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Hezbollah chief warns
against Israeli-US spies |
BEIRUT- Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah
warned the Lebanese government on Monday against sharing telecommunications
information with the United States, saying any such move would be tantamount
to collaborating with the Israeli enemy.

The Shiite militant leader also called for any Lebanese citizens convicted
of spying for Israel in a series of trials in recent months to face the
death sentence.
"The US embassy is sending letters to ministries and security forces asking
for information," Nasrallah said via video link to his supporters massed in
Hezbollah's stronghold in Beirut's southern suburbs.
"This is dangerous as it is a violation of Lebanon's sovereignty, but its
real danger lies elsewhere," he said.
"Because of the strategic relationship and unity between the United States
and Israel ... any information gathered through such requests, like spy
rings, reaches Israelis.
"In other words, it is giving Israel information by proxy on a silver
platter, and we hope there are no Lebanese citizens collaborating with the
US embassy in the matter," he said.
A US request for confidential data on Lebanon's telecommunications sector
prompted an emergency meeting of Lebanese MPs and top officials on Monday,
after local media accused Washington of spying.
The request by the US embassy in Lebanon was submitted in April last year
but was turned down by then-energy minister Gebran Bassil, reports said.
Bassil on Monday confirmed that he had turned down the embassy's request for
"very detailed information on the mobile phone service providers in Lebanon
-- the stations, the antennas, technical information."
US embassy officials would not comment.
Nasrallah also demanded the death penalty for convicted spies as Lebanese
authorities press on with an expanding crackdown on suspected Israeli spy
rings launched last year.
"I have said before, and I repeat today, yes to the death sentence for these
spies."
A Lebanese arrested last month on suspicion of spying for Israel on Monday
confessed to his involvement a 2004 bomb attack that killed Hezbollah
official Ghaleb Awali, a security source said.
"We have almost solid proof that he was behind the bombing, which he does
not deny, although he has backtracked a few times on his confession," the
source said on condition of anonymity.
Lebanon and Israel remain technically at a state of war, and convicted spies
face life in prison with hard labour or the death penalty if found guilty of
contributing to Lebanese loss of life. |
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EU 'strongly condemns'
murder passports abuse |
BRUSSELS - EU foreign ministers strongly
condemned Monday the misuse of European passports by alleged Mossad
assassins of a Hamas commander in Dubai, as their Israeli counterpart faced
tough questioning in Brussels.
"We strongly condemn the use of fraudulent EU member states' passports and
credit cards acquired through the theft of EU citizens' identities," the
foreign ministers said in a statement drawn up during a meeting in Brussels.

"We are extremely concerned that European passports... can be used in a
different manner for a different purpose," Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel
Angel Moratinos, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency, told
reporters as he arrived for the meeting.
Extremist Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman was to meet Moratinos
and other European foreign ministers during the day, over Tel Aviv's
connection with the use of British, Irish, French and German passports by
the murderers of Hamas officer Mahmud al-Mabhuh in January.
While the EU foreign ministers were not talking about Mossad by name, it was
clear that the spotlight was on Israel's notorious secret service, which has
used fake passports in previous operations.
Deputy Israeli Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon said on Saturday that he
foresaw no crisis in relations with Europe over the affair.
Britain, Ireland, France and Germany last week called in Israeli envoys for
talks at their foreign ministries after passports from those countries were
implicated in the assassination.
British Foreign Secretary David Miliband, who was to meet Lieberman Monday,
called on the Israelis to cooperate "fully" in investigating the incident.
Luxembourg Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn said Monday the culprits must be
punished, stressing that such political assassinations "have no place in the
21st century."
Mabhuh, a founder of Hamas' armed wing, was found dead in his hotel room in
Dubai on January 20.
Dubai police, accusing Mossad, released the names and photos of 11 suspects
who entered the United Arab Emirates on European passports -- six from
Britain, three from Ireland, one from Germany and one from France.
The passports mainly belonged to people with dual nationality living in
Israel who were shocked to learn of their being linked to the case.
"I think it is very important now that we fully support the investigation
ongoing in Dubai, said Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt. "Misuse of
European passports is not to be tolerated."
Lieberman was to meet Moratinos, Miliband, Irish Foreign Minister Micheal
Martin and EU foreign affairs chief Catherine Ashton among others.
Ashton's spokesman Lutz Guellner said she "shares the concern over
fraudulent use of passports."
The row over the Hamas killing cones as Europeans seek to encourage the
resumption of Middle East peace talks between the Israelis and Palestinians.
The foreign ministers of France and Spain said Monday that Europe would push
for a tight timetable for a final round of talks between Israel and the
Palestinian Authority.
In a joint editorial published in the daily Le Monde, France's Bernard
Kouchner and his Spanish counterpart Moratinos said the talks should lead to
the recognition of a Palestinian state. |
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Gunmen murder two Iraqi
families |
BAGHDAD
Gunmen murdered two Iraqi families, mostly children, beheading some of the
victims and killing 12 people on Monday, as a spate of brutal attacks hit
the country less than two weeks before elections.
Nine children were among those killed in their homes in and around Baghdad,
while 11 other people died in violence across Iraq, including three in a
suicide car bombing and a police commando who was shot dead by a sniper.
The worst incident occurred in Al-Wehdah, a predominantly Shiite Muslim town
in an ethnically-mixed area about 20 kilometers (12 miles) southeast of
Baghdad. Eight members of the same family, including six children younger
than 12, were gunned down and several were beheaded.
"A terrorist group carried out at 7:00 am (0400 GMT) a brutal crime against
a family in Al-Wehdah," the Baghdad Operations Command said in a statement.
"This gang killed eight members of this family using silencer pistols. The
criminals have beheaded some of them."
Beheadings have been the trademark of Sunni insurgents in Iraq, particularly
Al-Qaeda militants in the violence that flared after the 2003 US-led
invasion, although the motive for the attack was unclear.
Baghdad police said they later apprehended four people carrying silencers in
connection with the murders, after receiving a tip-off.
A second family, comprising a mother and her three daughters, was shot dead
overnight in their home in the mostly Shiite north Baghdad district of
al-Hurriyah, a police official said, on condition of anonymity.
The execution-style killings occurred ahead of parliamentary elections on
March 7, the second legislative polls since dictator Saddam Hussein was
ousted after the invasion.
Meanwhile, in the western Iraqi city of Ramadi, a suicide car bomb struck an
interior ministry detention centre, killing a man, his six-year-old son and
a policeman, said a police officer and a doctor at the city's hospital.
The attack left four other people wounded, including two policemen.
Ramadi, 100 kilometers (60 miles) west of Baghdad, is the capital of Anbar
province and was a key insurgent base in the wake of the invasion, but
violence has dropped as local Sunni tribes have since 2006 sided with the US
military.
The city, however, has seen a spate of attacks in recent months, including
three bombings of the provincial governor's offices since October.
Violence was also seen in the centre of Baghdad, when a police commando was
shot dead by a sniper in Saadoun street while he was checking a car for
explosives.
A higher education ministry official and university professor Thamer Kamil
was also gunned down while he was in the east of the capital, a policeman
said.
Five civilians were earlier wounded when several mortars hit Baghdad's
heavily fortified Green Zone, which is home to several foreign embassies and
government departments, an interior ministry official said.
Further north, in the restive northern city of Mosul two Iraqi soldiers and
two police were killed when their respective checkpoints came under fire
from unidentified gunmen on Monday morning, police officials said.
The nationwide trail of bloodshed was completed when two people were killed
in the oil-rich city of Kirkuk, also north of Baghdad, according to security
officials.
Police Lieutenant Kamaran Ali Hassan was |
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Dubai hunts Mabbuh
murderers |
DUBAI - Police are hunting 11 suspects with
European passports, including a woman, for the murder in a Dubai hotel room
of a top militant of the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, the Gulf
emirate's police chief said on Monday.

The hit team which killed Mahmud al-Mabhuh last month was made up of six
British passport holders, three with Irish passports, including the woman,
and the holders of a German and a French passport, Dhafi Khalfan said.
"We have no doubts that it was 11 people holding these passports, and we
regret that they used the travel documents of friendly countries," he told a
press conference.
While not ruling out "the involvement of (Israel's spy agency) Mossad or
other parties in the assassination," Khalfan said the names on the passports
had been passed on to Interpol to request arrest warrants.
Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip, has accused Israel of killing Mabhuh, 50,
who was found dead in his luxury hotel room in Dubai on January 20, and
vowed revenge.
Its members have acknowledged that Mabhuh, who was based in Damascus, was on
a visit to Dubai to buy weapons for the militant group's armed wing.
Mabhuh, who was born in northern Gaza, confessed to his involvement in the
1989 killings of two captured Israeli soldiers, in a video aired more than
two weeks after his death.
Last month, Khalfan said "it seems (Mabhuh) opened the door" of his room,
letting his killers in. "Mabhuh was suffocated," he said, adding that
"strangulation is possible."
According to Khalfan, Mabhuh entered the United Arab Emirates, of which
Dubai is a member, a day before his death using a passport that did not bear
his family name.
Amid official silence in the Jewish state, Israeli newspapers have hailed
the killing, with the rightwing Jerusalem Post calling it "another blow to
the 'axis of evil.'"
According to Britain's Sunday Times newspaper, citing unidentified Middle
East sources, Mabhuh on arrival in Dubai was followed by two men described
by local police as "Europeans carrying European passports."
The hit squad injected Mabhuh with a drug that induced a heart attack,
photographed all the documents in his briefcase, and left a "do not disturb"
sign on the door, it said.
It added that the Hamas leader was on a mission to buy arms from Iran, and
was tracked from the moment he boarded Emirates flight EK 912 from Damascus
on January 18.
Over the years, a number of Hamas leaders have died in what Israel calls
"targeted killings."
In 2004, Hamas founder Sheikh Ahmed Yassin was killed in an Israeli
helicopter gunship attack in Gaza. One month later, another Hamas leader in
the enclave, Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi, was killed when two missiles hit his
car.
In 1997, Israeli agents tried to poison Hamas's exiled political supreme
Khaled Meshaal in Amman, while in 1995. |
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Clinton: Iran headed for
'military dictatorship' |
DOHA - US Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton said on Monday that she feared Iran is moving
"toward a military dictatorship," with enterprises controlled by
the Revolutionary Guard "supplanting" the government.
The US chief diplomat told students in Qatar that the United
States was not seeking to use military action against Iran to
curb its nuclear ambitions but rather seeking to use
international pressure through the UN Security Council.
Such pressure "will be particularly aimed at the those
enterprises controlled by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, which
we believe is in effect supplanting the government of Iran,"
Clinton said.
"We see the government of Iran, the supreme leader, the
president, the parliament is being supplanted and Iran is moving
toward a military dictatorship," Clinton told students at the
Qatari branch of Carnegie-Mellon University.
In a speech in Doha on Sunday night to the US-Islamic World
Forum, Clinton said: "I fear the rise of the influence and power
of the Revolutionary Guard... poses a very direct threat to
everyone."
The United States last week imposed a fresh round of sanctions
against the Revolutionary Guards and hopes for UN sanctions to
target the group blamed for Iran's nuclear program.
"I would like to figure out a way to handle it," she told a
conference in Qatar, which lies across the Gulf from Iran.
"Certainly we don't want to be engaging while they're building
their bomb," she said.
She told students that her talks with leaders in the region
revealed great concern about Iran and its intentions.
"They worry about Iran's intentions. They worry about whether
Iran will be a good neighbor" and live peacefully, she said.
"I think people have reason to worry. The question is what can
Iran do to allay the fears of its neighbors. And yet I don't see
much progress there."
Clinton on Sunday urged Muslim leaders to help halt Iran's
sensitive nuclear work and detected a possible shift in China
toward supporting sanctions against Tehran.
Obama's National Security Adviser James Jones said earlier in
Washington that the United States is pressing for "very tough"
new sanctions against Iran this month, suggesting the move could
help bring about "regime change."
"We're... going through the UN this month to present sanctions,"
President Barack Obama's national security advisor, retired
general James Jones, told Fox News Sunday.
Jones said additional sanctions could have that effect. |
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Saudi: no Israel recognition
despite handshake |
RIYADH - A senior Saudi diplomat
said Sunday his handshake with Israel's deputy foreign minister
at a Munich security conference was no step toward recognition
of Israel.

Prince Turki al-Faisal, the country's former intelligence chief
and ex-ambassador to the United States, said his handshake
Saturday with Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon only
came after Ayalon apologised for actions that Turki objected to.
"This event should not be taken out of context or
misunderstood," Turki said in a statement received in Riyadh.
"My strong objections and condemnations of Israel's policies and
actions against the Palestinians remain unchanged.
"It is clear that Israel’s Arab neighbours want peace, but they
cannot be expected to tolerate what amounts to theft, and
certainly should not be pressured into rewarding Israel for the
return of land that does not belong to it in the first place,"
Turki said.
"Until Israel heeds US President Barak Obama’s call for the
removal of all settlements, the Israelis must be under no
illusion that Saudi Arabia will offer what they most desire --
regional recognition."
Turki, who though currently with no official government title
continues to carry out diplomatic work for the Saudi government,
said the handshake came after Ayalon publicly reprimanded him
for not sitting together on a panel at the annual international
security conference in Munich.
"I objected to sitting on the same panel with him not because he
is the deputy minister of foreign affairs of Israel but because
of his boorish conduct with the Turkish ambassador to Israel
Ahmet Oguz Celikkol," Turki said.
In January Ayalon made a show of publicly humiliating Celikkol
to demonstrate displeasure with a Turkish television show
critical of Israel.
Turki also said he objected to Ayalon's allegation that Saudi
Arabia has not provided any aid to the Palestinian Authority --
when in fact Riyadh has provided hundreds of millions of dollars
to the authority. |
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Israel 'stole' 2 billion
dollars from Palestinians |
Over the past four decades Israel
has defrauded Palestinians working inside Israel of more than
US$2 billion (Dh7.4bn) by deducting from their salaries
contributions for welfare benefits to which they were never
entitled, Israeli economists revealed this week.
A new report, “State Robbery”, says the “theft” continued even
after the Palestinian Authority was established in 1994 and part
of the money was supposed to be transferred to a special fund on
behalf of the workers.
According to information supplied by Israeli officials, most of
the deductions from the workers’ pay were invested in
infrastructure projects in the Palestinian territories – a
presumed reference to the massive state subsidies accorded to
the settlements.
Nearly 50,000 Palestinians from the West Bank are working in
Israel – following the easing of restrictions on entering Israel
under the “economic peace” promised by Benjamin Netanyahu, the
Israeli prime minister – and continue to have such contributions
docked from their pay.
Complicit in the deception, the report adds, is the Histadrut,
the Israeli labour federation, which levies a monthly fee on
Palestinian workers, even though they are not entitled to
membership and are not represented in labor disputes.
“This is a clear-cut case of theft from Palestinian workers on a
grand scale,” said Shir Hever, a Jerusalem-based economist and
one of the authors of the report. “There are no reasons for
Israel to delay in returning this money either to the workers or
their beneficiaries.” |
Obama firm on Dalai Lama
meeting despite China warning |
US President Barack Obama intends
to go ahead with plans to meet the Dalai Lama despite warnings
from China not to, a White House spokesman has said.
Mr Obama told China's leaders last year in Beijing that he would
meet with the Tibetan spiritual leader, White House spokesman
Bill Burton said.
China has warned that ties with the US would be undermined if
the meeting takes place.

No date has been set but it is expected to take place later this
month.
"The president told China's leaders during his trip last year
that he would meet with the Dalai Lama and he intends to do so,"
White House spokesman Bill Burton told reporters.
"The Dalai Lama is an internationally respected religious and
cultural leader and the president will meet with him in that
capacity," he said.
The comments came after Communist Party official Zhu Weiqun said
such a meeting would "threaten trust and co-operation" between
Beijing and Washington.
Relations between the world's largest and third-largest
economies have already been strained by trade disputes, US arms
sales to Taiwan and a row over internet censorship.
China, which took over Tibet in 1950, considers the Dalai Lama a
separatist and tries to isolate the spiritual leader by asking
foreign leaders not to see him.
The Dalai Lama fled Tibet in 1959 after a failed uprising
against Chinese rule and has been living in India since then.
Mr Obama declined to see the Dalai Lama last year when he
visited the US, saying he would meet him later.
A White House spokesman said last month that the two men
intended to meet when the Tibetan monk visited Washington later
in February.
"If the US leader chooses to meet with the Dalai Lama at this
time, it will certainly threaten trust and co-operation between
China and the United States," said Mr Zhu, executive deputy
minister of the Chinese Communist Party's United Front Work
Department. |
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Hamas: Talks on Shalit
and prisoner swap stopped |
Leading Hamas official Mahmoud Zahar has said
talks on swapping Palestinian prisoners for the captive Israeli soldier
Gilad Shalit have collapsed.
Late last year a German-mediated deal emerged in which hundreds of
Palestinian prisoners would be exchanged for Gilad Shalit.
In an interview with the BBC, Mr Zahar blamed Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu for the talks' failure.
Gilad Shalit was captured in a raid by Palestinian militants in 2006.
Speaking on the BBC's Hardtalk program, Mr Zahar maintained Prime Minister
Netanyahu pushed for stricter conditions for the release of several
high-profile Palestinian prisoners.
"As regarding negotiations, as of now the process has failed. The main
cause, well known to everybody, well known to the mediator, that after the
interference of the political element, after the appearance of Netanyahu
personally, there was a big regression and retraction. For this reason
negotiations have now stopped," he said.
Mr Zahar, one of the founders of Hamas, said the prospect for future talks
looked uncertain.
"We are looking to set free our people and also to give a chance for the
family of the Israeli soldier to live as a human being also. We demanded a
considerable number of prisoners, but the Israeli side, after hundreds of
rounds of talks, reached backward too much."
Sgt Shalit, 23, was captured in a raid into southern Israel by Palestinian
militants from Gaza, in 2006.
Hamas want hundreds of Palestinians held by Israel, including senior
militant leaders that Israel holds responsible for the deaths of dozens of
Israeli citizens, to be freed in exchange for Sgt Shalit's release.
Israel holds about 10,000 Palestinian prisoners in jail on security grounds
- a major bone of contention with the Palestinians. |
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Israeli minister warns of
new war with Hezbollah |
TEL AVIV - Israel is heading toward a new war
with Lebanon's Shiite movement Hezbollah, a cabinet minister warned Saturday
in remarks carried by military radio and the Ynet news website.

"We are heading toward a new confrontation in the north but I don't know
when it will happen, just as we did not know when the second Lebanon war
would erupt," said Yossi Peled, a minister without portfolio and a reserve
army general.
He was referring to the devastating war Israel fought with Hezbollah in
2006, which killed more than 1,200 Lebanese, most of them civilians, and
more than 160 Israelis, mostly soldiers.
However, Israeli flights over Lebanon occur on an almost daily basis and are
in breach of UN Security Council resolution 1710, which in August 2006 ended
the war.
Hezbollah is part of a new coalition government formed in November by
Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri.
"Although Hezbollah is part of the Lebanese government, the latter has no
influence on it," Peled said.
"Unlike many others (officials) I consider that peace is not a goal in
itself but only a means to guarantee our existence," said Peled.
But in a statement issued on Saturday after Peled made his comments,
hardline Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed that "Israel does not
wish at all to have a confrontation with Lebanon."
Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah warned Israel on Friday against launching a
new war against Lebanon.
Nasrallah said that Israel was again beating the drums of war to try to
restore its military's reputation as an invincible regional force.
Hezbollah, originally a resistance group formed to counter an Israeli
occupation of south Lebanon, had forced the Israeli military out of Lebanon
in 2000. Israel, however, continues to occupy the Lebanese Shabaa Farms.
|
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Blair due at Iraq war
inquiry next week |
LONDON - Former prime minister Tony Blair will
give long-awaited testimony to Britain's Iraq war inquiry at the end of next
week on January 29, officials said Monday.

Blair, who controversially backed the US-led 2003 invasion of Iraq alongside
president George W. Bush, will face a full day of questioning at the Chilcot
inquiry, according to an updated schedule on the probe's website.
The former premier has long been expected to be the star witness at the
inquiry, which was launched in November after the withdrawal of virtually
all of Britain's forces, six years after the invasion.
Last month Blair admitted in a television interview that he would have
backed the war even if he knew Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction
(WMD), triggering fresh criticism.
Blair, who quit as premier in 2007 and is now the Middle East Quartet's
envoy, told the BBC it would "still have been right to remove" Iraqi leader
Saddam Hussein because of the threat he posed to the region.
Interest in Blair's appearance at the inquiry is intense: a public ballot
was held Monday for public seats at the hearings, and the lucky few will be
allowed into either the morning or afternoon sessions, but not both.
Blair stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Bush over the 2003 invasion, but faced
a major backlash in Britain over the decision.
He resigned as prime minister two and a half years ago despite having led
his Labor Party to three successive election wins, handing the role to his
finance minister Gordon Brown.
An Internet campaign has been launched for Blair to face tough questions
about why he took Britain into the unpopular war, amid criticisms the
inquiry panel has been too easy on some witnesses.
Also due to appear at the inquiry next week is Peter Goldsmith, the former
British attorney general who advised Blair on the legality of the war.
Two key ministers from the time of the Iraq war are due to appear this week:
then defense minister Geoff Hoon on Tuesday, and then foreign secretary Jack
Straw on Thursday.
Blair's chief of staff at the time, Jonathan Powell, was due to give
evidence later Monday.
His former chief spin doctor Alastair Campbell appeared before the inquiry
last week, and fiercely denied "sexing up" a dossier which claimed Iraq
could launch chemical or biological weapons within 45 minutes.
In a defiant appearance, Campbell said that while the controversial document
could have been "clearer", he still defended "every single word" of it --
and the invasion itself.
Current Prime Minister Gordon Brown -- who Campbell said was one of the "key
ministers" Blair consulted in the run-up to war -- will appear after this
year's general election, expected in May.
Brown, who was Blair's finance minister at the time, insisted last week that
he has "nothing to hide" over the Iraq war.
Nearly one quarter of Britons want former prime minister Tony Blair to be
tried as a war criminal over the Iraq war, according to a poll published on
Sunday.
A YouGov poll for The Sunday Times newspaper found that 23 percent of those
surveyed think that Blair should face war crimes charges.
The weekly newspaper added that 52 percent believe that Blair deliberately
misled the country in the run-up to the 2003 war.
The US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 is viewed by critics as an 'act of
aggression' that violated international law.
Subsequent US occupation policies caused the country to descend into almost
total chaos, bordering on civil war.
An estimated 1.3 million Iraqis have been killed in Iraq as a direct result
of the invasion, while millions more have fled the country. |
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Turkey, Lebanon slam Israeli 'terrorism' |
ANKARA - The prime ministers of Turkey and
Lebanon on Monday lashed out at Israeli violations of Lebanese airspace and
air strikes in Gaza, warning they were undermining prospects for peace in
the region.
"Attacks on Lebanon is terrorism itself... We have to stand shoulder by
shoulder against the enemy's plans... We have to stop Israel," visiting
Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri told a press conference.
Lebanese anti-aircraft guns opened fire on four Israeli warplanes which were
violating its airspace at low altitude on Monday, the military said.
Hariri's counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose country's once-flourishing
ties with Israel took a sharp downturn last year, said that Turkey "will
never stay silent" on Israeli violations of Lebanese airspace.
He slammed the Israeli over flights as "unacceptable action that threatens
global peace."
Erdogan also questioned a deadly Israeli air raid on the Gaza Strip Sunday.
"Is the Israeli government in favor of peace or not?... Gaza was bombed
again yesterday. Why?... There were no rocket attacks," Erdogan said.
"They (the Israelis) have disproportional capabilities and power and they
use them... They do not abide by UN resolutions... They say they will do
what they like. We can in no way approve of such an attitude," he said.
Israel's ties with Turkey, a key regional ally, were poisoned by its massive
offensive on Gaza last year, which prompted an unprecedented barrage of
criticism from Erdogan's government.
In October, Turkey excluded Israel from joint military drills and said ties
would continue to suffer unless Israel ends "the humanitarian tragedy" in
Gaza and revives peace talks with the Palestinians.
Erdogan also renewed criticism of pro-Israeli powers on Monday for
pressuring Iran on its nuclear activities while tolerating Israel,
considered the region's sole if undeclared nuclear power.
"We are against the development of nuclear weapons by any country in the
region," he said.
"Israel has nuclear weapons... Those who are cautioning Iran must also
caution Israel," he said.
"If we fail to display a fair attitude in this region, the problems will hit
not only the region, but will spread elsewhere as well. The unrest of the
Middle East is the unrest of the world," he said.
Hariri hailed Turkey's improving ties with Arab countries and increased
activism in peace efforts in the Middle East.
The two premiers witnessed the signing of an accord on visa-free travel
between their countries and other deals envisaging cooperation in the
military, agriculture and transport realms. |
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