FROM THE DAILY STAR - LEBANON

8.1.98

speaker Nabih Berri gave a guarded response to Israeli defence minister Yitzhak Mordechai’s comments that the Jewish state is willing to comply with the demands of resolution 425. While describing it as a “positive sign”, Berri said he feared Mordechai’s statements could be an attempt to split the Syrian-Lebanese track in the peace process. He suggested that the Israelis might bend the demands of 425 into “UN resolution 425 with security conditions”.

12.1.98
Prime minister Rafik Hariri reiterated yesterday that Israel’s proposal to withdraw from the south in accordance with UN security council resolution 425 was a political manoeuvre aimed at instigating strife in Lebanon. “We hear Israel’s proposals in information media as ordinary people do. We haven’t got an official suggestion,” he said during an iftar at his house in Koraytem. “Israel has a reputation of launching ‘trial balloons’, full of hot air, that seek to instigate strife in Lebanon and give the Israeli government a good image in the world,” he added. Hariri denied that, during meetings with officials in Beirut, two US congress delegations had conveyed a message from Israel over the withdrawal proposal made by defence minister Yitzhak Mordechai last Friday. “It has become clear that Israel has a problem with peace. The Israeli government is doing all it can to undermine the peace process,” Hariri said, reaffirming that Lebanon and Syria “have the same interests that are threatened by one enemy: Israel”.

Bint Jbeil MP and member of Hizbullah’s Loyalty to the Resistance bloc, Mohammed Fneish, praised the government for not being “fooled by an enemy trap”. “The government, however, should announce its clear position rejecting any negotiation with the enemy and insisting that it will not offer any compromises on territory and water, be it on the political or security level,” Fneish said.

19.1.98
Source affirming that Syria regards the Israeli proposal as a “trial balloon,” and that the Jewish state is not serious about a withdrawal. Following the meetings, Hrawi described the Israeli proposal as a “manoeuvre”. The views were shared by al-Sharaa, who dismissed Israeli premier Benjamin Netanyahu’s offer to withdraw in return for security guarantees. He told Syria’s parliament that Israel’s aim was “to show that he had a peace proposal, that Lebanon is under Syrian hegemony and that Israel does not covet Lebanon”. He described the ploy as showing “unprecedented cunning,” adding that Israel was seeking “numerous conditions.” He rejected allegations that Syria would not welcome an Israeli withdrawal, stating that “We Syrians would be very happy with (a withdrawal). The Lebanese people too.” “Hizbullah would be the happiest of all because its resistance would have pushed the Israelis out of south Lebanon without negotiations or security arrangements” for the Jewish state, al-Sharaa said.

FROM HA'ARETZ

15.1.98
Informed European diplomats told Ha'aretz that four key Lebanese leaders told French Foreign Minister Hubert Vedrine in separate conversations in Beirut last week that "if Israel withdrew from Lebanon unilaterally, the Lebanese Army would deploy its forces in the south." The four leaders were President Elias Hrawi, Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, Foreign Minister Farez Boueiz, and Lebanese Speaker of Parliament Nabih Berri. By Amos Harel and David Makovsky, A member of the South Lebanon Army (SLA) was critically wounded when a booby-trapped video cassette that he carried over the Fatma border-crossing near Metulah exploded. An Israeli police sapper, two Israeli citizens and two Lebanese citizens were also injured in the explosion. The sapper and the one of the Lebanese citizens suffered medium injuries, and the others were lightly injured. In the meantime, informed European diplomats told Ha'aretz that four key Lebanese leaders told French Foreign Minister Hubert Vedrine in separate conversations in Beirut last week that "if Israel withdrew from Lebanon unilaterally, the Lebanese Army would deploy its forces in the south." The four leaders were President Elias Hrawi, Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, Foreign Minister Farez Boueiz, and Lebanese Speaker of Parliament Nabih Berri. UNIFIL commander in Southern Lebanon, Major General Konouse Konrote, said that if the IDF left Lebanon, UNIFIL could redeploy in the area north of the international border within one week. He said UNIFIL would cover a narrow strip of land, north of which the Lebanese Army would redeploy. Konrote met with Yossi Beilin MK (Labor) in Jerusalem on Wednesday. He said the Lebanese Army was growing stronger and enjoyed the support of the Shi'ites in the country's south. If the Lebanese Army does redeploy, Israel's main condition for leaving Lebanon would be fulfilled. However, it will be Damascus, and not Beirut that will decide whether the Lebanese Army redeploys. Until now Syria has given no indication that it would support such a move, which would weaken its leverage in extracting a full Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights. In 1993, after Operation Accountability, Syria foiled a Lebanese plan to deploy southward.

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