Monday, July 24, 2006

An Open Letter to Dr Kim Howells - Your visit to Beirut

As Minister of State for the Middle East at the UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office it was necessary to weigh your words carefully during your visit to Beirut - but you failed abysmally. Your comments were not worthy of a government minister.


When the UK was attacked during WW2 by V1 and V2 rockets the Royal Air Force bombed major German cities relentlessly. It ill behoves that you were sharply critical of the Israel Defence Force tactics in Lebanon. I don't recollect you making such criticism of the tactics of what the British media, in particular the state radio BBC, call "militants or guerrillas" when terrorists, suicide bombers and Hamas Terrorists' rockets were murdering Jewish children and people in cold blood since the 1950's.

You do not apparently realize that this is Israel's battle for survival. It is not an exercise in a far off country to try out newly developed British weapons and tactics or saturate bombing and rockets like the Cruise and other missiles used by the Coalition to attack Iraq.

Britain has not had to defend these shores since the conclusion of the Second World War but has been active in many theatres of war including its defending overseas territories it occupies which were acquired by force in previous centuries. You should question the UK's right to remain in the Falkland Isles for a start, located so far away from the UK.

Indeed you should have saved your criticism for the people of Lebanon who permitted Hezbollah to occupy the area in the first place, just like they permitted the terrorists of the PLO in the late 1970's.

Why not direct your attention to criticizing the permanent members of the UN Security Council, of which the UK is one, followed by the International Community, who turned a blind eye to the arming of Hezbollah to the teeth with such lethal weapons and permitted Hezbollah, Lebanon, Syria and Iran to ignore Security Council Resolution 1559 of 2 September 2004.

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