SPECIAL MEDIA REACTION: CRISIS IN LEBANON

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 ABU DHABI 003110

SIPDIS

STATE FOR NEA/ARP; NEA/PPD; NEA/RA; INR/R/MR; PA; INR/NESA; INR/B;
RRU-NEA
IIP/G/NEA-SA
WHITE HOUSE FOR PRESS OFFICE; NSC
SECDEF FOR OASD/PA
USCINCCENT FOR POLAD
LONDON FOR MCKUNE
PITRANSGRESS
E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: OIIP KMDR TC
SUBJECT: SPECIAL MEDIA REACTION: CRISIS IN LEBANON


1. Summary: Editorials continued to portray the United States as
responsible for the ongoing conflict in Lebanon. One columnist in
"Al-Khaleej" attributed recent comments by a fringe Israeli group as
attempts to assuage the American conscience. Another in "Emarat
Al-Youm" urged Arabs to take a stand against the true aggressor, the
United States. A female Emirati columnist in "Al-Bayan" attributed
both U.S. and U.K. actions to a historical pattern of cultural
liquidation. Finally, an Emirati columnist in "Al-Ittihad"
questioned why certain Islamic figures have chosen to support
Al-Zarqawi's sectarian war in Iraq while banning support for the
Lebanese resistance. End Summary.


2. Under the headline "Rabbis of death", columnist Mustafa Magdi
wrote the following in a 08/01 editorial in the Sharjah-based
Arabic-language daily "Al-Khaleej" (circulation 90,000):

"If either party had a conscience to begin with, the Zionist rabbis
have now freed the Americans' from any remorse over the elimination
of Lebanon. Killing women, children and civilians, the destruction
of their houses over their heads, is allowed and even required
according to Zionist law, which notes that 'there are no innocents
among the enemy' and that talking about morality only 'weakens the
morale of the Israeli army.' Washington's pursuit of this 'fatwa'
comes as no surprise, given their persistent refusal to recognize
the barbaric massacre of the people of Qana, labeling it not as a
war crime, but as something within 'the right of each country to
defend itself.' We would be repeating ourselves to say again that
this heinous war is a war of American-Zionism, executed by Israelis
with American weapons and Zionist rhetoric. They make a bath of the
blood torn from young flesh even as they decorate the shoulders of
Zionist neo-conservatives in the White House, who look for the road
towards the final battle of Armageddon, even as President Bush prays
for it nightly. He prevented the Security Council from issuing any
condemnation of Israel to advance this Armageddon. And of course
there is no chance of an immediate cease-fire, as Bush intends for
this conflict to produce the worst possible situation:
Armageddon..."


3. Under the headline "Who is the monster?" Emirati columnist Adel
Mohammed Al-Rashid, wrote the following in a 08/01 editorial in the
Dubai-based Arabic-language daily "Emarat Al-Youm" (circulation
15,000):

"Israel is not the monster. It is just a claw on the hand of the
huge monster raising its face towards the whole world. This monster
is 'America'... If there is anywhere that voice needs to be
directed, it must be towards the Americans, and if any stand must be
taken, it should be taken against the United States. They are the
ones who have inflicted this pain upon Arabs and Muslims alike,
under the pretext of aiding them! It is America whose sorrow over
the victims of Qana's massacre prevented the United Nations from
issue even a verbal condemnation of the Zionists' heinous crime."



4. On 08/01, female Emirati columnist Aisha Ibrahim Sultan wrote the
following in her daily column in the Dubai-based Arabic-language
daily "Al-Bayan" (circulation 85,000):

"I don't want to write of the Israeli atrocities and crimes in the
region, because I don't need to repeat what has already been said.
I don't want to write about the atrocities and crimes of Americans,
either. U.S. and British support for Israel does not surprise me.
The three have the same doctrine and history, focused on eradicating
those different from them... The false tears from Bush and Rice only
serve to remind us of a quote from an activist of the Sioux Indian
tribe: 'Our history is written with white ink. The first thing the
victor does is erase the history of the loser. The victors cry much
over the bodies of their victims.'"


5. On 08/01, Emirati columnist Abdullah Rasheed wrote the following
in his daily editorial in the Abu Dhabi-based semi-official
Arabic-language daily "Al Ittihad" (circulation 65,000):

"When I read the fatwas prohibiting support for Lebanon and
Hezbollah, I was reminded of similar fatwas issued by the same
people that urged support for the killing of Shi'a by Al-Zarqawi in
Iraq. I wrote an article about those fatwas, noting that Islamic
organizations and scholars should put an end to fatwas with so much
potential for harm, and so little for good... Similarly today, under
the pretext of sectarian differences, we see fatwas which ban
support for the Lebanese even as they suffer under Israeli
gunfire."


6. Under the headline "U.S. and Britain share Israel's culpability,"
British-born journalist Linda Heard wrote the following in a column
on 08/01 in the prominent English-language daily "Gulf News"
(circulation 95,000):

"It's with a heavy heart that I pen this week's column. What I would
really like to say isn't publishable... [I]t's hard for me to cast
emotion aside."

"What was done to Qana for the second time in 10 years is a war
crime but Israel isn't the lone perpetrator. The killing would have
stopped days ago if it wasn't for the tacit and material support
Israel has received from the U.S. President George W. Bush and my
own British Prime Minister Tony Blair."

"How ironic that the Lebanese are dying from American-made missiles
and bombs that are transported from the U.S. to Israel by planes
that refuel in Scotland, while other U.S. planes carry food and
medicines."

QUINN