Civilian Resistance in Lebanon

from IRIN News

A civilian convoy of more than 150 people in 47 cars was turned back by local police when attempting to bring relief supplies from Beirut to Nabatiyeh, 80km south of the capital on Saturday.

Organisers and participants of the Campaign of Resistance returned to Beirut after being advised by police that it was unsafe to travel any further than the checkpoint at Neama, about 20 km south of Beirut.

“We are currently meeting and discussing our next move,” said campaign spokesperson Rasha Salti. “It is likely, though not definite, that it will be the organisation of another civilian convoy. Either way, we will be taking action very, very soon.”

Participants of the Campaign of Resistance arrived at Martyrs Square in downtown Beirut early on Saturday to launch a civilian movement expressing anger at Israel’s forced blockade of south Lebanon as well as at the overall destruction the country has witnessed over the past month.

The current conflict started after the armed wing of Lebanese political party Hezbollah captured two Israeli soldiers on 12 July. In response, Israel launched a military offensive that has focused largely on the south of Lebanon, from where Hezbollah has since been firing rockets into Israel.

Israel’s bombs have so far destroyed 630 roads and 73 bridges, according to the Lebanese Higher Relief Council (HRC) – a government body set up specifically to manage relief efforts in this conflict. South Lebanon has become almost completely cut off from the rest of the country and, as such, is suffering shortages of a range of essential supplies, medicines and fuel.

by Christian Henderson, Al-Jazeera

More than 100 Lebanese and foreign activists are joining a ‘civil resistance’ convoy that will leave Beirut on Sunday morning to bring aid to areas of south Lebanon that have been cut off by the Israeli offensive.

The convoy will carry much needed supplies to Tyre and a nearby village despite Israeli warnings that any car south of the Litani river will be fired upon.

Huwaida Arraf, a former co-founder of the International Solidarity Movement (ISM), said: “We are trying to let the whole world know that there is no justification for Israel’s aggression in Lebanon.”

ISM is a group initially formed to direct non-violent resistance to the Israeli military in the Palestinian territories.

The convoy will include Lebanese, Syrian, Saudi, Tunisian, EU and US citizens.

“International civilians have come here in response to call by Lebanese civilians,” said Arraf.

Danger and death

The activists will face a dangerous trip to the south. Earlier on Friday, a civilian car travelling next to a UN aid convoy north of Tyre was hit by an Israeli missile killing two people.

Arraf said she was aware of the risk, but said the activists felt that something must be done to protest against Israel’s offensive in Lebanon that has killed more than 1,000 Lebanese.

“No one going is wanting to die, but we know that we must stand up to Israel,” Arraf said.

from Al-Jazeera

Israel has asked the US government to speed delivery of short-range anti-personnel rockets armed with cluster munitions, which it could use to strike Hezbollah missile sites in Lebanon.

The Israeli request for M-26 artillery rockets, which are fired in barrages and carry hundreds of grenade-like bomblets that scatter and explode over a broad area, is likely to be approved shortly, the New York Times reported on Friday.

The U.S. Defense Department, without confirming or denying the report, said “We fully support Israel’s right to defend itself.”

Israel was authorized to buy the multiple launch rocket system in 1995, said Commander Greg Hicks, a Pentagon spokesman.

“These are not indiscriminate arms transfers,” Hicks said. They are done “in the interest of peace and broader international security” and “help peaceful nations meet their legitimate needs of self-defense,” he said.

At least 10 other countries including Egypt and Bahrain also have bought the missile system, manufactured by Lockheed Martin, he said.

But some State Department officials want to delay the approval because the rockets could cause civilian casualties if used against targets in populated areas of southern Lebanon, the New York Times reported.

Israel hit back at Hezbollah only after repeatedly warning the civilian population to vacate the area, said David Siegel, a spokesman for the Israeli embassy in Washington.

“It’s important to stress that Hezbollah operates from densely populated areas in attacking Israeli civilian targets and that Israel, in defending itself, uses only precision-guided munitions,” he said.

from the Associated Press

Israeli warplanes struck several targets in north and south Lebanon today, hours after the UN Security Council adopted a resolution calling for an immediate end to hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah.

The LBC television station and Voice of Lebanon Radio reported several airstrikes in Akkar province, located about 97km north of Beirut. LBC and the pan-Arab Al-Arabiya station also reported raids on targets in the southern port city of Tyre.

There was no immediate word of casualties.

The airstrikes came shortly after the Security Council voted on a resolution that calls for an end to the month-long Israel-Hezbollah conflict. It also authorises sending 15,000 UN peacekeepers to help coordinate the deployment of Lebanese troops to southern Lebanon and the withdrawal of Israeli forces.

Israel said its campaign would continue until Sunday, when its Cabinet will meet to endorse the resolution.

Ecumenical, non-violent opposition group organizes civilian convoy to South

“We’ve been told the situation here is different from Palestine,” says Huwaida Arraf, co-founder of the International Solidarity Movement. “In Palestine you have Israeli soldiers on the ground actively brutalizing civilians. Here, they’ve been brutalizing civilians from the air. That certainly is a tactical difference.

“But the brutal aggression, the terrorizing of civilians is the same. The war crimes are the same. The impunity with which Israel carries this out is the same. The dehumanization of the other is the same…

“The way they expel you from your land is the same and, if you try to stay and resist, you’re terrorized and dehumanized and killed - that’s all the same as in Palestine.”

It seems you don’t have to be a Hizbullah militant to shame the Israeli and US governments.

Arraf, her husband Adam Shapiro and a handful of other activists co-founded the International Solidarity Movement (ISM) in 2001.

The ISM is a Palestinian-led movement devoted to applying non-violent direct action to resist the Israeli occupation.

ISM aims to provide Palestine’s popular resistance with two resources: international protection and a voice to resist Israel’s military occupation non-violently. Its activists argue that Israel’s occupation, oppression and domination of the Palestinians must be dismantled through people’s action.

“The occupation,” as their mission statement says, “can be defeated by strategic, disciplined unarmed resistance, utilizing the effective resources Palestinians can mobilize - including international participation.”