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Viewing cable 06DAMASCUS3779, Damascus Media Reaction: Israeli Operation in Lebanon,

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Reference ID Created Released Classification Origin
06DAMASCUS3779 2006-08-01 13:37 2011-08-24 01:00 UNCLASSIFIED Embassy Damascus
VZCZCXYZ0062
OO RUEHWEB

DE RUEHDM #3779/01 2131337
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
O 011337Z AUG 06
FM AMEMBASSY DAMASCUS
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 0712
RHEHAAA/WHITE HOUSE WASHDC IMMEDIATE
RUEHAM/AMEMBASSY AMMAN 6150
RUEHLB/AMEMBASSY BEIRUT 3994
RUEHEG/AMEMBASSY CAIRO 2536
RUEHRH/AMEMBASSY RIYADH 7190
RUEHTV/AMEMBASSY TEL AVIV 1179
RUEHAK/AMEMBASSY ANKARA 4565
RUEHJM/AMCONSUL JERUSALEM 0784
RHMFISS/HQ USCENTCOM MACDILL AFB FL//CCPA//
INFO RUEHNC/AMEMBASSY NICOSIA 6923
UNCLAS DAMASCUS 003779 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPARTMENT FOR PA, NEA/ARN, INR/IC/CD, INR/S:STHIBEAULT AND 
JMCCARTER, VOA NEWS CA, NEA/PPD:CBOURGEOIS, DBENZE AND 
AFERNANDEZ, IIP/G/NEA-SA RWINCHESTER 
WHITE HOUSE FOR NSC 
CENTCOM FOR CCPA 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: KMDR PREL KPAO OPRC SY
SUBJECT: Damascus Media Reaction: Israeli Operation in Lebanon, 
Syria/Qatar (8/1) 
 
 
1. Summary: Syrian papers reported that President Asad addressed 
the Syrian armed forces on July 31 in a speech published in "The 
People's Army" magazine, marking the 61st anniversary of the 
foundation of the Syrian Army. Asad said that the anniversary is 
 
being observed this year "amid international circumstances and 
regional challenges that call for vigilance, awareness and 
readiness as the genocidal war waged by the Israeli enemy on our 
brave people in Lebanon and Palestine becomes more vicious." 
Asad added that "brotherly Lebanon is under flagrant aggression 
by the Israeli war machine by air, land and sea, perpetrating 
the ugliest forms of killing, destruction and sabotage against 
innocent unarmed people and infrastructure, in defiance of all 
international laws, charters, and human and moral principles, 
and supported by the powers of hegemony in the world. Those 
powers have stood by the aggressors, justifying their actions 
and providing them with the means to go ahead with their 
destruction." President Asad said that "these aggressions, 
killings and acts of destruction committed by the Israelis are 
nothing but a pre-meditated plot in collaboration with a number 
of superpowers which dominate international society, disabling 
it and confiscating its legitimacy, resolutions and institutions 
to kill the will of life and freedom." He added that "their plot 
is to undermine all aspirations of resistance, dismember the 
region and inflict moral defeat before geographic defeat as part 
compensation for the humiliating defeat and departure from south 
Lebanon under the blows of the resistance." The President said 
that "this is the time of national public resistance which has 
been able to humiliate the occupiers in Iraq, Palestine and 
today in Lebanon, proving to the world that the might of right 
is stronger than the might of unjust power." President Asad 
stressed that Israel is the party that started the aggression by 
capturing land before individuals. "Israel detains thousands of 
prisoners in its jails; it is the party which occupies Arab 
lands in Palestine, the Golan and south Lebanon." He stressed 
that "all shouts of threat and warning launched by the powers of 
hegemony, which support the aggression, will not affect us or 
force us to abandon the march of liberation or stop backing our 
brothers and the resistance." The President instructed all 
Syrian armed forces to be prepared, saying that "with our belief 
that martyrdom is the way of freedom and victory, we have to be 
confident that every effort and each drop of sweat spent now in 
training will in the future spare a drop of blood when it is 
time to do so. Our battle will be continuous so long as our land 
is occupied and our rights are usurped, and victory is coming, 
God willing." 
 
Syrian papers also reported Foreign Minister Walid al-Mouallem's 
visit to Doha carrying a message from President Asad to the Emir 
of Qatar, Sheikh Khalifa Ben Hamad Al-Thani, about the tense 
situation in the region caused by the Israeli aggression against 
Lebanon. Al-Mouallem will also hold talks with senior Qatari 
officials. 
 
Papers also reported Lebanese President Lahoud's interview with 
Al-Jazeera TV, warning against dispatch of international forces 
to Lebanon, saying that such forces cannot end the resistance 
and will only destroy Lebanon. "France's calls to send forces to 
Lebanon aim at increasing French influence in Lebanon. Americans 
also want to send their forces. Only  UN forces will guarantee 
the preservation of peace on the borders", Lahoud added. 
 
End of summary. 
 
2.  Selected Headlines: 
 
"President Asad addresses Syrian armed forces in a speech marking 
the 61st anniversary of the foundation of the Syrian Army, 
expressing Syria's support for the brave Lebanese  national 
resistance, stressing Syria's support for Lebanon" (Government- 
owned Tishreen, 8/1) 
 
"A message from President Asad to the Emir of Qatar asserting 
importance of mobilizing efforts to form an international 
committee to investigate the Israeli massacres" (Government-owned 
Tishreen, 8/1) 
 
"The National Leadership of Al-Baath Party calls on Arab and 
foreign parties to support the Lebanese and Palestinian people: 
America underestimates international legitimacy and supports 
Israel's brutality" (Government-owned Al-Thawra, 8/1) 
 
"Information Minister Bilal reviews with Italian Foreign Minister 
D'Alema the dangerous situations in the region and means of 
reaching an immediate ceasefire " (Government-owned Tishreen, 
8/1) 
 
"Lebanese President: Any multinational forces will cause sedition 
among Lebanese. We support maintaining UNIFIL troops in agreement 
with the Lebanese government" (Government-owned Tishreen, 8/1) 
 
"The US gives Israel more time to destroy what remains of 
Lebanon. Israeli Prime Minister Olmert is determined to continue 
aggression, admits big losses" (Government-owned Tishreen, 8/1) 
 
"A sit-in conducted by Syrian and Lebanese women in Damascus: 
Stop shedding innocent blood in Lebanon" (Government-owned 
TIshreen, 8/1) 
 
3.  Editorial Block Quotes: 
 
--------------------------------- 
 
"Responsibility for the Massacre" 
 
--------------------------------- 
 
Muhammad Khair al-Jammali, an editorialist in government-owned 
Al-Thawra, wrote (8/1): "The killing of civilians in the south 
Lebanese village of Qana is an organized crime showing once 
again that Israel is a criminal state, adopting crime as an 
official policy and a tool to achieve its unconcealed hostile 
objectives against the Arabs.... 
 
"Israel is the first and last source of threat to regional 
stability and world peace.... The international community must 
break its silence and apply the provisions of Chapter Seven of 
the UN Charter against Israel because it is not qualified to 
live peacefully in a world that seeks peace.... 
 
"Allies in the aggression against Lebanon are accomplices to the 
Qana crime.... The United Nations and human rights 
institutions must investigate the Qana massacre and bring 
Israeli and American officials to trial as war criminals for 
perpetrating it.... 
 
"Bush and his administration are directly responsible for the 
crime because they are the ones who gave the green light to the 
aggression and who supplied Israel with the tools of the crime, 
in the form of internationally prohibited weapons.... 
 
"We know that the aim of the crime was to terrorize the Lebanese 
people so that they will not continue to embrace the national 
resistance, and to take revenge against the resistance for the 
bitter defeat it inflicted upon Israel, its arrogance and its 
army. But the Lebanese people, who have experienced the Zionist 
enemy and its malice, spite, and racist hatred, will remain 
steadfast in the face of the aggression, supporting their heroic 
resistance with all elements of power and victory...." 
 
------------------ 
 
"Two Options Only" 
------------------ 
 
Dr. Khalaf al-Jarrad, Chief Editor of government-owned Tishreen, 
wrote (8/1): "Planners, strategists, and decision-makers in 
Israel and its supporters must read the history and nature of 
the Arab region, as this will help them understand that their 
brutal wars, destruction, and collective killing of our people 
in Iraq, Palestine, and Lebanon will be of no use to them and 
will not force our nation to surrender. On the contrary, they 
 
will drive millions of Arabs in their various countries to join 
the resistance, carry weapons, and fight Zionism. They will 
trigger formidable popular eruptions in many countries against 
those who collude with the enemy or remain silent about the 
aggression, those who search for excuses and justifications for 
the enemy's crimes against our people, kinsfolk, women, 
children, and the elderly.... 
 
"History will have no mercy on anyone. Every individual in this 
[Arab] nation -- particularly its rulers - must choose the 
trench it wants to stand in and fight from: Either the trench of 
Israel, Zionism, the United States (led by the neoconservatives) 
and the rightist and racist trends allied to them and the forces 
and regimes that support them militarily, politically, 
economically, intellectually, diplomatically, ideologically, and 
through collusion, or the trench of resistance, which is 
defending land, rights, dignity, honor, history, and identity, 
and with it all Arab, Islamic, and international opposition 
forces. There is no third option in this decisive existential 
equation at this decisive juncture...." 
 
Roebuck