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Rome Peace Conf., U.N. Observer Evacuations Scripted The stalemated Rome conference on a Middle East cease-fire and the removal of several U.N. observers from the Lebanon-Israel border are carefully scripted moves, say diplomatic sources. Earlier this week, NewsMax's Stewart Stogel conducted several "background" interviews with senior U.N. and various diplomatic officials on events in the middle east. Interviewees "predicted" that United Nations peacekeeping officials will decide to relocate some, if not all of the U.N. observers stationed along the Lebanon-Israel border. Earlier this week, 4 U.N. "blue helmets" were killed in an Israeli air strike. U.N. chief Kofi Annan publicly declared that the Israeli attacks "appeared deliberate," which brought a strong denial from Israel's U.N. ambassador Dan Gillerman, who called the allegations "unbelievable." Privately, the U.N. claimed the attack on the observer post was one of ten incidents since the weekend where U.N. locations were shelled by Israel. The U.N. speculated that Israel's real motive for the attacks was to put pressure on Annan to remove his observers from the area "for safety reasons." Such a move would give the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) a greater freedom of movement. On Friday, Annan announced a limited "redeployment" of U.N. blue helmets. As for the Rome peace conference, Senior Arab diplomats told NewsMax Tuesday that the meeting in Rome on Wednesday "would produce nothing; it would fail."
One main problem was the exclusion of Syria from the meeting. "How can you have such a conference and exclude one of the main countries in the region?" asked Syrian ambassador Jafar Ja'afari in an exclusive interview. Ja'afri insisted that any peace agreement in Lebanon should involve Syria, or it would be doomed to fail. The Syrian was insistent that while Damascus did not want to re-enter Lebanon, it was still impacted politically and as such felt it should be included in any peace conference. The conference in Rome ended with no action. Ja'afari also revealed that more than 700,000 refugees have fled into his country and that Syria's economy could not handle the continued influx of people fleeing Lebanon. Remember that thousands of Palestinians have also fled to Syria, as well as thousands more Iraqis. Appeals for aid have been launched with the U.N. and the International Red Cross he explained. On another front, Iranian sources told Stogel that Tehran "did not intend" to enter the conflict in Lebanon by sending any "military volunteers." The source did not dispute Israeli charges that numerous Iranian made "medium-range" missiles may have filtered into Hezbollah's arsenal. On Friday, press reports from Tehran indicated that "student volunteers" may now be on their way to fight in Lebanon. Additionally, Israeli sources say a line in the sand has been drawn: If Hezbollah is "stupid" enough to attack Tel Aviv or its suburbs, "then all bets are off." While refusing to provide more details, the Israeli warned that if Hezbollah attacked Tel Aviv then the IDF will no longer have any restraints on prospective responses. While recent Hezbollah attacks have rocketed cities south of the port of Haifa, all have fallen far short of Tel Aviv and its environs ... for now. U.S. diplomats had no comment. ---------------------------------------------------
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