpetrates the same agenda as the familiar old ones. One thing they have in common - enriching the corporation's leadership at the expense of corporation supporters (customers).
have a nice day.
how about Hitler debating Churchill?
Privet Tseska (tak ono est),
Don't you think a live TV debate between, say, Hitler and Churchill would have been most profitable for many, if not all, Europeans in, say, 1937? Pluralism and the expression of ALL points of view are, IMHO, the key factor in true individual freedom. Of course, there are those out there who rathter tell us that things are just like in Orwell's 1984: one really good side and one terribly bad side. They would rather tell us:" these are the bad guys, hate them, never listen to anytyhing they say, because they are scumsbags you see, and simply have a good doubleplusgoodbellyfeel rejection their crimethink". I personally rather hear each side out and make up my own mind.
Remember how the doubleplusgoodthinkers in the Soviet Union used to say that Solzhenitsyn is a traitor, an enemy of the people, a Jew, a lackey of the capitalists, etc. but when asked whether they have ever read his books they would answer "I don't read this kind of trash". Remember?
I do not want to live by the example of the doubleplusgoodthinkers. YMMV.
Also - by whom exactly is the Debian community respected? If it is by those who cherish and love freedom, they will also love it plurality of views and freedom of expression. If it is respected buy those who rather have ONE opinion, ONE point of view and ONE Truth - then I do not think we need their respect. Besides, most of those folks would use Windoze of Mac and think of us as "hippies" and "zealots" - so how cares?
Lastly, it is supposed to also be an American value to cheer for the underdog. The least they can do in this conflict is at least hear him out before cheering for the one with the big guns and big money, no?
(notice - I did *not* write 'side with' only 'hear out'. these are different things altogether)
Kind regards,
VS
PS: 'a few words from the commander in chief'
Here are the words of wisdom pronounced off-mike (or so he thought) by Dubya yesteraday:
"See the irony is that what they need to do is get Syria to get Hezbollah to stop doing this shit and it's over," (full article here: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/07/17/world/printable1807304.shtml)
LOL. These are the words of the very same President who wanted Syria OUT of Lebanon and now wants them to act back INSIDE again. MPD?!
Motto: chown -R linux:GNU world
Distros: Debian, Kanotix, Frenzy, Damn Small Linux
Hitler chats with Stalin over Internet
Sorry Teska, but after I hear your example with Hitler we have little to talk about.
I have a view of the world fundamentally different from yours.
Briefly I can summarize it in a way, that discussion is good with people who actually aim to discuss.
Those who aim to kill are dealt with in a military way. And it has nothing to do with pluralism, freedom of expression, underdog cheering, american values, doubleplusthinking - whatsoever. Don't appeal to american values, I'm not american and my values are vastly different form american values.
Perharps you are american, but otherwise I see no reason for using american values in this situation, the conflict is bw Israel and Hezbollah, and is not taking place in America. I find it appropriate to use american values to resolve situaions in America.
Perharps you find it usefull to organize a debate between Hitler and Cherchill, perharps also Stalin, perharps not only TV but an interactive chat in the internet. Please, go forward, spend your time for this. It's your right to do your imaginary experiments. In these terms I find it completely OK posting the chizofrenic speaches of nasralah, nascalah, nablevalah, who else is out there, etc. To your pleasure.
One thing I find inapropriate in your post is clear tailoring of mentally impaired people with just one Opinion Truth, etc, to the usage of M$and Mc.
Of course you can always talk yourself out, saying you did not mean exactly this, but any way that's how your post sounds.
using M$, Mc,Debian , etc, is a matter of choice: which is a technical purpose for you sitting at computer, what kind of task do you need to do, and with which effort (financial time, etc).
I don't think that creators and developers of Debian had in mind separating "smart and openminded champions of pluralism and freedom of speach, bla, bla, bla" from those with ONE TRUTH, OPINION, bla,bla, and whose respect we will never need. Because that's already sounds like something from which hitler, stalin, and co take their start.
Yourself sure why do you belong to debian comunity?
perharps this quote may help you sort the things out for yourself and find whether your usage of Debian is for wright or perharps for wrong reason:
Martin Krafft's excellent book, The Debian System, includes a useful appendix setting out reasons for and, crucially, against using Debian. These can be briefly summarised as follows:
Reasons why you should run Debian:
1. You are experienced/confident in using Linux and/or Unix generally, or you are willing to go up a steeper learning curve than for many other distros, in return for long-term ease of maintenance.
2. You need specialist features offered by Debian, eg consistency across multiple hardware platforms.
3. You value stability over the bleeding-edge.
4. You want full control over your system without too many intermediate layers between you and "the core of Linux".
5. You have a particularly strong commitment to software freedom.
6. Most important of all, perhaps: ""you want to use Debian for whatever reason, and are self-confident about the desire".
Reasons why you should not run Debian:
1. You are new to Linux/Unix.
2. You need to use top-of-the-line hardware (since Debian minimises the number of external kernel patches it applies by default).
3. You want to run Debian because "it is cool".
4. You want a system that Just Works(TM) without your having to figure out how it works or what to do to make it work.
the big difference
Dorogoi Tseska,
I have read Martin Krafft's - indeed excellent - book and I do not see much point in discussing with you the reasons why I use and love Debian.
As for the rest of your post, it uses plenty of words to mask one simple aim: to silence the opinions you disagree with. We have, indeed, very different values. I will continue posting what I consider interesting and under-represented points of view in the political forum and you can react by expressing your outrage at mine doing so.
Kind regards and best wishes,
VS
Motto: chown -R linux:GNU world
Distros: Debian, Kanotix, Frenzy, Damn Small Linux
The Debian Soul
Then I read The Debian Manifesto, that is in the book too, I found the following two snippets interesting then it come to explain the Debian soul.
"the focus will be on providing a first-class product and not on profits or returns"
"The time has come to concentrate on the future of Linux rather than on the destructive goal of enriching oneself at the expense of the entire Linux community and its future."
The Debian soul is anti capitalistic. And that is also the reason behind the social contract that establish that "Debian will remain 100% free". To be anticapitalistic whose days mean that you are an outsider in many ways. The main difference between the mainstream capitalistic world, and their supporters, and the others are that the others have power to reamind unaffected and think independent. And doing just that: have the power to reamind unaffected and think independent is very much the Debian soul. And because of that it's not difficult to understand that a forum like debianHELP cover topics like Political Economy there we discuss the world from another point of view than the mainstram media and even let opinions that are banned in mainstream media speak out.
And If you like the Debian soul: Debian is for you!
Hey, not that hard guys!
I think being free does not necesseraliy mean being anti-capitalistic. One should not tag anything which is for free as anti-capitalistic.
Debian runs on the boxes, which are produced by the companies with an exclusive goal of enrichning themselves - their owners.
perharps the latter is not good, but there is no other way known to humanity so far.
At least socialist Cuba or North Korea have not offered us a receipe of producing functionable hardware on a state/collective owned enterprises. The Soviet Union tried really hard, but has ceased to exist in the final run, China, perharps the most consecutive developer of the socialist economy, also adopted capitalism in the microelectronics industry - and with a stunning sucess.
Other systems like dictatorships, theocracies, failed to produce any computing gear as well.
So the capitalism is all alone there my friend, and you have to admit it.
Capitalism has very much to do with enterprenuership, and it is the latter, due to which we have computers, internet, debian, etc. around.
At the end, isn't the operating system which Linux pretended to mimic and be on par with, come out of the deeply capitalist corporate world?...
So, guys, be carefull not to thaw a branch on which you sit.
I thought though, that Debian is largerly about giving people a freedom of choice, and here it is true, some capitalist minded companies really push hard by means of anti-market methods to impose their products in a compulosry way. Well Microsoft is actually severely punished for that - read the news from the corporate outlets, about penalties which Microsoft has to pay in Europe.
It's a matter of how far would you go with pursuing anti-capitalistic agenda.
In the Soviet Union the communist went so far as to exterminate millions (in fact much more than Hitler) of human beings pursuing the anti-capitalist agenda. And I will never forget that.
So to my opinion Debian is not anti-capitalist.
Rather it is free and reasonable.
And being reasonable does not mean hating the infrastructure and the environment in which you exist.
Being reasonable means understanding the nature and the workings of your environment and taking reasonable decisions to improve the life of people, and give all of them equal starting chances on the labor market.
to think or not to think, that is the question
What is going on in the Middle East is highly interesting to Americans or, should I say, should be highly interesting for Americans. For example. their country invaded Iraq only to find out that nothing could unite the Iraqis like Sheikh Nasrallah on one hand and Israel's actions on the other (see article below)
So:
1) option one: try to understand
2) option two: try not to understand
(-: Those choosing option two should remember that when your head is in the sand, your ass is in the air :-)
Cheers,
VS
Motto: chown -R linux:GNU world
Distros: Debian, Kanotix, Frenzy, Damn Small Linux
=======
Iraq's divided parliament stands united over Israel
16 Jul 2006 20:52:51 GMT
Source: Reuters
BAGHDAD, July 16 (Reuters) - Shi'ite, Sunni and Kurdish lawmakers in Iraq's U.S.-backed parliament often fail to see eye to eye, but on Sunday they stood united in their condemnation of Israel's military offensive against Lebanon.
Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has been pleading with fellow Iraqis to put aside deep sectarian and ethnic divisions of the kind that plunged Lebanon into civil war 30 years ago.
His pleas have gone largely unheeded, but Israel's five-day-old assault on Lebanon that has killed well over 120 people, all but four of them civilians, has evoked strong feelings of solidarity among Iraqis, bridging the sectarian divide, with hostility toward Israel and the United States.
"Support Hassan Nasrallah and stand by his side and you will be closer to the angels in heaven," wrote Hameed Abdullah, a Sunni, in an editorial in al-Mashriq newspaper, referring to the leader of Shi'ite Hizbollah, the target of the Israeli campaign.
The Iraqi media has closely followed developments in the offensive, and Iraqiya state television has flashed breaking news in red script across normal programming, a practice usually reserved for its coverage of the daily carnage in Iraq.
And whether by coincidence or design, communal and insurgent violence appears to have dipped slightly in Iraq since Israel began its campaign, launched after Hizbollah captured two Israeli soldiers and killed eight on Wednesday.
Hundreds of supporters of the Shi'ite Fadhila party, a small but locally powerful party in Basra, Iraq's oil export hub, staged a street demonstration, rare in Iraq, in support of the Shi'ite guerrilla group, chanting "Yes, yes to Hizbollah".
After dark, residents heard several dozen explosions from an apparent mortar attack on British bases in the city. A British spokesman confirmed at least one such attack. It was unclear if it was related to pro-Hizbollah sentiment against U.S. allies.
Mahmoud al-Mashhadani, the Sunni speaker of parliament, sent a personal message to his Lebanese counterpart on Sunday, telling him that Iraqis supported Lebanon's efforts to defend its "sovereignty ... against outrageous Israeli aggression".
The Iraqi parliament earlier passed a motion unanimously condemning the Israeli offensive and urging the U.N. Security Council and Group of Eight leaders meeting in St Petersburg to intervene "to stop the ... Israeli criminal aggression".
"COMMON ENEMY"
It followed a statement by Maliki on Saturday, in which the Shi'ite Islamist prime minister, making a rare foray into foreign affairs, denounced Israel and warned of the dangers of escalating tensions in the region.
His Shi'ite-dominated government, installed two months ago in a U.S.-sponsored electoral process, has focused its foreign policy on mending ties with its neighbours, partly to improve security by hindering foreign aid to guerrilla groups.
Other Arabs have been suspicious of Iraq's new rulers, partly because of the dominant U.S. military role in Baghdad. Maliki has been at pains to demonstrate independence and to improve ties with the mostly Sunni Muslim Arab leaders.
Popular Shi'ite-run al-Bayyna newspaper, praising the Hizbollah rocket attacks on northern Israel, said: "About half a million Jews are sitting in underground shelters. The Jihadi missiles were stronger than those of the warplanes of Zion."
In the Shi'ite holy city of Najaf, civil servant Muhsin Hassan, 27, said he was prepared to join the fight against Israel: "If there is any chance of reaching south Lebanon, we'll be ready to go to fight with our brothers in Hizbollah."
Radical Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, in a sermon in Najaf on Friday, had urged Iraqis to stand behind Lebanon to confront a "common enemy". (Reporting by Khaled Farhan in Najaf and Ahmed Rasheed and Mariam Karouny in Baghdad)
Voices from the other side: Hezbollah's take on the war
FYI - Extensive interview with Hezbollah Secretary General Hasan Nasrallah, by Al-Jazeera Beirut bureau chief Ghassan Bin-Jiddu, on 20 July:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=AL-20060722&articleId=2790
Hezbollah's take on the war
Vees,
Can anyone have a take from a head down and running position? Is Hezbollah Secretary General Hasan Nasrallah in Iran yet or has he gotten to winded?
jaclon