SPECIAL MEDIA REACTION: CRISIS IN LEBANON

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 ABU DHABI 003165 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: The bombing in Al Qaa dominated UAE media coverage. Headlines emphasized the human cost and moral implications of the tragedy, while several papers featured graphic multi-page photo spreads of the aftermath of the attack. One editorial in "Akhbar Al-Arab" applauded Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's support for the Lebanese, while two editorials in "Al-Bayan" continued to question American and Israeli intentions in this conflict and accuse both parties of moral turpitude. End Summary. ¶2. The front pages of both Arabic and English-language periodicals focused on the most recent incident in Al Qaa. The headline of the Arabic-language daily "Al-Khaleej" (circulation 90,000) read "Day of destruction and massacre: Al Qaa joins Qana and her sisters," while the headline for the Arabic-language "Al-Bayan" (circulation 85,000) read "The insanity of Israeli failure: roving massacres kill one hundred Syrian and Lebanese civilians." The prominent English-language "Gulf News" (circulation 95,000) had a headline that read "Israel commits another terrorist massacre." Both Arabic-language papers dedicated several interior pages to photos of the aftermath of the Al Qaa attack, heavily featuring photos of wounded survivors and fatalities. ¶3. Under the headline "Chavez is more Arab than the Arabs themselves!", columnist Dr. Omar Abdel-Aziz wrote the following in an 08/05 editorial in the Abu Dhabi-based Arabic-language daily "Akhbar Al-Arab" (circulation 20,000): "Venezuelan President Chavez has dared to do something that Arab countries, who continue to maintain their diplomatic and commercial relations with the Zionist entity, have not. Chavez has decided to withdraw his country's Ambassador from Tel Aviv, in protest of the criminal military operation that the Zionist entity is conducting on behalf of American imperialism... It is truly saddening to watch Arabs strive to satisfy the Yankees in Washington. It is moral and ethical suicide... Bush's brutal right-wing administration would have thought twice before supporting its stepdaughter Israel if it had felt even the slightest Arab public reaction in the form of a voluntary boycott of American goods... Chavez has acted on behalf of �0A;the Arabs and the Lebanese people while we remain silent. Just how many pretexts are now left?" ¶4. Under the headline "When killers fail to kill", columnist Mamdouh Taha wrote the following in a 08/05 editorial in the Dubai-based Arabic-language daily "Al-Bayan" (circulation 85,000): "In contrast to dirty wars, clean wars involve only military targets as laid out in international treaties and law. Dirty armies perform criminal acts and abandon their honor and morals... Israel has not learned from the stupidity of its military planners and from the short-sighted policies of those in Washington that protect her... Israel is once again waging a dirty war on the Palestinian and Lebanese people. This war is more outrageous than the crimes of the Nazis and the fascists... In this war, Israel has lost its honor and gone morally bankrupt, and confirms its own tendencies towards terrorism... Israel's stupidity and the short-sightedness of American policy have helped turn this terrorist madness towards unexpected results. Today, the resistance is celebrated, while the aggressors are in disgrace." ¶5. Under the headline "Palestine, Iraq, and Lebanon...the death triangle", Kuwaiti columnist Dr. Abdulmalik Al-Tamimi wrote the following in his weekly editorial on 08/05 in the Dubai-based Arabic-language daily "Al-Bayan" (circulation 85,000): "Palestine has been occupied and its people killed for sixty years under Zionist occupation, with support from the United States and the West in general. History demonstrates that those Palestinians seeking a so-called peace with the enemy are actually running after a mirage. Iraq, which was run by a dictatorship for three decades, has had its military forces, national heritage and potential for the future destroyed. The hands of Americans and others have played with Iraq's unity and now there is a new kind of dictatorship there, ruled by armed militias that focus more on power than reconstruction, unity, stability and the return of the displaced. Iraq continues to live in an undeclared civil war... Lebanon, which went through several civil wars and external aggressions, had been the face of freedom and democracy in the region in spite of its diversity... [but] it was not left alone to grow. Instead its internal wars were followed by external aggression, particularly the most recent war by Israel which has decimated its infrastructure, killed innocent people and destroyed the economy. What we are seeing is an American-Israeli plot for what they call the new Middle East. A new map is being drawn for the region, and the sectarian division of several major countries is being prepared. The American-Israeli plan is to have very small countries in the Middle East, to destroy the fronts of resistance under of a war on terrorism, to kill the Palestinian cause, to destroy the anti-Israel and anti-American states, to impose complete obedience to the U.S., and ultimately to control the region's oil. After all this, Israel will be the greatest power in the Middle East and will dominate its land, sea and petroleum." QUINN