SIGNS IN THE HEAVENS WHATS COMING P-1
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THE 7 YR TREATY WHATS COMING P-2
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Israel's Mofaz gets boost in Kadima party race AUG 11,08
JERUSALEM (AFP) - Former defence minister Shaul Mofaz on Monday won the endorsement of a close ally of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in the race to replace the premier that pits him against Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni. I will support the candidacy of Shaul Mofaz because he is the best candidate to lead the party and the state, Housing Minister Zeev Boim told journalists.Olmert, who is facing multiple corruption investigations, announced on July 30 he would step down when the centrist Kadima party elects a new leader in a mid-September primary election.Mofaz and Livni are seen as the frontrunners in the race for the party leadership, in which Public Security Minister Avi Dichter and Interior Minister Meir Sheetrit are also expected to compete.Livni last week won the the support of Finance Minister Roni Bar-On, who is also close to Olmert.The winner of the vote will be formally asked by President Shimon Peres to form a government, although analysts say the new Kadima leader might find it impossible to form a strong enough coalition.That would force a general election, and opinion polls indicate that rightwing Likud leader and former premier Benjamin Netanyahu, who has called for snap elections, is the favourite to take over the helm of government.Israelis are not scheduled to go to the polls until 2010.
Russia expands Georgia blitz, deploys ships By MISHA DZHINDZHIKHASHVILI | Monday, August 11, 2008
TBILISI, Georgia - Russia and Georgia clashed on land and at sea Sunday despite a Georgian cease-fire offer and claim of withdrawal from the separatist province of South Ossetia, officials from both countries said.Georgian officials said Russian planes bombed the Georgian capital's outskirts and Russian tanks moved from South Ossetia into Georgian territory, heading toward a strategic city before being turned back.Russian jets hit communications facilities just west of Tbilisi early Monday and also targeted the Black Sea port of Poti, said Georgia's Interior Ministry spokesman, Shota Utiashvili. He said that Russian raids inflicted no casualties.
A Russian general said Georgian forces directed heavy fire at positions around Tskhinvali, the capital of South Ossetia, early Monday even though Georgia had claimed to be withdrawing from the shattered city and called for a cease-fire.Active fighting has been going on in several zones, the Interfax news agency quoted Maj. Gen. Marat Kulakhmetov as saying. He is commander of the Russian peacekeeping contingent that has been in South Ossetia since 1992.Russia also claimed to have sunk a Georgian boat that tried to attack Russian vessels in the Black Sea.Russia appears determined to subdue diminutive, U.S.-backed Georgia despite international condemnation. Russia ignored a wave of calls to observe Georgia's cease-fire, saying it must first be assured that Georgian troops had indeed pulled back from South Ossetia.President Bush on Monday sharply criticized Moscow's harsh military crackdown, saying the violence is unacceptable and Russia's response is disproportionate.Bush, in an interview with NBC Sports, said, I've expressed my grave concern about the disproportionate response of Russia and that we strongly condemn the bombing outside of South Ossetia. He said he did so directly to Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and by phone to Russian President Dmitri Medvedev.
International envoys were trying to end the conflict before it spreads throughout the Caucasus, a region plagued by ethnic tensions. But it was unclear what inducements or pressure the envoys could bring to bear, or to what extent either side was truly sensitive to world opinion.Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili said one of the Russian raids on the airport area came a half hour before the arrival of the foreign ministers of France and Finland.Utiashvili, the Georgian Interior Ministry spokesman, said Russian tanks tried to cross from South Ossetia into the territory of Georgia proper, but were turned back by Georgian forces. He said the tanks apparently were trying to approach Gori, but did not fire on the city of about 50,000, which sits on Georgia's only significant east-west highway.An Associated Press photographer in Gori said early Monday that the city appeared quiet.
Russia also sent naval vessels to patrol off Georgia's Black Sea coast, but denied Sunday that the move was aimed at establishing a blockade.Russian Navy spokesman Igor Dygalo said that Russian ships deployed to Georgia's Black Sea coast on Sunday sank one of four Georgian patrol boats which dangerously approached them and refused to stop, turning the others back. Georgian Coast Guard chief David Golua dismissed the Russian claim.South Ossetia broke away from Georgian control in 1992. Russia granted passports to most of its residents and the region's separatist leaders sought to absorb the region into Russia.Georgia, whose troops have been trained by American soldiers, began an offensive to regain control over South Ossetia overnight Friday, launching heavy rocket and artillery fire and air strikes that pounded the regional capital Tskhinvali. Georgia says it was responding to attacks by separatists.In response, Russia launched massive artillery shelling and air attacks on Georgian troops.Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin said more than 2,000 people had been killed in South Ossetia since Friday, most of them Ossetians with Russian passports. The figures could not be independently confirmed, but refugees who fled the city said hundreds had died.The respected Russian radio station Ekho Moskvy reported that two journalists were killed by South Ossetian separatists, citing a correspondent of Russian Newsweek magazine.Thousands of civilians have fled South Ossetia many seeking shelter in the Russian province of North Ossetia.The Georgians burned all of our homes, said one elderly woman, as she sat on a bench under a tree with three other white-haired survivors of the fighting.
She seemed confused by the conflict. The Georgians say it is their land, she said. Where is our land, then? We don't know.The scope of Russia's military response has the Bush administration deeply worried.The U.S. military began flying 2,000 Georgian troops home from Iraq after Georgia recalled them, even while calling for a truce.
The U.N. Security Council met for the fourth time in four days Sunday, with U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad accusing Moscow of seeking regime change in Georgia and resisting attempts to make peace. Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin said Russians don't use the expression, but acknowledged there were occasions when elected leaders become an obstacle.Georgia borders the Black Sea between Turkey and Russia and was ruled by Moscow for most of the two centuries preceding the 1991 breakup of the Soviet Union. Both South Ossetia and Abkhazia have run their own affairs without international recognition since fighting to split from Georgia in the early 1990s.
Both separatist provinces have close ties with Moscow, while Georgia has deeply angered Russia by wanting to join NATO.Russian jets raided several Georgian air bases Saturday and bombed the Black Sea port city of Poti, which has a sizable oil shipment facility. The Russian warplanes also struck near the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline which carries Caspian crude to the West.Russian officials said they were targeting Georgian communications and lines of supply. But a Russian raid Saturday on Gori near South Ossetia, which apparently targeted a military base on the town's outskirts, also killed many civilians.Tskhinvali residents who survived the Georgian bombardment overnight Friday by hiding in basements and later fled the city estimated that hundreds of civilians had died.NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said Russia violated Georgia's territorial integrity in South Ossetia and employed a disproportionate use of force.Adding to Georgia's woes, Russian-supported separatists in Abkhazia launched air and artillery strikes on Georgian troops to drive them out of a small part of the province they control.Abkhazia's separatist government called out the army and reservists on Sunday and declared it would push Georgian forces out of the northern part of the Kodori Gorge, the only area of Abkhazia still under Georgian control.Separatist Abkhazia forces also were concentrating on the border near Georgia's Zugdidi region.Associated Press writers David Nowak in Gori, Georgia; Douglas Birch in Vladikavkaz, Russia; and Jim Heintz, Vladimir Isachenkov and Lynn Berry in Moscow; and John Heilprin at the United Nations contributed to this report.A service of the Associated Press(AP)
NATO chief raps Russia over Georgia assault Mon Aug 11, 2008 10:50am
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer accused Russia on Monday of using excessive force and violating Georgia's territory after military action spread beyond the breakaway Georgian region of South Ossetia.He is seriously concerned about the disproportionate use of force by the Russians and the lack of respect for the territorial integrity of Georgia, NATO spokeswoman Carmen Romero said, speaking on behalf of De Hoop Scheffer.The military operations that we saw on Saturday and since then, including air and missile attacks, have no relation to and go well beyond the CIS peacekeeping operation, the spokeswoman said, referring to the Russia-led Commonwealth of Independent States grouping former Soviet republics.
NATO leaders declared in April that Georgia would one day be a member of the U.S.-led military alliance, angering Moscow.Georgian Foreign Minister Ekaterine Tkeshelashvili will meet NATO ambassadors in Brussels on Tuesday to discuss the crisis, a foreign ministry spokeswoman said.She said Tkeshelashvili would meet NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer before attending a meeting of the policy-making North Atlantic Council.The NATO spokeswoman said the alliance was supporting international mediation effort, based on upholding Georgia's territorial integrity, but had no mandate to play a direct role in conflicts in the Caucasus.European Union foreign ministers will hold an emergency meeting on Wednesday on the crisis over South Ossetia and hear a report from French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, who is on a mediation mission to Georgia.Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski said on Sunday the EU could play a stabilisation role in the region, but it was not clear.
Kouchner, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency, said on Monday he found Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili determined to make peace after meeting him in Tbilisi.He has proposed a plan to end the conflict between Georgia and Russia over South Ossetia that calls for an immediate ceasefire, the withdrawal of forces to positions held before August 6 with some form of international presence, and the respect of Georgian territorial integrity.Kouchner said French President Nicolas Sarkozy would travel to Moscow on Tuesday and was expected to meet Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.(reporting by Paul Taylor, editing by Ingrid Melander)
Oil up as Georgia conflict disrupts shipments
Mon 11 Aug 2008, 10:30 GMT
Oil rises on fighting between Georgia and Russia
Some oil shipments suspended from Caspian producers
Repair at BTC pipeline may take 1-2 weeks or longer
By Alastair Sharp
LONDON, Aug 11 (Reuters) - Oil edged above $116 on Monday, after fighting between Russia and Georgia disrupted exports from the Caspian region, helping to stem a steep selloff on the crude market.U.S. light crude for September delivery was up $1 at $116.21 a barrel by 11061 GMT, off highs of $116.90. London Brent crude rose 90 cents to $114.23.Oil had fallen more than $5 on Friday, when it largely ignored the outbreak of hostilities in the Caucasus region, a key transit route for oil and gas from the Caspian, to focus on concerns about global economic growth.Even with what is a serious situation in Georgia, with pipelines threatened perhaps, we haven't had much of a bounce back, said Simon Wardell, an analyst at Global Insight.All it seems to have done is halted the speed of the fall.Oil has shed about $31, or 21 percent, from its peak of over $147.27 struck on July 11 on concerns of a slowdown in demand.
Analysts said oil's gain was also tempered by the rising U.S. dollar, which vaulted to a six-month high against a basket of currencies on Monday.Georgia's oil ports of Supsa and Batumi, used to export Azeri crude oil, are operating only partially, while the Georgian port of Poti is not operating, a shipping agent said on Monday. Kazakhstan also stopped shipments of its crude from Georgia's Batumi port. Both Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan also use crude pipelines for export.A major oil pipeline exporting Azeri crude passes through Georgia but was disabled last week on Turkish territory before the conflict erupted.A fire in eastern Turkey on the Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline halted loadings of Azeri Light crude shipped to the Turkish port of Ceyhan.The blaze was extinguished on Monday and repairs may take one to two weeks or longer, a source at the pipeline consortium said.BP has also cut output by at least 400,000 barrels a day at the Azeri-Chirag Gunashli oilfields because of the fire.Russian warships have been dispatched to Georgia's Black Sea coast, but Russia has denied targeting oil pipelines.
Analysts said investors were refocusing on supply and demand fundamentals, with OPEC's next move and U.S. inventory levels eyed in the months ahead.(U.S.) inventories are indicating that the market is a little bit tighter than people think, and that it isn't a one-way bet, said Michael Lewis, global head of commodities research at Deutsche Bank.The forward curve is quite a good barometer of fundamentals in the market, obviously barring these geopolitical events, he said.The crude forward curve has been in contango -- when prices are higher further out -- for most of the last two years, but briefly dipped into backwardation last week.
OPEC President Chakib Khelil, speaking on a visit to Iran, urged members of the oil exporters' group to stick to agreed targets on output.OPEC is overshooting its informal output target, with Saudi Arabia leading the way after the kingdom pledged to meet rising demand and help tame runaway oil prices. OPEC meets on Sep. 9. (Additional reporting by Santosh Menon in London, Fayen Wong in Perth; Editing by William Hardy) Reuters 2008.
Putin assails US over conflict with Georgia AUG 11,08
MOSCOW - Russia's Prime Minister Vladimir Putin is criticizing the United States for airlifting Georgian troops from Iraq. Putin said Monday that the U.S. move will hamper efforts to solve Russia's conflict with Georgia over the breakaway province of South Ossetia. The U.S. military has begun flying 2,000 Georgian troops home from Iraq after Georgia recalled them.The Russian-Georgian conflict blew up after a Georgian offensive to regain control of the breakaway province of South Ossetia.
Georgian troops fled South Ossetia on Sunday, yielding to superior Russian firepower, and Georgian leaders pleaded for a cease-fire. Moscow responded that Georgia was not observing its cease-fire pledge.
THIS IS DEFINETLY RUSSIA DESTROYING ANYTHING TO DO WITH AMERICA. AND THAT ALMIGHTY OIL IS WHAT RUSSIA IS AFTER. ISRAEL PAY ATTENTION IN THE FUTURE THIS IS HOW RUSSIA AND THE MUSLIMS WILL COME AGAINST USE LIKE A STORM.
Russia and Georgia accuse each other of new attacks by Michael Mainville AUG 11,08
TBILISI (AFP) - Dozens of Russian warplanes staged new raids in Georgia on Monday which in turn pounded the Russian-controlled capital of breakaway South Ossetia, the two sides said, as European leaders intensified efforts to head off all-out war. The foreign ministers of France and Finland put a peace plan to Georgia's president in Tbilisi before heading to Moscow for more crisis talks.But US President George W. Bush said he had firmly told Russia's Prime Minister Vladimir Putin that Moscow's offensive had been unacceptable.Georgia's foreign ministry accused Russia of staging the new air attacks.More than 50 Russian warplanes are flying over Georgia. Tbilisi was bombed. Bombs hit the village of Kojori and Makhata mountain, said a ministry statement.The Russian military acknowledged that it has lost 18 soldiers and four planes in the conflict but gave no details of its latest operations.President Dmitry Medvedev said that a major part of the military operation has been completed in South Ossetia -- where the conflict escalated after Georgia launched an operation last week to take back control of the separatist region.Russian planes bombed radars at Tbilisi airport and hit civilian targets in the city of Gori, an interior ministry spokesman said.The UN refugee agency said that up to 80 percent of Gori's population of 50,000 have fled the city -- the main Georgian city near to South Ossetia -- because of Russian attacks.Russian planes had already bombed a special forces base and an air traffic control centre in the Tbilisi suburbs, the spokesman said. Explosions could be heard from the centre of the capital.Three Russian soldiers were killed and another 18 wounded by Georgian forces in South Ossetia on Monday, Russia's Interfax news agency quoted a South Ossetian spokesman as saying.
Georgian forces pounded the South Ossetian rebel capital Tskhinvali with artillery fire during the night and residents said there had been many deaths.A local cleric, Bishop Georgy Pukhati, said: There was heavy firing all night with rockets and machine guns from the southern side of the city, where Georgian units were active.
Georgia said Sunday it had withdrawn from South Ossetia and offered a ceasefire, but Russia said Georgian troops were still fighting.The situation is very tense here. This is a humanitarian catastrophe. There is no water and the city's entire infrastructure is destroyed, the bishop said.Russia, which has already moved battleships to the Black Sea, is preparing to deploy 9,000 troops to bolster its forces inside a second separatist Georgian region, Abkhazia, a military spokesman was quoted as saying by Interfax.It will send more than 350 armoured vehicles to add to what is officially a Russian peacekeeping force in the breakaway region, the spokesman said.Moscow said it had sunk a Georgian naval vessel on Sunday. French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said Georgia's President Mikheil Saakashvili had accepted nearly all of a European Union peace plan during meetings in Tsibili. The European plan calls for a ceasefire, medical help for victims, controlled withdrawals of troops on both sides and eventual political talks. Kouchner and Finland's Alexander Stubb were to leave for Moscow on Monday to see the Russian president and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, said Stubb, current chairman of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. French President Nicolas Sarkozy will travel to Georgia on Tuesday, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili told journalists. Sarkozy is expected to head to Moscow thereafter to try to hammer out a ceasefire, Kouchner said. The United States, however, strongly criticised Russia. Bush said he had told Russian Prime Minister Putin that the violence in Georgia was unacceptable.I expressed my grave concern about the disproportionate response of Russia and that we strongly condemn bombing outside of South Ossetia, the US president told NBC television. I was very firm with Vladimir Putin... just like I was firm with the Russian president.Vice President Dick Cheney told Saakashvili in a telephone conversation that Russian aggression must not go unanswered, his office said in a statement.
Russia sent thousands of troops, tanks and air support into South Ossetia on Friday after Georgia launched an offensive to seize control of the province, which broke from Georgia in the early 1990s. The conflict has already forced about 40,000 people from their homes in areas around the conflict zone, an International Committee of the Red Cross spokeswoman told AFP. Russia has put the death toll in South Ossetia at 2,000, but this is disputed by Georgia which says it is much lower. South Ossetia , a patchwork of ethnic Georgian and Ossetian settlements in the mountainous north of the country, has a population of about 70,000, many of whom have been granted Russian passports.
Israel cracks down on Arabic Harry Potter AUG 11,08
JERUSALEM (AFP) - Harry Potter and Pinocchio are apparently not welcome in Israel, at least in their Arabic translations imported from Syria and Lebanon. Arab-Israeli publisher Salah Abassi told Israeli public radio on Monday that authorities ordered him to stop importing Arabic-language children's books from the two longtime foes of Israel.The ban includes translations of such books as Pinocchio and Harry Potter as well as Arabic classics.The trade and industry ministry and treasury warned me that importing those books is illegal, said Abassi, who imported the books through Jordan.
The ban is based on a decree from 1939 -- when the area was under British mandate -- prohibiting the importation of books from countries that are at war with Israel.
Abassi told the Maariv daily most of the books can be found only in Lebanon and Syria.If they were printed in Jordan or Egypt, which are friendly to Israel, I would lose no time in buying them there. Now the significance is that the Arabic reading public in Israel will not be able to enjoy the best literature, he said.
Palestinian negotiator considers binational state By Ali Sawafta
Sun Aug 10, 5:25 PM ET
RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - A top negotiator said on Sunday Palestinians may demand to become part of a binational state with Israel, if the Jewish state continued to reject the borders they propose for a separate country. Ahmed Qurie, who heads Palestinian negotiators in U.S.-brokered talks with Israel, told Fatah party loyalists behind closed doors that a two-state solution could be achieved only if Israel met their demands to withdraw from all occupied land.The Palestinian leadership has been working on establishing a Palestinian state within the '67 borders, Qurie said, referring to land in the West Bank and Gaza Strip that Israel captured in a 1967 war, which Palestinians seek for a state.If Israel continues to oppose making this a reality, then the Palestinian demand for the Palestinian people and its leadership (would be) one state, a binational state, he added at the meeting held in the West Bank town of Ramallah.His comments were carried in a statement issued after the meeting.Israel objects to the idea of forging a joint state, and says absorbing millions of Palestinians could undermine its future as a majority Jewish country.The chances of achieving Washington's goal of a peace deal before President George W. Bush leaves office next year have dimmed since a scandal-struck Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert announced last month he planned to resign in the coming weeks.Despite the Israeli political crisis, Olmert, who has vowed to pursue peace efforts until he leaves office, met with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas last week. The two are said to be planning additional talks later this month.But months of discussions have produced little visible progress on key issues of the conflict such as who would control Jerusalem, a city both Israel and the Palestinians want for a capital, and the future for millions of Palestinian refugees.
Abbas has also had his authority undermined by the loss of Gaza to Hamas Islamists in a bloody fight last year.A Palestinian official said Qurie told Sunday's gathering he thought the peace talks had hit an impasse.The unsuccessful efforts to realize the goal of a separate state has touched off debate among Palestinians for months, including as to whether they should seek instead to merge into a joint state with Israel.(Additional reporting by Mohammed Assadi in Ramallah; Writing by Allyn Fisher-Ilan in Jerusalem; Editing by Caroline Drees)
Israel uses skunk bombs against West Bank demonstrators Sun Aug 10, 3:23 PM ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) - Israeli security forces have started to use liquid skunk bombs to disperse demonstrators in the occupied West Bank, police said on Sunday. They said border police used the new crowd-control method for the first time on Friday at the weekly demonstration near the Palestinian village of Nilin against Israel's separation barrier.Use of the stinking liquid has been given the green light by medical and legal authorities, police said.It can be hurled by hand or with a special device, forcing most demonstrators to disperse and rush off to change their clothes because of the unbearable stench.Border guards have so far been using live rounds or rubber-coated bullets when the protests turn violent. On July 29, a Palestinian child was shot dead in Nilin.Israel says its projected 723 kilometres (454 miles) of steel and concrete walls, fences and barbed wire in the West Bank is needed for security, while Palestinians view it as a land grab that undermines their promised statehood.
Syria rules out new UN nuclear visit to bombed site Sun Aug 10, 10:13 AM ET
DAMASCUS (AFP) - Syria on Sunday ruled out the UN atomic watchdog making a second inspection of a contested site bombed by Israel last year and alleged by the United States to be the location of a nuclear facility. The official news agency SANA quoted a foreign ministry source as saying Syria had agreed with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) that the site should be visited just one time.A senior IAEA delegation in late June visited the Al-Kibar site in a remote desert area of northeastern Syria that was attacked by Israel in a secret air raid in September.
Syria has carried out what it promised in this regard, SANA quoted the source as saying. If, after visiting the site, the IAEA wants any clarifications then Syria can give answers to them.Citing intelligence and photographic evidence, the United States says Al-Kibar was a nuclear facility built with North Korean help and close to becoming operational.But Syria has denied the allegations, saying Al-Kibar was merely a disused military building and insisting the country has no nuclear programme whatsoever.The foreign ministry source said that the accusations had been made by the United States to justify the Israeli aggression against the Al-Kibar site.The UN watchdog's deputy director general Olli Heinonen, who led the delegation, has described his trip as a good start but has not given any details over the findings.He said the visit was a first trip whose findings now had to be analysed.Syria's top regional ally Iran has over the past two decades pushed forward with its own nuclear drive, which Tehran insists is only aimed at producing energy but the West fears could be used to make atomic weapons.Israel is believed to be the sole nuclear weapons power in the Middle East, even though the Jewish state has never officially confirmed the existence of such an arsenal.
Hamas demonstrators urge Egypt to open Gaza crossing Sun Aug 10, 5:49 AM ET
RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AFP) - Hundreds of pro-Hamas demonstrators gathered on Sunday at the Rafah crossing in the Gaza Strip to demand that Egypt open its border to relieve a months-old Israeli siege. Around 600 demonstrators waving green flags deployed in front of the crossing under the watchful eyes of Egyptian security forces on the other side, an AFP photographer said.Hamas-run security forces prevented anyone from approaching the crossing itself -- which is the only Gaza frontier post that bypasses Israel.People of Palestine, the Arab world, and the Islamic world, do not leave Gaza to die! Ahmed Baher, a senior Hamas leader and the acting head of the Palestinian parliament, said in a speech at the crossing.Around 700 policemen, including anti-riot forces, were mobilised on the Egyptian side of the border to prevent any violation after Hamas asked its supporters to protest at the terminal, an Egyptian security official said.The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that 450 policemen were already on the ground while 250 others were in police cars waiting for orders to deploy.The reinforcements were given orders to maintain calm and not respond to the provocations from the Palestinian protesters, the official told AFP in the Egyptian border town of El-Arish.Israel has sealed off the Gaza Strip since Hamas seized power in the impoverished territory in June 2007 following deadly clashes with supporters of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas.
Israel has allowed only limited humanitarian goods into Gaza to isolate Hamas, which is pledged to the destruction of the Jewish state.In January Palestinian militants blew up large sections of the border fence, sending hundreds of thousands of Gazans pouring into Egypt to stock up on basic goods before Egyptian and Hamas resealed the border after nearly two weeks.In June, an Egyptian-brokered truce brought a virtual halt to fighting between Israeli troops and Palestinian militants and near-daily rocket attacks launched from Gaza on southern Israel.Hamas had said the truce would lead to the lifting of the Israeli siege, which Israel has in turn linked to progress on the release of Gilad Shalit, a soldier captured in a bloody cross-border raid by Gaza militants in June 2006.Hamas has offered to exchange Shalit for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, including several who were implicated in deadly attacks on Israelis, but so far Israel has refused.
Israel mulls halting arms shipments to Georgia: report Sun Aug 10, 3:06 AM ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) - The Israeli foreign ministry has recommended a complete halt to the sale of arms to Georgia for fear of spurring Russia to increase its support of Syria and Iran, an Israeli newspaper reported Sunday. The Haaretz newspaper quoted an unnamed senior official as saying that Israel would try to remain neutral as Russia and Georgia drift towards all-out war over the fate of the breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.Israel needs to be very careful and sensitive these days, the official said. The Russians are selling many arms to Iran and Syria and there is no need to offer them an excuse to sell even more advanced weapons.Israel considers Iran its main strategic threat because of that country's accelerating nuclear programme, and has long pushed for stronger international sanctions against Tehran.Israel, the region's sole if undeclared nuclear power, is especially concerned about the transfer of S-300 anti-aircraft missiles to Iran, which could be used to protect its nuclear installations.Iran has always insisted its nuclear programme is peaceful.The decision to halt the sale of all arms to Georgia must now go to the defence ministry, which is expected to make a decision in the coming days, Haaretz said.Foreign Ministry spokesman Arye Mekel declined to comment on the report, saying only that Israel is closely following developments in the situation in Georgia, especially regarding the Jewish community there.He added that hundreds of Israeli tourists who are visiting Georgia are planning to return today.Around a year ago Israel decided to limit its aid to Georgia to defensive weaponry and military advisors, and at present its aid stands at 200 million dollars (120 million euros), the newspaper said.Israel has in the past sold aerial drones, night-vision equipment, and rockets to Georgia, and many retired officers from the Israel's military and internal security services work as military advisors there.
