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DE RUEHAM #5743/01 2121023
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O 311023Z JUL 06
FM AMEMBASSY AMMAN
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 2748
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UNCLAS AMMAN 005743 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR NEA/ARN, NEA/PA, NEA/AIA, INR/NESA, R/MR, I/GNEA, B/BXN, 
B/BRN, NEA/PPD, NEA/IPA FOR ALTERMAN 
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SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
 
TAGS: KMDR JO
 
SUBJECT: MEDIA REACTION ON ISRAEL-HEZBOLLAH COMBAT 
 
Editorial Commentary 
 
-- "Qana must be our point of reference" 
 
Columnist Bater Wardam writes on the inside page of center-left, 
influential Arabic daily Al-Dustour (07/31):  "When we see the 
children martyrs in Qana, how can we think of peace, coexistence and 
tolerance?  Who do we tolerate?  The prime minister who ordered the 
war? The defense minister who led the army? The soldier who fired 
the rocket? The government's spokesman who is trying to justify the 
crime and the lies? The media outlets that promote Israeli 
viewpoints? The United States that provides political and military 
cover for the Israeli crime?  Let Qana be our point of reference for 
everything.  When we are overtaken by the illusion that Israel wants 
peace, let us remember Qana.  When we talk about normalization and 
coexistence, let us remember the children martyrs.  When we listen 
the U.S. lies, let us remember Qana....  When the Arab regime fails 
to rein in Israel, the people will move towards extremism, and when 
the international community fails to achieve justice, the Arabs and 
Muslims will move towards the so-called terrorism....  Every time we 
write about the logic and importance of peace, Israel comes along 
and kills off every hope and every illusion of the possibility of 
having peace.  We can no longer talk about democracy and coexistence 
in view of these crimes.  We can no longer justify to the angry 
masses that abiding by international legitimacy and fighting 
terrorism will achieve security and justice for the Palestinian and 
Lebanese people.  I do not care if Hezbollah is implementing a 
Lebanese or Iranian policy.  I do not care if Hassan Nasrallah is a 
Shiite, Sunni, Buddhist or even an atheist.  But as long as they 
have become the only weapon that this nation has to retrieve part of 
its dignity and seek revenge against the Israeli criminals, then we 
are with Nasrallah and with Hezbollah and against any plan or 
project that seeks to disarm them....  We curse Israel and we ask 
for forgiveness and mercy for the Qana martyrs.  And before the 
martyrs of Qana, I go down on my knees and apologize for every word 
I had written about the possibility of achieving coexistence with 
Israel." 
 
-- "The embassy of criminality must shut down" 
 
Columnist Basem Sakijha writes on the op-ed page of center-left, 
influential Arabic daily Ad-Dustour (07/31): "Let the embassy of 
criminality shut down and let that despicable flag that is flying in 
our country go to hell.  There is no more room for them on our land, 
and they have no more justification in view of this flagrant scene 
of the bloodshed of our folks in Lebanon and Palestine....  The ugly 
crime, as the King described it, must have a Jordanian response. 
The dirty war, right from the beginning, should make us adopt a 
decisive and conclusive stand.  If the fragile peace that was 
established between us and the Israeli entity came about out of 
embarrassment and the tying of our hands, then it must go to hell. 
Amman is sad about what has been going on since day one, and it 
boils over with every piece of news that comes from the southern 
parts of Lebanon and Palestine.  But yesterday with the news of the 
second Qana massacre, a new type of anger is added to the sadness, 
and we stand today facing ourselves wondering about this begrudging 
historical enemy to whom we gave peace with good intent, only to 
receive from it killing after killing after killing....  We regret 
that there is still an embassy and ambassador that act as a thorn in 
our side and prevent us from even speaking out.  We regret even more 
that Jordan, the Arab and nationalistic country, is put in an 
awkward position because of the presence of the embassy and the 
ambassador." 
 
-- "New Nazis launch the 'final solution'" 
 
Columnist Mahmoud Rimawi writes on the op-ed page of semi-official, 
influential Arabic daily Al-Rai (07/31): "Rice expressed her 
feelings by what she called deep sadness over the victims of the 
Israeli attack.  She should have expressed shame, since her 
administration supported this dirty war and quickly provided Olmert 
and his gang with advanced American bombs....  The organized 
massacres that the Hebrew state has been committing over the past 
era, which started with Sharon's rule, proves that the people and 
countries of the region, as well as the humanity and the world, are 
now facing new Nazism that is focused on military armament and 
manufacturing, the spread of a culture of racism, organization of 
racial extermination campaigns, and complete contempt for the rest 
of the world including the allies in Washington." 
 
-- "Qana 2006" 
 
Chief Editor Ayman Safadi writes on the back-page of independent, 
centrist Arabic daily Al-Ghad (07/31): "Do we call it a massacre? Do 
we call it a slaughter? Do we pin it in our Arab memories as another 
Israeli crime that thwarts all proposals for peaceful coexistence 
with a barbaric racist enemy? Do we consider it a result of the 
shameful Arab reality?  Do we consider the United States an 
accomplice in the crime? Do we condemn the frailty of the United 
Nations?  All that we can do, but we are still ashamed of this 
helplessness to preserve the lives of children whose bodies were 
torn by the Israeli terrorism tools in a shelter where they escaped 
anyway from the Zionist war.  We are angry that Israeli flags rise 
in Amman and Cairo while the voices of the victims of Israel's 
terrorism rise in the skies of Lebanon and Palestine....  We 
remember all the Israeli killing and we form the genuine image of 
Israel: a rogue country built on hatred and resentment; a country 
whose children sign the rockets of destruction that kill the 
Lebanese children; a country that takes life from death.  It is not 
the Arabs who raise their children on hatred and glorification of 
death, but Israel.  It is not the Arabs who justify terrorism, but 
the President of the United States of America, George Bush.  He 
supports the terrorism of the Israeli state and justifies its taking 
of innocent lives as legitimate self-defense....  Israel's 
criminality will not produce a new and safe Middle East.  Let 
America stop belittling the minds of Arabs and offending their 
feelings as it promises this new Middle East.  The outcome of the 
Israeli criminality and American complicity is an environment where 
only violence is created and where only the desire for vengeance is 
grown....  Meanwhile, Israel's ambassadors must not stay in Cairo 
and Amman, and Jordan and Egypt's ambassadors must not stay in Tel 
Aviv.  Let the Jordanian and Egyptian anger at the Israeli crimes be 
manifested, at least in protest, by the withdrawal of the 
ambassadors." 
HALE