Yesterday, only the Israeli press was carrying statements from UNIFIL saying that the IDF soldiers who were fired on by the Lebanese yesterday were definitely on the Israeli side of the border. The mainstream media couldn’t seem to find a UNIFIL spokesman to clarify that. Yesterday, only the Israeli press said that the Lebanese shot first. The mainstream media couldn’t seem to dig up the facts supporting Israel’s claims.
Today, even the Lebanese army is admitting that their soldiers ambushed the Israelis. The mainstream media? They’re still behind the curve. They’ve only just noticed that UNIFIL supports the Israeli version of events. And how do they present this information? With the news that Israel will cut down more trees no matter what Lebanon says. And that the border is disputed—even though the headline states that the trees are on Israel’s side of the border.
The Israeli military said it would cut more trees Wednesday in the tense border area where Israel and Lebanon fought the most serious battle between the countries in four years, touched off by a dispute over a cypress tree.
Israel has pruned trees along the border in the past to improve its sight lines to Lebanon, but the move turned violent Tuesday after both sides claimed the cypress was in their territory and Lebanon opened fire. Subsequent fighting killed a senior Israeli officer, two Lebanese soldiers and a Lebanese journalist.
The U.N. peacekeeping force in south Lebanon, UNIFIL, confirmed Wednesday that Israel was cutting down trees only on the Israeli side, the force’s spokesman Lt. Naresh Bhatt said.
That’s absolutely not what happened. Lebanese snipers fired on and killed Israeli soldiers, while the UNIFIL Blue Helmets looked on.
The Lebanon army’s spokesman has confirmed Israel’s claims that Lebanese forces fired first during Tuesday’s deadly border skirmish.
In a statement issued to AFP and quoted by Lebanese daily al-Nahar Wednesday, the spokesman said that “the Lebanese Army opened fire first at Israeli soldiers who entered Lebanese territory…this constituted defense of our sovereignty and is an absolute right.”
I saw a photograph yesterday that disturbed me greatly—it showed a UNIFIL soldier standing next to a Lebanese soldier who seemed about to fire an RPG. It’s starting to look like UNIFIL was part and parcel of this attack.
Snoopy went into greater depth today than I did, but we both reached the same conclusion about why the attack occurred: The Hariri report is due out soon. Every time the world brings focuses on the misdeeds of the Palestinians, the Lebanese, or the Iranians—Israel pays a price in blood. It’s a tried-and-true method. The media runs the anti-Israel line every single time.
The facts were out there yesterday. The mainstream media only managed to find them today. Color me unsurprised.
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This sounds like an update of the Korean DMZ axe attack that killed a U.S. Soldier decades ago.
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Lebanon is an Iranian proxy–cat’s paw. Israel will have to clean out the place sooner or later. I hope the enabling “blue helmets” were standing next to their HAMAS buddies when the shells and bullets hit home.
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John Bibb
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Our President believes this stuff. Here is great danger because the U.S. could actually become much more adversarial toward Israel before this is all over.