Excerpts: Lebanons Maronite Christians urge domestic arms control. US push
for Israel/ Lebanon and Israel/ Syria peace talks. Chinas military
emboldened and ambitious for respect. Mubarak speaks out. Response to Hamas
murders. Mubarak and son. Lebanons dozens of private armies. Iran insults
Mrs.Sarkozy. Qadhafi: Islam should become the religion of all of Europe
September 01, 2010

+++SOURCE: Naharnet (Lebanon) 1 Sept '10:Maronite Bishops Urge Officials to
End
Spread of Arms and their Use"

SUBJECT: Lebanon's Maronite Christians urge domestic arms control

QUOTE: "Council of Maronite Bishops:'put an end to the chaos in the spread
of arms
and their use' "

EXCERPTS:The Council of Maronite Bishops urged Lebanese officials on
Wednesday(1 Sept) to
"put an end to the chaos in the spread of arms and their use."
"The bishops expressed regret at the painful incidents that took place in
some of the capital's neighborhoods," said Monsignor Youssef Tawq following
the Council's monthly meeting under Patriarch Nasrallah Sfeir.

The statement was referring to the deadly Borj Abi Haidar clashes between
Hizbullah and al-Ahbash gunmen one week ago.. . .

+++SOURCE: Naharnet (Lebanon) 1 Sept.'10:"Mitchell: U.S. Pushing for Israeli
Peace Talks with Syria, Lebanon",Agence France Presse

SUBJECT: US push for Israel/Lebanon and Israel/Syria peace talks

QUOTE:" US objective:Israel at peace with and having normal relations with
all of
its Arab neighbors.' "

EXCERPTS:"The United States is pushing for peace talks between Israel, Syria
and
Lebanon, U.S. envoy George Mitchell said Tuesday(31 Aug), as the Israelis
prepared
to resume direct negotiations with the Palestinians.
Wider peace talks between Israel and its northern Arab neighbors, which have
been in perpetual conflict with the Jewish state since its creation in 1948,
are seen as vital to any lasting peace in the region.
"With respect to Syria, our efforts continue to try to engage Israel and
Syria in discussions and negotiations that would lead to peace there and
also Israel and Lebanon," said Mitchell, U.S. President Barack Obama's
Middle East envoy.
"You will recall that when the president announced my appointment two days
after he entered office, he referred to comprehensive peace and defined it
as Israel and Palestinians, Israel and Syria, Israel and Lebanon, and Israel
at peace with and having normal relations with all of its Arab neighbors,"
Mitchell said, before adding: "And that remains our objective."
[IMRA: Re-phrased: " all its Arab neighbors having normal relations
with Israel" ?]
. . .
Top level talks in search of an elusive Middle East peace deal broke off in
December 2008 when Israel invaded the Palestinian Gaza Strip to halt
militant rocket fire on its south.
Obama's administration has been trying to engage Syria and has asked the
Senate to approve the first U.S. ambassador to Damascus in five years.
Republican senators have so far successfully blocked the move.. . .
Washington still regards Damascus as an essential player in bringing peace
and stability to the region.(AFP)

+++SOURCE: Saudi Gazette 1 Sept.'10:"China's army treading on policy toes",
Chris Buckley, Reuters

SUBJECT: China' military 'emboldened and ambitious for respect'

QUOTE:"Peoples Liberation Army have loudly warned that national interests
are threatend by neighbors' rival claims in the South China Sea and decreid
planned US-South Korean drills in the Yellow Sea between Korea and China"

BACKGROUNDER:FULL TEXT:
Military loyal but 'experience gap' emergingChina's military, emboldened and
ambitious for respect, risks steering a course that jars with the country's
foreign policy soft-sell, raising the risk of confusion and blunders in a
region already wary of its expanding reach.
People's Liberation Army officers have loudly warned that national interests
are threatened by neighbors' rival claims in the South China Sea, and
decried planned US-South Korean drills in the Yellow Sea, between Korea and
China.
"A country needs respect, and a military also needs respect," wrote Major
General Luo Yuan in the PLA's paper. Stressing the point, the PLA navy will
hold artillery exercises on the Yellow Sea from Wednesday.
Beneath that public assertiveness, lie questions about evolving Chinese
civil-military relations, a murky area with broader implications for foreign
policy, especially in Asia.
The Chinese military remains firmly subordinated to the ruling Communist
Party, but it has grown less finely meshed with civilian leaders, and that
matters for coordinating and communicating policy, especially under
pressure.
"Civil-military relations in China are very different from the old days.
There used to be a symbiosis. Now they are more distinct spheres," said Nan
Li, a professor at the US Naval War College on Rhode Island, who specialises
in the PLA.
"Inter-agency coordination is a big problem," he said.
With China exploring how to use its fast-expanding military, such internal
uncertainties could have consequences in the region, where the US keeps a
big military presence.
"It clearly has tremendous implications for real policy choices both in
Beijing and abroad," David Finkelstein, an expert on the Chinese military at
CNA, an institute in Virginia that studies security issues, said of
PLA-civilian ties.
"China's global security interests have expanded faster than the capacity of
its traditional bureaucratic institutions to handle them," he said.
Lobbying or wrong-footing among civil and military players could make
Chinese policy-making even even less like a tightly-rehearsed orchestra, and
more like a band with members competing for attention, risking miscues or
confusion.
One PLA strategist recently warned as much.
"With no concrete leadership for national security, when many departments
become involved, coordination is difficult, responses tend to be tardy,
counter-measures lack focus, and constantly problems emerge in certain links
among the institutions dealing with matters," the strategist, retired Rear
Admiral Yang Yi, wrote in a study published late last year.
Demanding respect
The PLA has received two decades of annual rises in its official budget that
average out at a 12.9 percent increase every year. That rise has made it
more powerful, and more impatient with foreign pressure, said PLA Senior
Colonel Liu Mingfu.
"In the past, the focus was on economic development and our budget was low
and we were marginalised. But now it's very different. We understand that a
prosperous country needs a strong military", he told Reuters earlier this
year.
In June, the US Defense Secretary Robert Gates took on what he saw as PLA
pushiness. He claimed it was thwarting efforts to improve military ties,
going against Chinese government efforts to ease tensions.
Gates' complaint came after vehement criticism of Washington by PLA
officers, and Beijing's rejection of Gates' hopes to visit and revive
military ties put on hold by China over US weapons sales to Taiwan, the
self-ruled island that China claims.
PLA officer-commentators have recently renewed tough words aimed at
Washington. These public growls appear aimed at a domestic audience hungry
for a strong voice, said Li, the analyst from the US naval college.
But by creating public and elite expectations that China will stand tough,
such talk may narrow room for quiet back-downs or sow uncertainty abroad
about who is steering policy in Beijing.
"Compared to the past, the influence or constraining role of Chinese public
opinion on Chinese foreign policy is striking," Wang Wen, a senior
commentator at the Global Times, an often ardently nationalist newspaper,
wrote recently.

Not a rogue
In Zhongnanhai, the Chinese Communist Party's walled compound where big
decisions are made, the real problem may be ill-coordination, not disloyalty
or outright division.
The Party demands unswerving military loyalty, especially to the top leader,
currently Hu Jintao, who is also chairman of the Central Military Affairs
Commission, the top body on PLA affairs.
"The PLA is still the Party's army. They're not running a rogue foreign
policy," said Finkelstein, the CNA analyst. But under the canopy of
Party-PLA unity, an "experience gap" has emerged, said Finkelstein.
The naval analyst Li said an examples of the trouble that can create was
China's anti-satellite test in 2007, when the foreign ministry appeared
ill-prepared for the test, which created international worry over space
debris and Beijing's space plans.
By saying that the South China Sea is also an area of "core national
interest" for China, the country's policy-makers have also risked their
credibility, because their navy is not strong enough to enforce control of
the sea, said Li.
"By elevating it to a core national interest without the means to defend it,
China's deterrence is weakened," he said. - Reuters

+++SOURCE: Egyptian Gazette 1 Sept '10:"A peace plan within our grasp",
President Hosni Mubarak

SUBJECT: Mubarak speaks out

QUOTE: Mubarak:"creation of a Palestinian state in the territories occupied
by Israel in 1967 with Jerusalem a capital for both Israel and
Palestine"

FULL TEXT:It's been 10 long years since the Palestinians and Israelis last
came close
to establishing a permanent peace, in January 2001 at Taba in Egypt.
During my career in the Egyptian Air Force, I saw the tragic toll of war
between the Arabs and Israel. As president of Egypt, I have endured many ups
and downs in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. Egypt's decision to be
the first Arab state to make peace with Israel claimed the life of my
predecessor, Anwar el-Sadat.
Ever since the day in 1981 that I witnessed his assassination by
extremists, I have tried to turn the dream of a permanent peace in the
Middle East into a reality.
Now, after a nearly two-year hiatus in direct negotiations, we are
openingyet another chapter in this long history. Many claim that this new
round of talks .quot; which begins with meetings between President Obama;
Prime Minister Netanyahu of Israel; the Palestinian president, Mahmoud
Abbas; King Abdullah of Jordan; and myself here on Wednesday(1 Sept) .quot;
is
doomed to fail like all the others.
However, President Obama's determined involvement has revived our hopes
for peace and we must seize this opportunity. The broad parameters of a
permanent Palestinian-Israeli settlement are already clear: the creation of
a Palestinian state in the territories occupied by Israel in 1967 with
Jerusalem as a capital for both Israel and Palestine. Previous negotiations
have already resolved many of the details on the final status of refugees,
borders, Jerusalem and security.
The biggest obstacle that now stands in the way of success is
psychological: the cumulative effect of years of violence and the expansion
of Israeli settlements have led to a collapse of trust on both sides.
For the talks to succeed, we must rebuild trust and a sense of security.
How do we do this?
First, we must safeguard the peace process from further outbreaks of
violence. To that end Egypt stands ready to resume its efforts to resolve
the many difficult issues surrounding Gaza: mediating a prisoner exchange
between Israel and Hamas, which controls Gaza, bringing an end to Israel's
blockade and fostering a reconciliation between Hamas and its rival Fatah,
which controls the West Bank. All this is critical to achieving a two-state
solution. The Palestinians cannot make peace with a house divided.
If Gaza is excluded from the framework of peace, it will remain a source
of conflict, undermining any final settlement.
For an Israeli-Palestinian peace to succeed, it must also be embedded in
a broader regional peace between Israel and the Arab world. The Arab Peace
Initiative, endorsed by all Arab states, offers Israel peace and
normalization in exchange for Israel's withdrawal from Arab territory and a
just solution to the Palestinian refugee issue. But in the interim both
sides must show that this dream is within reach.
Arab nations should continue to demonstrate the seriousness of their
peace initiative with steps that address the hopes and concerns of ordinary
Israelis. For its part, Israel should make no mistake: settlements and peace
are incompatible, as they deepen the occupation that Palestinians seek to
end.
A complete halt to Israel's settlement expansion in the West Bank and
EastJerusalem is critical if the negotiations are to succeed, starting with
an extension of Israel's moratorium on settlement-building, which expires
this month.
For both sides trust can be built only on tangible security. Security,
however, cannot be a justification for Israel's continued occupation of
Palestinian land, as it undermines the cardinal principle of land for peace.
I recognize that Israel has legitimate security needs, needs that can be
reconciled with the Palestinians' just demand for a complete withdrawal from
occupied territory.
Egypt believes that the presence of an international force in the West
Bank, to be stationed for a period to be agreed upon by the parties, could
give both sides the confidence and security they seek.
Finally, Egypt stands ready to host the subsequent rounds of
negotiations. Every major Palestinian-Israeli agreement has been reached
with active Egyptian involvement, in close collaboration with the United
States. The 2001 talks in Taba, on the Egyptian coast of the Red Sea, were
the closest that the two sides have ever come to an agreement to end the
conflict. Let us pick up where we left off, and hope that the spirit of
engagement that accompanied those last talks engenders success.
We live in a world that is suffering from the bitter lash of extremism. A
permanent peace between Israel and the Palestinians would bring the light of
hope to the Middle East and to people everywhere. As someone who has
witnessed both the ravages of war and the hope for peace, I appeal to all
sides to make this new round of negotiations the one that succeeds.

Hosni Mubarak is the president of Egypt. The Story is published in the New
York Times September 1, 2010.

+++SOURCE: Egyptian Gazette 1 Sept '10:"Hebron sealed off after attack"
Agencies

SUBJECT: Response to Hamas murders

HEBRON (West Bank)--Israeli forces on Wednesday(1 Sept) sealed off parts of
the West Bank while Palestinian security officials said they arrested about
50 people after four settlers were gunned down just ahead of Middle East
peace talks.
Israeli soldiers carried out house-to-house searches in villages in the
Hebron area, near the Kiryat Arba settlement where the two couples,
including a pregnant woman, were killed on Tuesday(31 Aug) evening.

Military Chief of Staff Lieutenant General Gabi Ashkenazi and other generals
were at the scene where they conducted "operational and intelligence
situation assessments," the military said.

"We are operating on a number of different levels since the event took place
and will continue to act until we get a hold of the terrorists," Ashkenazi
said.

"The IDF (Israel Defence Forces,) together with the rest of the different
security apparatuses, is operating and will continue to do so until we catch
the murderers responsible for this event," he said.
Security forces set up roadblocks in the area.

Palestinian forces for their part arrested about 50 people during the night,
a security official said. He said the suspects were supporters of Hamas, the
movement that claimed responsibility for the attack.

Two couples, identified as Yizhak and Talia Aimes, Avishai Shindler and
Kochba Even-Chaim, were shot dead on Tuesday evening.

"It appears that the attack was carried out by a passing vehicle, however
the investigation is still under way," the Israeli military said.
Israeli army spokeswoman Avital Leibovitz said she believed the dead were
colonists from the area.

The bloodstained vehicle at the side of the road was riddled with what
looked like dozens of bullet holes.

The attack was claimed by the Ezzedine Al Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of
Hamas which is vehemently opposed to the talks that Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu and Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas are to relaunch in
Washington on Thursday.

Netanyahu expressed outrage at the attack. "We witnessed today a savage
murder of four innocent Israelis," he said on Tuesday.

+++SOURCE: Haaretz via Egypt Daily News 1 Sept. '10:"Mubarak signals Egypt
succession by taking son to Washington" by Avi Issacharoff

[IMRA: Egyptian Gazette 1 Sept. flashes: Mubarak and Obama will meet one on
one Thursday, 2 Sept.]
SUBJECT Mubarak and son

EXCERPTS:Gamal Mubarak, long presumed heir to the ageing president, will
meet Israeli
delegates to peace summit - and maybe even Netanyahu himself.

Gamal Mubarak, son of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, will accompany his
father to this week's Washington peace summit in what may be the clearest
sign yet that he is being groomed for the succession.
Gamal has long been the center of speculation that he will replace his
ageing father - but until now the 82-year-old president has kept his
presumed heir at arm's length during high-profile international engagements.

This time, the younger of the president's two sons is expected to meet with
Israeli delegates to U.S.-sponsored peace talks with the Palestinians, and
perhaps even with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu himself.
. . . This week he to return to Paris en route to the
United States for talks with French President Nicholas Sarkozy. . .
Mubarak has never appointed a vice president, and there is no political
figure of comparable stature to stand out as an election possibility -
although Mohammed El Baradei, a former chief of the International Atomic
Energy Agency, has emerged as a possible opposition candidate.
Most observers still see Gamal as the frontrunner for the leadership,
however, and a recent poster campaign calling for his candidacy has been
interpreted as a push by his allies within the governing National Democratic
Party to convince doubters of his ability to lead.

+++JORDAN TIMES 1 Sept '10:"Armed militias: a quandary for
Lebanon",Elizabeth
A. Kennedy,
The Associated Press
SUBJECT: Lebanon's 'dozens of private armies'

QUOTE:"Hariri to call yet again for for the militias to disarm. But the
biggest militia of all is. Iranian-backed Hizbullah , is part of his
government, wielding virtual veto power"

Backgrounder on Hizbullah political strength:
FULL TEXT:BEIRUT - It started with a dispute over a parking space and
erupted into a four-hour street war between Hizbollah and a rival militia,
with masked snipers running through alleyways and rocket-propelled grenades
exploding in the middle of a Beirut neighbourhood.
The bloodshed in the holy month of Ramadan, which killed three people, was
nothing close to the worst this city has seen. But it has refocused
attention on the bane of Lebanon's existence: the dozens of private armies
that grew out of the country's 15-year civil war and still flourish 20 years
after the conflict ended.
"People still in this country have RPGs in their homes," Nadim Houry, the
Beirut director at Human Rights Watch, told the Associated Press after the
August 24 clashes. "And they're still in good shape, as you can see."
The fighting led the Western-backed prime minister, Saad Hariri, to call yet
again for the militias to disarm. But the biggest militia of all,
Iranian-backed Hizbollah, is part of his government, wielding virtual veto
power, and long-running talks on disarmament have gone nowhere.
The power balance worries the US and its close ally Israel, Hizbollah's
sworn enemy. This month, US lawmakers in Congress put a hold on $100 million
of the $720 million in military aid that US administrations have provided to
Lebanon's ill-equipped army since 2006.
It's not clear how long the suspension might last. US administration
officials say the aid should continue, and will prepare responses to the
lawmakers' concerns that the weapons may be falling into the wrong hands.
Israel says it spotted an ominous change on August 3 when the Lebanese army,
recipient of the US weapons, traded fire with Israeli forces who were
pruning a tree on their border with Lebanon. An Israeli officer, two
Lebanese soldiers and a Lebanese journalist died.
Hizbollah was not involved in that fighting, but Israeli Defence Minister
Ehud Barak said his country always had concerns the army's weapons could end
up in Hizbollah's hands.
Now, he said, Lebanon's weapons are being used directly against Israel.
The move in Congress has provoked defiant responses in Lebanon. Hizbollah
and its chief backer, Iran, both said they were willing to make up the arms
shortfall, and Lebanese Defence Minister Elias Murr vowed Lebanon would
reject any military assistance if the condition was that the weapons not be
used against Israel.
He opened a bank account for Lebanese to donate money to buy arms from
alternative sources.
Since Israel and Hizbollah fought a devastating 34-day war in 2006, Western
governments have worked to strengthen the central government, now led by
Saad Hariri. The danger of another Israel-Hizbollah war is ever-present, and
would be especially disruptive now, when Palestinian-Israeli peace talks are
about to get a fresh start initiated by the Obama administration.
Hariri's call to disarm the militias has broad public backing, motivated by
fears that local clashes could erupt into another civil war. But when it
comes to Hizbollah, opinion is ambivalent. Hizbollah confronting Israel is
applauded, but after the militia was seen by some as igniting the 2006 war
and Israel bombed Lebanese infrastructure, it came under criticism.
Now that it's part of the government and focused on building its political
credentials, Hizbollah must tread carefully; it knows its standing would
suffer if it were blamed for another outbreak of violence.
The criticism that followed the war with Israel was repeated two years later
when 80 people died in clashes as Hizbollah resisted government attempts to
dismantle its private phone network, and after the latest violence, both
Shiite Hizbollah and its smaller Sunni rival, Al Ahbash, were at pains to
portray the matter as stemming from a "personal dispute", not a sectarian
one.
But the fact that gunmen last week had the weapons to sustain a four-hour
gun battle is testament to the power of these armed groups.
Lebanon is not entirely dependent on US military assistance, and has turned
to Russia and Arab governments for assistance in the past. But Iran's
profile is growing steadily.
"Iran and Lebanon are members of one body," Iranian President Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad said in Tehran on Sunday. "These two nations have joint
assignments and responsibilities against arrogant powers."
Hariri has stressed that his calls for a "weapons-free" Beirut do not extend
to Hizbollah, and he would have a hard time including it in a ban.
For one thing, Hizbollah draws legitimacy from being the only militia that
was allowed to keep its weapons under the agreement that ended the 1975-1990
civil war. For another, it is respected by Lebanese as the force most
willing to stand up to Israel.
"We are with the resistance against Israel, and there is an ongoing dialogue
about these arms," Hariri said recently.
But, he added in a later speech, Lebanon cannot stand by in the face of
firefights like last week's, saying: "We will not allow anyone to burn our
homes, kill our children and destroy our belongings only because someone
didn't find a suitable parking for his car.

+++SOURCE: Jordan Times 1 Sept '10Iranian insults against Carla Bruni
'unacceptable' - France",Agence France Presse

SUBJECT: Iran insults Mrs.Sarkozy

EXCERPTS:PARIS (AFP) - France said Tuesday31 Aug) that insults in the
Iranian media against
first lady Carla Bruni Sarkozy, who has been branded an "Italian prostitute"
who "deserves death", are unacceptable.
"The insults in the daily Kayhan and picked up by Iranian websites against
several French figures, including Mrs Carla Bruni Sarkozy, are
unacceptable," foreign ministry spokesman Bernard Valero said.
"We're making this message known through normal diplomatic channels."
The Iranian press reacted with fury last week after Bruni Sarkozy, the wife
of France's President Nicolas Sarkozy, made a public statement in support of
an Iranian woman who has been sentenced to be stoned to death.
She and other French personalities signed a petition calling for Tehran to
release 43-year-old mother-of-two Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, whom an
Iranian court has convicted of adultery and complicity in her husband's
murder.
The case has triggered an international outcry, and the French government -
. . .- has made a formal protest and threatened sanctions.
Nevertheless, on Tuesday the Iranian foreign ministry warned its national
media to refrain from personal attacks on foreign dignitaries.

+++SOURCE: Jordan Times 1 Sept '10:"Vatican criticises Qadhafi's Islamic
call", Agence France Presse

SUBJECT: Qadhafi: ":"Islam should become the religion of all of Europe"

QUOTE:Vatican official: not particularly concerned about Qadhfi's remarks,
labelling them 'a non-solicited provocation lacking seriousness.' "

FULL TEXT:ROME (AFP) - A Vatican official criticised Tuesday(31 Aug) Libyan
leader Muammar Qadhafi's reported call for Islam to become the religion of
all of Europe, labelling it disrespectful to the Pope and Catholic Italy.
"To speak of the European continent converting to Islam makes no sense
because it is the people alone who decide consciously to be Christian,
Muslim or to follow other religions," Archbishop Robert Sarah told the La
Repubblica daily. Qadhafi made his controversial comments on Sunday in front
of 500 women paid to attend his lecture. He was on an official visit to Rome
to mark the second anniversary of a friendship treaty with its former
coloniser Italy. According to one of the women present, the firebrand leader
had said "Islam should become the religion of all of Europe" and that "Islam
is the last religion and if we are to have a single faith then it has to be
in Mohammed". Sarah, the Vatican's secretary of the Congregation for the
Evangelisation of Peoples, said he was not particularly concerned by
Qadhfi's remarks, labelling them "a non-solicited provocation lacking
seriousness
============
Sue Lerner - Associate, IMRA