Iran calls for attacks on Israel

Special to World Tribune.com MIDDLE EAST NEWSLINE Thursday, October 5, 2000 NICOSIA  Iran continues to call for an intensification of attacks on Israel.

Iranian leaders have urged Hamas to attack Israeli targets both in the Palestinian territories as well as inside the Jewish state.

"The only solution to the current conflict is to continue the holy war against the enemies of Islam, and that will not stop," Iranian supreme leader Ali Khamenei told Hamas leaders in Tehran. "The uprising continues. It will not stop at anything -- not at threats, not at bullets."

Later, Hamas politburo chief Khaled Mashaal called for strikes against Israeli interests abroad. "Before the 1987 uprising, Israel would not even recognize the Palestinian nation," Mashaal said. "This shows we have no option but armed struggle. Lebanon was not liberated from Israeli occupation by negotiations but by war."

Militants close to Khamenei have urged the Palestinians and their supporters to adopt the Hizbullah guerrilla tactics that they said led to the May 24 Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon.

"Yesterday, it was Lebanon's turn. Today it is that of the resistant Palestinian nation," a statement by the Islamic Revolutionary Republican Guard said.

In Beirut, Palestinian and Shi'ite leaders met to plan strategy amid the miniwar in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The meeting was headed by Hizbullah chief Hassan Nasrallah and Popular Front of the Liberation of Palestine-General Command leader Ahmed Jibril.

"We discussed ways to support and help the Palestinian people in their intifadah and in their confrontation with the Zionist instrument of destruction, savagery, and murder," Jibril said. "We are sure that our brothers in Hizbullah represent an important backing for the causes of Palestine, Jerusalem, and the Al Aksa mosque."

On Wednesday, Iraqi President Saddam Hussein was quoted as urging Arab neighbors of Israel to allow him to destroy the Jewish state. Saddam told a delegation of Iraqi academics that his forces could destroy Israel in a short period of time.

"Let them [Arab leaders] just give us a piece of land near Israel, stay away and support us," Saddam was quoted as saying. "And they will see how we will put an end to Zionism."

Thursday, October 5, 2000

http://www.worldtribune.com/tout-4.html

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), October 05, 2000

Answers

Why do I get the idea that the situation in the Middle East is about to blow sky high?

-- QMan (qman@c-zone.net), October 05, 2000.

What's even more interesting is the fact that CNN/MSNBC, etc. are largely downplaying the escalating situation. Where are CNN's "Crisis in the Middle East" special reports? Maybethey don't want to upset the already extremely fragile stock markets?.....

-- Carl Jenkins (Somewherepress@aol.com), October 05, 2000.

Good point, Carl. It wouldn't take much to blow the U.S. Stock Market to Kingdom Come, it's that delicate a situation. And, how about the presidential election? I'm sure our major media have made their choice as to whom they wish to become president.

-- Billiver (billiver@aol.com), October 05, 2000.

Some observers have predicted that the Middle East situation would end up cascading out of control, since the start of the year, possibly even into World War III. This now appears to be entirely possible. Reference URL: http://y2kfind.listbot.com/cgi- bin/subscriber?Act=view_archive&list_id=y2kfind

-- Robert Riggs (rxr.999@worldnet.att.net), October 05, 2000.

I agree that the media has made a choice of who it wants for president. Maybe the Arab states do not want the U. S. to have a vice-president with close ties to Isreal, so they are forcing the issue just before the election.

-- K (infosurf@yahoo.com), October 05, 2000.

There is a prophecy in Zechariah, the 12th chapter, "Thus says the LORD, who stretches out the heavens, lays the foundation of the earth, and forms the spirit of man within him: Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup that causes reeling to all the peoples around; and when the siege is against Jerusalem, it will also be against Judah. And it will come about in that day that I will make Jerusalem a heavy stone for all the peoples; all who lift it will be severely injured."

We arc closer.

-- Phillip Maley (maley@cnw.com), October 05, 2000.

Iranians join spreading Mideast protests

By ALI AKBAR DAREINI, Associated Press

TEHRAN, Iran (October 5, 2000 7:11 p.m. EDT http://www.nandotimes.com) - Some 10,000 people took to the streets of Tehran on Thursday to protest the deaths of scores of Palestinians in clashes with Israeli forces, chanting anti-American slogans and calling for the destruction of Israel.

"The only way left for the liberation of Palestine is resistance and jihad (holy war) against the Zionist occupation," parliament speaker Mahdi Karrubi told the demonstrators in the Iranian capital's Palestine Square.

"Experience has shown that talks and reconciliation with Israel is an exercise in futility," said Karrubi, whose speech was interrupted by protesters' shouts of "Allahu Akbar," or "God is great," and "Death to Israel."

Behind the podium, a large banner said: "Death to America." The demonstrators also burned an American flag.

In Jordan, a riot broke out in a Palestinian refugee camp outside Amman when police used batons and tear gas against a crowd of 5,000 people demanding that the government break relations with Israel.

The protesters threw rocks, smashing the windows of a police station. They smashed shop windows and cars in Wehdat camp, home to nearly 20,000 Palestinians displaced in the 1948 and 1967 Middle East wars.

Hours earlier, Prime Minister Ali Abu-Ragheb had urged protesters to "refrain from attacking private and public property," the official Petra news agency reported. He spoke at a meeting with security advisers amid concern that the West Bank violence would spread to Jordan. Roughly two-thirds of Jordan's 4.8 million people are of Palestinian origin.

Egypt flew eight Palestinian casualties, including a 13 year-old boy, from Gaza to Cairo for treatment Thursday.

Egyptian Health Minister Ismail Sallam, a practicing surgeon, had flown to Gaza with a team of doctors Wednesday to assist the Palestinian health service.

"How can you respond to kids throwing rocks with bullets and rockets?" the minister said to reporters on his return to Cairo.

The Arab League declared Oct. 1 as Arab Child Day to mark the death of a 12-year old Mohammed Aldura, a Palestinian boy who was killed by Israeli forces in Gaza. Dramatic pictures showed the child huddling behind a barrel with his father moments before the fatal shots were fired.

"The decision is meant to remind children in the Arab world of the moment Israel deprived Mohammed Aldura of the right to life, and to remember Palestine's many other children not caught on camera," the league said in a statement carried by Egypt's Middle East News Agency.

In Syria, where protesters pelted the U.S. Embassy on Wednesday, the newspaper of the ruling Al-Baath party said the actions of Israel's security forces over the past week surpassed Nazi crimes in brutality.

In Riyadh, the imam of one of the Saudi capital's largest mosques called for jihad against Israel and its supporters.

"Washington supports Israel blindly. American embassies, companies and individuals are legitimate targets and must be targeted by Muslims all over the world," said the imam, Sheik Mansour bin Ali al- Hussein.

The United States announced on Thursday that its diplomatic missions in the Middle East would be closed to the public for several days because of the mounting protests.

In Yemen, more than 20,000 people in the southern town of Ad Dali protested the killings. Police dispersed them with tear gas and live ammunition.

In the Sudanese capital of Khartoum, thousands of residents took to the streets. In a rally at Martyrs Square, they burned an Israeli flag and shouted "Down, down, U.S.A."

Iran's local Jewish leaders also joined the protesters in condemning Israeli actions.

"The brutalities committed by Israeli forces have nothing to do with the divine Jewish religion. They are fascists," said the head of Iran's Jewish Society, Haroun Yashayaii, who was among the demonstrators.

The protesters also had words of contempt for Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, criticizing him for negotiating with Israel. "Death to compromiser Arafat" and "Palestine cannot be liberated through compromise," they chanted.

The protests were inspired by days of clashes in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank that have left scores dead and more than 1,800 wounded, most of them Palestinians.

The violence erupted last Thursday following a visit to Jerusalem's sacred Temple Mount and Al Aqsa mosque compound by right-wing Israeli politician Ariel Sharon. Control over the site, sacred to both Muslims and Jews, has been the most contentious issue in the Israeli- Palestinian peace talks.

http://www.nandotimes.com/noframes/story/0,2107,500266047-500412877- 502529953-0,00.html

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), October 06, 2000.