Israel’s deadly legacy still lurks in Lebanon
Nearly four years after Israel littered southern Lebanon with mines during its devastating war with Hezbollah, teenager Mohammed al-Hajj Mussa can barely bring himself to speak of the day he lost his legs.
On August 11, 2006, the lean, dark-haired boy was riding behind his father on a motorbike to deliver food to a nearby town badly hit in the Israeli raids when a cluster bomb went off under one of the tyres.
"Later, I was told that I was found in a creek about four hours after the explosion," Mohammed, now 15, told AFP at his rundown home in the Palestinian refugee camp of Al-Bass, located in the southern coastal town of Tyre.
"I came to when they were pulling me out of the water, and I knew it. I could see my legs falling apart."
That same night, the UN Security Council unanimously adopted Resolution 1701 calling for an end to the hostilities and three days later, the month-long war was over.
But Israel left a deadly legacy: the United Nations estimates that Israeli jets dropped more than four million cluster bombs in southern Lebanon in the summer battles.
Ninety percent of the bombs were dropped in the final 72 hours before the ceasefire after Resolution 1701 was adopted, the United Nations says.
Around 40 percent of the munitions failed to detonate on impact, rendering them de facto anti-personnel mines.
The munitions have killed 46 and maimed over 300 civilians since 2006, according to Lebanese army and UN figures.
Most of the victims are sappers, farmers and unsuspecting children, who mistake the shiny objects for toys.
April 4 marks the International Day for Mine Awareness and Assistance in Mine Action and in Lebanon activists plan to plant trees in cleared minefields.
But with new humanitarian crises across the world and the global economic downturn, hope for mine victims in the tiny Mediterranean country is dwindling as funds dry up.
Victims like Mohammed are waiting in line for prosthetic limbs and demining activities have slowed as the army and international organisations are forced to cut down on manpower.
"We are facing a serious shortage in funds," said Colonel Rolly Fares, who heads the army's mine victim assistance programme.
More than 197,000 cluster bombs have been defused since the end of the 2006 war, Fares said, but hundreds of thousands still threaten the people of southern Lebanon.
"We have cleared almost 52 percent of the 45 square-kilometre (17.3 square-mile) area affected but we have less demining teams with the cash shortage," he said.
-- 'They're terrified of another war' -- Maha Shuman Jebahi, of the Lebanese Handicap Welfare Association, said lack of funding meant more and more victims are left waiting for prosthetic limbs.
"How do you tell someone that we can provide psychological assistance but we can't give them a leg?" she said.
But Mohammed, who is also a Palestinian refugee, refuses to pin his hopes on a new pair of legs. He finds it easier to cope that way.
He received treatment for his injuries in Germany and Malaysia but back now in Lebanon, the growing adolescent is battling to find adequate prosthetic limbs.
"These don't fit," he said, showing a pair of artificial legs propped up in a corner, with jeans bunched around the ankles and sneakers on both feet. "They hurt and they keep breaking.
"It's not legs I want anymore," he added. "All I want is a life, an education, a girlfriend."
Khaled Yamout, who heads the landmine action program for the Norwegian People's Aid, said his organisation was facing a 25 percent budget cut this year and a 50 percent cut next year.
"The Lebanese government alone lacks the capacity to ensure the safety of land for civilians," Yamout told AFP. "The load is beyond huge."
Israel's use of cluster bombs in Lebanon goes back decades. According to Human Rights Watch (HRW), Israel used the munitions during Lebanon's 1975-1990 civil war, and then again in 2006.
The United States, too, dropped the deadly bomblets on Syrian army bases near Beirut in 1983, according to HRW.
While the Jewish state provided maps of cluster bomb and landmine locations last year, the Lebanese army has said the maps were flawed and incomplete.
In a significant step forward, the United Nations announced last month that a 30th country had signed the international convention banning cluster bombs, paving the way for the document to come into force on August 1.
The United States and Israel are not among the signatories.
But for the people of southern Lebanon, the convention is years late and offers little hope amid fears that a new war is lurking, threatening new devastation.
Seventy-year-old farmer Ibrahim Ramadan today can only gaze at his land from a distance. Aid groups have warned him it is still contaminated with mines, and he fears for the safety of his grandchildren, preferring to keep them indoors.
"No one dares touch this land, the land that we and our ancestors before us cultivated with olive trees, tobacco, and wheat," Ramadan told AFP at his home in the windy southern town of Ghanduriyeh, which was badly hit in the 2006 war.
Today, he says tensions are again high and his townsfolk are bracing for another round of violence.
"People are terrified," he said. "They're terrified to venture into their own land.
"They're terrified of another war."
Related information:
Lebanon (pronounced /ˈlɛbənɒn/ (
listen) or /ˈlɛbənən/; Arabic: لُبْنَان Lubnān; French: Liban), officially the Republic of Lebanon[nb 1] (Arabic: اَلْجُمْهُورِيَّة اَللُّبْنَانِيَّة al-Jumhūrīyah al-Lubnānīyah; French: République libanaise), is a country in Western Asia, on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. It is bordered by Syria to the north and east, and Israel to the south. Lebanon's location at the crossroads of the Mediterranean Basin and the Arabian hinterland has dictated its rich history, and shaped a cultural identity of religious and ethnic diversity.[8]
The earliest evidence of civilization in Lebanon dates back more than 7,000 years—predating recorded history.[9] Lebanon was the home of the Phoenicians, a maritime culture that flourished for nearly 2,500 years (3000–539 BC). Following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire after World War I, the five provinces that comprise modern Lebanon were mandated to France. The French expanded the borders of Mount Lebanon, which was mostly populated by Maronite Catholics and Druze, to include more Muslim elements. Lebanon gained independence in 1943, and established a unique political system, known as confessionalism, a power-sharing mechanism based on religious communities. French troops withdrew in 1946.
Before the Lebanese Civil War (1975–1990), the country experienced a period of relative calm and prosperity, driven by tourism, agriculture, and banking.[10] Because of its financial power and diversity, Lebanon was known in its heyday as the "Switzerland of the East".[11] It attracted large numbers of tourists,[12] such that the capital Beirut was referred to as "Paris of the Middle East." At the end of the war, there were extensive efforts to revive the economy and rebuild national infrastructure.[13]
Until July 2006, Lebanon enjoyed considerable stability, Beirut's reconstruction was almost complete,[14] and increasing numbers of tourists poured into the nation's resorts.[12] Then, the month long 2006 War between Israel and Hezbollah caused significant civilian death and heavy damage to Lebanon's civil infrastructure. However, due to its tightly regulated financial system, Lebanese banks have largely avoided the Financial crisis of 2007–2010. In 2009, despite a global recession, Lebanon enjoyed nine percent economic growth and hosted the largest number of tourists in its history.
Israel to replace ‘Mossad officer’ expelled by UK
The Israeli diplomat who is to be expelled from Britain over the alleged forgery of British passports connected to the killing of a top Hamas militant, is a Mossad officer who will be replaced by the Jewish state, Israeli media reports said on Wednesday.
Downing Street on Tuesday declared the unnamed diplomat persona non grata after a police investigation found that Israel stole the identities of 12 British citizens to make the fake passports.
Public radio and other Israeli media said the diplomat was an officer in the Mossad spy agency and would be replaced "soon" by another intelligence officer.
Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said he was "very disappointed" by the expulsion, but a senior official said the Jewish state would not retaliate.
Foreign Secretary David Miliband said there were "compelling reasons" to believe that Israel was behind the forgeries used by the team which killed Mahmud al-Mabhuh in Dubai in January.
"I've asked that a member of the embassy of Israel be withdrawn from the UK as a result of this affair and this is taking place," he told parliament.
The Foreign Office declined to specify the position of the expelled diplomat, but reports in several British newspapers said the diplomat was believed to be Mossad's station chief in London, without citing sources.
The killing of Mabhuh has been widely blamed on Israel, which has declined to comment on the affair in line with a longstanding policy of ambiguity.
The suspects used the identities of 12 Britons, as well as Australian, French, German and Irish nationals. Interpol has issued arrest notices for 27 suspects wanted by Dubai in connection with the killing.
Many of the forged passports bore the names of Israelis of dual nationality who appear to have been the victims of identity theft.
Related information:
Some disagreement exists over the meaning of the word "Hamas".[citation needed] Hamas is an acronym of the Arabic phrase حركة المقاومة الاسلامية, or Harakat al-Muqāwama al-Islāmiyya or "Islamic Resistance Movement". In Arabic the word "Hamās" translates roughly to "enthusiasm, zeal, élan, or fighting spirit".[39] The initial consonant is not the ordinary /h/ of English, but a slightly more rasping sound, the voiceless pharyngeal fricative /ħ/, transcribed as <ḥ>; it is for this reason that speakers of Hebrew frequently use the voiceless uvular fricative /χ/, the equivalent sound for most Hebrew speakers.
The Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas's military wing formed in 1992, is named in commemoration of influential Palestinian nationalist Sheikh Izz ad-Din al-Qassam. Armed Hamas cells sometimes refer to themselves as "Students of Ayyash", "Students of the Engineer", or "Yahya Ayyash Units",[40] to commemorate Yahya Ayyash, an early Hamas bomb-maker killed in 1996.
US envoy cancels Mideast trip amid US-Israel feud
A U.S. envoy's postponement of his Mideast trip appeared Tuesday to deepen one of the worst U.S.-Israeli feuds in memory — even as Israel's foreign minister signaled his government had no intention of curtailing the contentious construction at the heart of the row.
Dozens of masked Palestinians also hurled rocks at police and set tires ablaze across the holy city's volatile eastern sector, as the deployment of thousands of Israeli security personnel entered its fifth day.
The diplomatic crisis erupted last week after Israel announced during a visit by Vice President Joe Biden that it would build 1,600 apartments for Jews in disputed east Jerusalem, the sector of the holy city that the Palestinians claim for a future capital.
The announcement enraged Palestinians, who have threatened to bow out of U.S.-brokered peace talks that were supposed to have begun in the coming days. The Obama administration, fuming over what it called the "insulting" Israeli conduct, demanded that Israel call off the contentious project.
Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman told Israel Radio that demands to halt Israeli construction there "are unreasonable as far as we are concerned." And he predicted that the diplomatic row with the U.S. would blow over, saying neither side had an interest in escalation.
But Washington notified Israel early Tuesday that envoy George Mitchell had put off his trip. The visit will be rescheduled at an undetermined time, officials on both sides said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has apologized for the timing of the project's approval, but he has not said it would be canceled. On Monday, backed by his hawkish coalition, he defended four decades of Jewish construction in east Jerusalem and said it "in no way" hurts Palestinians.
The feud is feeding already high tensions in east Jerusalem, where Jews and Palestinians live together uneasily. Some 3,000 Israeli police officers were deployed in the east Jerusalem area on Tuesday, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said.
Early Tuesday, masked Palestinians hurled rocks at Israeli police and burned tires in multiple areas. Jerusalem police spokesman Shmuel Ben-Ruby said police fired stun grenades to disperse dozens of protesters at one site, and that village elders helped to end protests at another. No injuries were reported in those disturbances.
At another site, rioters on a road strewn with rocks, tires and a charred garbage bin were dismantling a public bus stop. Police said 15 Palestinians have been arrested so far.
Palestinian access to a disputed hilltop shrine holy to both Jews and Muslims remained limited to men 50 and over, Rosenfeld said.
Palestinians are protesting the rededication of a historic synagogue in the Jewish quarter of the Old City, amid rumors of plans by Jewish extremists to take control over a hilltop complex at the crux of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The rededication has stoked periodically recurring rumors that Jewish extremists are planning to take over the shrine known to Jews as Temple Mount and to Muslims as Haram al-Sharif, home to the Al-Aqsa mosque complex.
Temple Mount, where the biblical Jewish temples stood, is Judaism's holiest site. The Al-Aqsa complex is Islam's third-holiest shrine.
Palestinians summoned by their leaders to defend the compound run afoul of Israeli checkpoints limiting access to the site, creating an environment for clashes.
Palestinians, who number about 250,000 in east Jerusalem, see the building of new settlements and the presence of some 180,000 Jews there as a grave challenge to their claims to the territory.
Jerusalem is the most explosive issue in the Israel-Palestinian conflict. At the emotional and religious center of the dispute is Jerusalem's Old City, with shrines holy to Jews, Muslims and Christians.
Israel annexed east Jerusalem after capturing it from Jordan in the 1967 Mideast war. Most Israelis accept the Jewish neighborhoods in east Jerusalem as part of Israel, and previous peace proposals have allowed them to remain in Israeli hands.
But the international community does not recognize the annexation or distinguish the Jewish neighborhoods in east Jerusalem as different from West Bank settlements, seen internationally as illegal.
The rift has presented Netanyahu with a predicament. If he doesn't make gestures toward the U.S. and the Palestinians on east Jerusalem, he will likely further antagonize Israel's most important ally. But Netanyahu, who historically has taken a hard line against territorial concessions to the Palestinians, could see his hawkish governing coalition crumble if he compromises on Jerusalem.
Related information:
The Middle East (or, formerly more common, the Near East)[1] is a region that encompasses southwestern Asia and Egypt. In some contexts, the term has recently been expanded in usage to sometimes include Afghanistan and Pakistan, the Caucacus and Central Asia, and North Africa. It's often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East. The corresponding adjective is Middle-Eastern and the derived noun is Middle-Easterner.
The history of the Middle East dates back to ancient times, and throughout its history, the Middle East has been a major centre of world affairs. When discussing ancient history, however, the term Near East is more commonly used. The Middle East is also the historical origin of three of the world’s major religions - Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The Middle East generally has an arid and hot climate, with several major rivers providing for irrigation to support agriculture in limited areas. Many countries located around the Persian Gulf have large quantities of crude oil. In modern times the Middle East remains a strategically, economically, politically, culturally and religiously sensitive region.
Dubai death: ‘The last assassination of its kind’?
The killing of a Hamas operative in a Dubai hotel may signal the end of an era: the moment when modern technology finally caught up with the cloak-and-dagger world of disguised assassins and fake passports.
"The last assassination of its kind," said a headline in the Israeli daily Haaretz.
Some believe the fallout — the killers whose faces and aliases were made startlingly public, their movements gone from state secrets to YouTube favorites — could mean a permanent change in the murky world of espionage.
The hit team got into the Persian Gulf city undetected, pulled off the highly complex killing of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, and escaped unscathed: mission accomplished, or so they must have thought.
But then the photos on their doctored passports were released by Dubai police and published worldwide. So were their 26 aliases, more than half of which turned out to belong to real-life dual nationals living in Israel, whose Mossad agency is widely assumed to have been behind the killing.
Israel saw several of its important friends, including Britain, Ireland and Australia, express displeasure with the killing and the abuse of their passports.
Terry Pattar, a security consultant for IHS Jane's in London, said the details that became public "might represent an unexpected operational risk that had not been planned for."
In the future, he told The Associated Press, "They will have to decide if the probability of high levels of media coverage after the event is an unacceptable risk that outweighs the potential benefit from a successful assassination."
The spread of technology of the kind that uncovered the Dubai operation has permanently altered the rules, wrote Yossi Melman, Haaretz's intelligence correspondent. "The conclusion could be that the era of heroic operations in the style of James Bond movies is close to its end."
Inspired by Dubai's success, neighboring Abu Dhabi announced Wednesday that it would spend more than $120 million to blanket the city with surveillance cameras.
Today, said Gad Shimron, a field operative for the Mossad in the 1970s and 1980s, agents risk leaving electronic footprints everywhere: credit card charges, passport information in airport computers and easily traced cell phone calls. As Dubai demonstrated, they must also plan for the possibility that law enforcement will be able to put the pieces together.
And if the current complications seem daunting, Shimron said in an interview, agents will soon face even greater challenges with the advent of biometric passports, which can feature fingerprint, facial and iris recognition, making them far harder to forge.
But if the spy's world has become more complicated in some ways, it has become simpler in others, Shimron said. A few decades ago carrying communications equipment would have been a sure giveaway; today cell phones and tiny computers arouse little suspicion.
The Dubai operation shows not that 21st century spies have been vanquished by technology, he said, but that they have accepted the ways it restricts them while taking advantage of the ways it can help.
"The new world definitely limits things," said the former Mossad man, "but history shows that every time someone invents something, someone else invents something else to bypass it."
Jonna Mendez, who spent some of her 27 years in the CIA as the agency's chief of disguise, believes the Dubai perpetrators took the fallout into account, all of it: the TV footage, the blown aliases and the head shots. The agents, she said, clearly knew they were under surveillance — they had simply decided it was unavoidable and a price worth paying.
"You can be sure they knew they were being surveilled. Likewise, they would assume that the documents they were using would be made available after the fact," said Mendez. "What does this mean? It means it didn't matter. The faces and the documents that were captured by the cameras will probably never be seen again."
The fact that the perpetrators had to take the identities of real people rather than simply invent false identities is a symptom of the new world facing modern-day spies, one of databases and traceable passport information, she said.
The real agents likely don't resemble the faces in the photos, she said: "Bald? Not really. No facial hair? Not normally. Blonde? Are you kidding," Mendez said. And if they do, plastic surgery, dental implants and hair grafts can ensure they are unrecognizable afterward.
"Steal the identity, disguise the participants, be ready on the other side with another set of identities and documents, and embrace and conceal the protagonists on their return," she said. "With that goal in mind this may, in fact, be the operation of the future."
Related information:
Dubai (Arabic: دبيّ; pronounced /duˈbaɪ/ doo-BEYE) is one of the seven emirates of the United Arab Emirates (UAE). It is located south of the Persian Gulf on the Arabian Peninsula. The Dubai Municipality is sometimes called Dubai state to distinguish it from the emirate. Written accounts document the existence of the city for at least 150 years prior to the formation of the UAE.
Dubai shares legal, political, military, and economic functions with the other emirates within a federal framework, although each emirate has jurisdiction over some functions such as civic law enforcement and provision and upkeep of local facilities. Dubai has the largest population and is the second-largest emirate by area, after Abu Dhabi.[5] Dubai and Abu Dhabi are the only two emirates to possess veto power over critical matters of national importance in the country's legislature.[6] Dubai has been ruled by the Al Maktoum dynasty since 1833. Its current ruler, Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, is also the Prime Minister and Vice-President of the UAE.
The emirate's main revenues are from tourism, property, and financial services.[7] Although Dubai's economy was originally built on the oil industry,[8] revenues from petroleum and natural gas currently contribute less than 6% (2006)[9] of the emirate's US$ 80 billion economy (2009).[10] Property and construction contributed 22.6% to the economy in 2005, before the current large-scale construction boom.[11]
Dubai has attracted world attention through many innovative large construction projects[12] and sports events. This increased attention, coinciding with its emergence as a global city[13] and business hub, has highlighted labour and human rights issues concerning its largely South Asian workforce.[14]
Australia police head to Israel over Dubai slaying
Australian police and passport officials are being dispatched to Israel to meet with three dual Australian-Israeli nationals whose passports were used in the slaying of a top Hamas operative in Dubai, a spokeswoman for Australia's department of foreign affairs said Tuesday.
The spokeswoman, speaking from the Australian capital, Canberra, had no details on when the team would arrive in Israel. She spoke on customary condition of anonymity.
Israel's Mossad spy agency is widely suspected of carrying out the Jan. 19 slaying of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in a luxury Dubai hotel, but Israel has neither confirmed nor denied involvement. Israel claims al-Mabhouh was a major player in smuggling weapons to Hamas militants who control the Gaza Strip and attacked Israel with bombs, rockets and mortars for years.
Dubai police say 26 suspects used fake British, Irish, French and Australian passports of real people in the assassination. At least 15 of the suspects share names with Israeli citizens, who say they were victims of identity theft and deny having been in Dubai.
Britain has already sent a special police investigator to Israel to meet with eight dual nationals whose passports were used in the slaying. passports in the killing.
Dubai police say they are convinced that Israel assassinated al-Mabhouh, who was also wanted in the 1989 killing of two Israeli soldiers. They contend al-Mahbouh's assassins used a powerful muscle relaxant to incapacitate him before suffocating him with a pillow in his hotel room.
On Monday, Dubai police announced that dual-national Israelis arriving on foreign passports would be barred from entering. Voice and face profiling will be used to detect Israeli citizens.
Related information:
Dubai (Arabic: دبيّ; pronounced /duˈbaɪ/ doo-BEYE) is one of the seven emirates of the United Arab Emirates (UAE). It is located south of the Persian Gulf on the Arabian Peninsula. The Dubai Municipality is sometimes called Dubai state to distinguish it from the emirate. Written accounts document the existence of the city for at least 150 years prior to the formation of the UAE.
Dubai shares legal, political, military, and economic functions with the other emirates within a federal framework, although each emirate has jurisdiction over some functions such as civic law enforcement and provision and upkeep of local facilities. Dubai has the largest population and is the second-largest emirate by area, after Abu Dhabi.[5] Dubai and Abu Dhabi are the only two emirates to possess veto power over critical matters of national importance in the country's legislature.[6] Dubai has been ruled by the Al Maktoum dynasty since 1833. Its current ruler, Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, is also the Prime Minister and Vice-President of the UAE.
The emirate's main revenues are from tourism, property, and financial services.[7] Although Dubai's economy was originally built on the oil industry,[8] revenues from petroleum and natural gas currently contribute less than 6% (2006)[9] of the emirate's US$ 80 billion economy (2009).[10] Property and construction contributed 22.6% to the economy in 2005, before the current large-scale construction boom.[11]
Dubai has attracted world attention through many innovative large construction projects[12] and sports events. This increased attention, coinciding with its emergence as a global city[13] and business hub, has highlighted labour and human rights issues concerning its largely South Asian workforce.[14]
Israel unveils new drone fleet that can reach Iran
Israel's air force on Sunday introduced a fleet of huge pilotless planes that can remain in the air for a full day and fly as far as the Persian Gulf, putting rival Iran within its range.
The Heron TP drones have a wingspan of 86 feet (26 meters), making them the size of Boeing 737 passenger jets and the largest unmanned aircraft in Israel's military. The planes can fly at least 20 consecutive hours and are primarily used for surveillance and carrying diverse payloads.
At the fleet's inauguration ceremony at a sprawling air base in central Israel, the drone dwarfed an F-15 fighter jet parked beside it. The unmanned plane resembles its predecessor, the Heron, but can fly higher, reaching an altitude of more than 40,000 feet (12,000 meters), and remain in the air longer.
"With the inauguration of the Heron TP, we are realizing the air force's dream," said Brig. Gen. Amikam Norkin, head of the base that will operate the drones. "The Heron TP is a technological and operational breakthrough."
Israeli officials refused to say how large the new fleet is or whether the planes were designed for use against Iran, but stressed it was versatile and could adapt to new missions. The plane's maker, state-owned Israel Aerospace Industries, has said it is capable of reaching the Persian Gulf, which would put Iran within its range.
"The Heron TP has the potential to be able to conduct new missions down the line as they become relevant," said Maj. Gen. Ido Nehushtan, commander of Israel's air force.
Israel believes Tehran is trying to develop nuclear weapons and has repeatedly hinted it could strike Iran if diplomatic efforts to curb the nuclear program fail.
Israeli defense officials said the Heron TP could be a useful tool against Iran, whose leaders have repeatedly called for the Jewish state's destruction. In addition to providing surveillance, the aircraft can jam enemy communications as well as assist in communications between ground control and manned air force planes.
The officials requested anonymity because they were discussing sensitive military technology.
The Heron TP has been in development for about a decade, but the aircraft first saw action during Israel's offensive against Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip just over a year ago.
Palestinian witnesses have long claimed that Israeli drones fire missiles in Gaza, both before and during the Israeli offensive. Israel has never confirmed that its unmanned aircraft are capable of firing missiles.
Israel first began using drones in the early 1970s, and its fleet has steadily increased since then. The unmanned planes are now considered an integral part of the military and tend to accompany air and ground forces on various missions.
Israel under pressure over Hamas killing in Dubai
Israeli commentators are criticizing the vaunted Mossad spy agency for sloppiness after revelations that the alleged assassins of a Hamas military commander in Dubai used identities of at least seven European-born Israelis.
The sharp criticism of Mossad is making it tough for Israel to maintain its silence over the killing. The spy agency is being accused of exposing agents and invading citizens' privacy.
Dubai police released names, photos, and passport numbers of 11 members of an alleged hit-squad that killed Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in his Dubai hotel room last month. Dubai says all carried European passports.
But most of the identities appear fake and at least seven match real people in Israel who claim they are victims of identity theft.
Most Hamas police applicants only want jobs
Gaza Strip – Take this for a measure of Gaza's economic woes: When the territory's Hamas rulers announced plans to hire about 1,000 new policemen, 15,000 applied.
Only a few of those reporting for fitness tests one recent afternoon expressed an interest in police work or said they belonged to the Islamic militant group. Most just wanted a job.
Plagued by poverty for decades, Gaza's private sector has been all but wiped out by nearly four years of closed borders and last year's devastating Israeli offensive. In the meantime, Hamas has solidified its grip, making it Gaza's second largest employer.
Amid growing desperation, announcements of the hiring campaign spread a blaze of hope among the territory's unemployed young men.
Not everyone could apply. Candidates had to be between 18 and 20 years old, taller than 5-foot-6, (1.7 meters) and weigh more than 154 pounds (70 kilograms). They could have no more than a high school education, since most would work as street officers and not commanders, said Hamas Interior Ministry spokesman Ehab Ghussein.
In four days, about 15,000 men signed up, Ghussein said. Over the past two weeks, Hamas has been holding daily drills to test their fitness.
One recent afternoon, about 400 applicants lined up near a sandy lot in Gaza City. When a Hamas officer in combat boots and black fatigues yelled their names through a bullhorn, they removed their shoes, showed their IDs and had their height and weight measured. They ran a lap on a track and did push-ups, sit-ups and pull-ups. Hamas officers, some toting rifles, jotted down their results.
Most of the applicants hailed from Gaza's refugee camps. Few said they were interested in police work or expressed much enthusiasm for Hamas' Islamic ideology. Some said their families made them come.
"The salary, what else?" said Majd Subah, 20, when asked why he applied. "If there was other work to look for, we'd go for that."
Subah said he needed work to get married. He had saved $11,000 working in smuggling tunnels under the Gaza-Egypt border and fixed up an apartment for his bride, but her father refused to let her go until he had a real job, he said.
"I want to go back and tell him I'm a cop," he said.
Gaza's already sinking economy has plunged in recent years. Israel sealed the territory's borders after Hamas-allied militants captured an Israeli soldier in 2006.
The following year, Hamas seized control of Gaza from forces loyal to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Israel and Egypt tightened the blockade, leading to shortages of many goods.
Last winter, Israel launched a military offensive to stop Gaza militants from firing rockets at Israel. Some 1,400 Gazans were killed, including more than 200 police officers. Thirteen Israelis were also killed.
Hamas now employs about 25,000 Gazans, said Gaza economist Omar Shaban, second only to the Abbas' Palestinian Authority, which continues to pay 55,000 employees in Gaza since the Hamas takeover — though they now stay home.
About 80 percent of Gaza's 1.5 million residents depend on food aid from the United Nations and other groups. There are no official figures, but some estimates put unemployment at more than 40 percent.
The recruits will join the 15,000 already serving in Hamas security services, Ghussein said. While many of them direct traffic and guard government buildings, others work for Hamas' internal security service, which is widely feared and often accused of cracking down on political rivals.
Ghussein said applicants were not being vetted politically.
Even those landing jobs are unlikely to see their financial troubles disappear. Recruits will work for free for four months, then earn about $260 per month for six months before being eligible for raises, Ghussein said.
Still, some looked forward to working for Hamas.
"God willing, I'm going to protect my country," said Momen Abu Athra, 20, who came out in a white skull cap and wispy beard and soundly beat the others in his running group.
Abu Athra, who has memorized the Quran, said he now teaches in an Islamic school but wanted to work "for an Islamic government."
Few others shared his zeal.
"I want to support my family and build my future," said Mahmoud Douda, 20.
Douda said he had earned about $26 a day working in the tunnels, but being underground terrified him. Douda said he didn't belong to any political group but would work for anyone who would give him a job.
Israel to release report into Gaza offensive
As a deadline neared, Israel handed the United Nations Friday a report justifying its actions during last year's Gaza campaign and rebutting the so-called "Goldstone Report" as biased.
At a tree-planting ceremony southern Israel Friday, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said, "This report stresses that the IDF (Israel Defense Forces) is like no other army, both from a moral standpoint as well as from a professional standpoint.
"The Goldstone Report is a distorted, false, and irresponsible report," Barak said. "All of the soldiers and officers whom we sent to battle need to know that the state of Israel stands behind them even on the day after."
The Israeli report is in response to a United Nations' call for both the Jewish state and the Palestinian Hamas movement to conduct independent inquiries to examine charges that both sides committed war crimes during the course Gaza war fought just over a year ago.
U.N. spokesman Farhan Haq said Friday afternoon "the secretary general has received communications from the Israeli government ... "
An Israeli government official, who asked not to be named because he was not authorized to speak to the media on the matter, said Israel's 40-plus page response was to be handed over the to Secretary-General Friday afternoon in New York.
The response is expected to outline the steps Israel has taken to investigate charges of wrong-doing by its military during the course of its three week offensive -- dubbed Operation Cast Lead -- in Gaza aimed at stopping militant rocket-fire into Israel. It is also expected to explain why it believes the U.N. probe into the conflict is biased.
Released in September, the 575-page report written by a commission chaired by South African Judge Richard Goldstone alleged that both Hamas and Israel committed war crimes and may have also committed crimes against humanity during the course of fighting that killed some 1,400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis.
The majority of criticism in the report was reserved for Israel which has waged an aggressive international public relations campaign to discredit the probe's findings.
With the publication of the report, the United Nations asked both Israel and Hamas to initiate independent investigations into the the various allegations and report back before February 5 when the General Assembly will be taking up the report and its recommendations.
Among those recommendations were the call for the report's findings to be passed on to the International Criminal Court if both sides did not start legitimate investigations into war crimes.
In Israel, the military has conducted investigations into possible wrong-doing itself which has raised criticism from human rights groups and some Israeli lawmakers that a more credible investigation is needed.
Israel's outgoing attorney-general Menachem Mazuz told the Haaretz newspaper Friday "Israel has a clear interest in conducting a serious, expert examination that will deal with the (Goldstone) report and produce an opposing report."
In Gaza, the ruling Hamas movement this week released a 20-page summary of the steps it has taken to investigate wrong-doing, contending it had prevented militants from rocketing Israeli civilians and that any examples to the contrary were a result of mistaken fire.
It was a claim quickly dismissed by the by human rights organizations and the Israeli government.
"Hamas can spin the story and deny the evidence, but hundreds of rockets rained down on civilian areas in Israel where no military installations were located," Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch said in a statement. "Hamas leaders at the time indicated they were intending to harm civilians."
Minister: Israel rejects UN Gaza war probe call
Israel will not set up a special panel to investigate last winter's Gaza offensive, a Cabinet minister said Tuesday, rejecting a key demand of a U.N. report that accused the military of war crimes.
Information Minister Yuli Edelstein said Israel would submit a document to the U.N. later this week that deals only with Israel's own investigations of its conduct during the three-week war. Those investigations have been conducted by the military, which has exonerated itself of any systematic wrongdoing.
"To the best of my knowledge, there is no intention to create an investigative committee," Edelstein told Israel Radio, saying he had checked with his colleagues in the Cabinet.
It was not certain that Edelstein's comments were Israel's last word on the subject. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was out of the country, and his office declined comment.
The U.N. report accused both Israel and Gaza's Islamic militant Hamas rulers of war crimes and urged both to independently probe their wartime conduct. The U.N. General Assembly endorsed the report last November, giving the sides until Feb. 5 to respond.
By rejecting calls for an independent inquiry, Israel could open itself to international war crimes proceedings. But Israeli leaders are worried that forcing soldiers to testify could hurt morale and make troops wary of taking part in future battles.
Israel, which considers the report to be deeply flawed, "will relay a document addressing something very specific, namely, the character and credibility of internal investigations that took place in Israel," Edelstein said.
Nine Israel-based human rights groups issued a call Tuesday to Netanyahu to order a full-fledged inquiry. In a joint statement, they said the internal probe "does not satisfy Israel's obligations to investigate."
Although Israel denies wrongdoing, it is worried about the report, which has battered its image internationally. Netanyahu recently called the report one of Israel's three biggest strategic challenges — along with Iran's nuclear threat and militants' rocket attacks that had sparked the Gaza war.
Israel launched the Gaza offensive after years of rocket barrages on its southern region. More than 1,400 Palestinians, including more than 900 civilians, were killed, as were 13 Israelis. Large chunks of Gaza were devastated and have not been repaired because of an ongoing Israeli and Egyptian blockade.
The U.N. report, authored by veteran war crimes prosecutor Richard Goldstone, accused Israel of deliberately targeting Palestinian civilians and intentionally destroying infrastructure, homes and livelihoods.
Powerful forces in Israel have arrayed against appointing an independent panel with sweeping investigative powers. Netanyahu, who will ultimately decide the case, has said he doesn't want to see Israeli officers hauled before such a panel.
But in deference to the international outrage, top defense officials would be open to having prominent civilian jurists examine the military's own investigations, without empowering them to call soldiers to testify, defense officials said. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to report on confidential discussions.
It's unlikely such a halfway measure would satisfy the U.N.'s call for a credible probe.
If Israel disregards the U.N.'s call, the Security Council could refer the case to prosecutors at the International Criminal Court in The Hague. Washington would be expected to block such a move, but would not be able to spare Israel an embarrassing, high-profile investigation.
Israel says Hamas is to blame for civilian casualties because militants operated within residential areas. It says it made exceptional efforts to avoid harming civilians.
Israel refused to cooperate with the Goldstone probe, despite Goldstone's Jewish faith and his close ties Israel, because the U.N. body that commissioned it has a history of singling out Israel for particular censure.
