PAKISTAN: DO A ‘CIVIL SOCIETY’ AND A ‘PEACE CONSTITUENCY’ EXIST?

By Dr. Subhash Kapila

Introductory Observations

In India there does undoubtedly exist a sizeable ‘civil society’ which is a product of its politically liberalized society, democratic institutions and a general level of religious tolerance in a traditionally historic multi-racial society. It also emerges from a well educated middle class and an enlarging one fuelled by its high rate of economic growth. Credit also needs to be given in this regard to the growth of political liberal institutions established during the British rule and further nurtured in the last 60 years of independent India.

There is also a sizeable ‘peace constituency’ in India, spurred more by political idealism than political realism that advocates peace with Pakistan. Both taken together are then flaunted as icons by India’s political parties and the intelligentsia (including the media) to reinforce their strategies of ‘political secularism’ as opposed to the existential societal secularism.

In this context, a major question that calls for an answer is that whether a corresponding ‘civil society’ and ‘peace constituency’ exists in Pakistan. Why this question is important and calls for an answer is because in India it is assumed that such societal segments do exist in Pakistan and such segments have similar aspirations for peace with India. If it existed then such segments would have emerged as strong pressure groups on Pakistan’s governing establishment and restrained them from use of terrorism as an instrument of state policy and the strategies of confrontation with India.

On July 17, 2006, in the wake of the Mumbai 7/11 bombing incidents in which more than 200 innocent lives were lost and 700 wounded, this author was co-opted by Pakistan’s GEO TV channel in a live show along with a former Pakistani Ambassador to review the impact of these Mumbai blasts on the ongoing India-Pakistan peace dialogue.

The main thrust of this author’s participation in the Pakistani TV show was as under:

• India’s public opinion encompassing an extraordinary wide political spectrum outpaced the initial muted responses by the present Indian Government. Public opinion forced the establishment to come out with stronger political responses against terrorism emanating from Pakistan.
• India at large expected Pakistan’s President to honour his pledges to restrain terrorism, Mumbai 7/11 blasts were an indicator to the contrary and would therefore impact the ongoing peace process.
• The future of the India-Pakistan peace dialogue and its substantial success would depend heavily on the emergence of a sizeable civil society and peace constituency in Pakistan. This can only come about with such groups pressing strongly for restoration of democracy in Pakistan.

However, this author prefaced his participation in the Pakistani GEO TV show with the remarks that India at large today expected that the ‘civil society’ and the ‘peace constituency’ in Pakistan would come out with strong and vocal condemnations of the Mumbai 7/11 bombings (whose trails led to Pakistan's ISI and its protégé terrorist organisations) as ‘wanton destruction' of innocent lives were a crime against humanity.

In the succeeding weeks, this author eagerly and hopefully awaited such responses from Pakistan’s ‘civil society’ and ‘peace constituency’. Scanning the English language Pakistani media there does not seem to have been any evidence of any heartfelt forthright condemnation forthcoming.

It is this which leads one to ponder whether in reality a ‘civil society’ and a ‘peace constituency’ exists in Pakistan?

Pakistan: The Absence of a ‘Civil Society’

Some may be able to discern a semblance of a ‘civil society’ in Pakistan from a handful of objective political commentators, intellectuals and human rights activists, Pakistan otherwise seems to be devoid of an effective and a widely established 'civil society'.

The Pakistan nation-state projects the following deficiencies of a ‘civil society’ in Pakistan:

• Liberal political institutions are not visible in Pakistan.
• Pakistan has in the last 60 years regressed from the liberal political institutional framework left by the British and down-slided into an autocratic Pakistan Army – Islamist Mullah gridlock. Liberalism stands snuffed out.
• Pakistani society stands polarized between a feudal extravagantly rich ruling establishment and a vast economically weak lower strata of society.
• Lack of any sustained economic growth, as a result of exorbitant expenditure on military buildup has retarded the emergence of a sizeable and vocal middle class.
• Pakistan is totally devoid of representative and responsive political structures and mechanisms.
• The Pakistan Army has always strongly reacted to any signs of emergence of ‘civilian supremacy’ in Pakistan’s governance.

A Pakistani intellectual Iftikhar H. Malik in a work on ‘State and Civil Society in Pakistan’, makes the following observations:

• The Pakistani State has successfully refurbished itself at the expense of vital civil institutions – Constitution, pluralism, political parties, independent judiciary, free press and activist groups.
• The imperatives for establishment of a civil society in Pakistan have been side lined.
• Totalitarianism, elitist monopolization, majoritarian coercion and ethnic fascism which normally stand rejected by a ‘civil society’ are all pervasive and predominant in Pakistan.

The Pakistani author also makes an important observation that a ‘civil society’ cannot be taken as a given reality, it has to be created and strengthened. Sadly, Pakistan even after 60 years of independence is bereft of a ‘civil society’ – an essential prerequisite of any modern and progressive state.

Indian policy planners and its thinking elite have therefore to take it as a given in their planning and formulations, that a ‘civil society’ does not exist.

As a corollary to the above, India cannot count on an India-Pakistan peace dialogue to be carried forward on this premise.

Pakistan’s ‘Peace Constituency’ as a Reckonable Political Force: A Mistaken Indian Notion

India’s political compulsions for peace with Pakistan, for whatever external or internal reasons, has been fed with the assumption that an appreciable ‘peace constituency’ exists in Pakistan and that this political segment is an enlarging one.

That a sizeable number of average Pakistanis aspire for peace with India is conceded. People on both sides have wanted peace. But what cannot be conceded is that a sizeable ‘peace constituency’ exists in Pakistan. And why it cannot be conceded is that there are two very good reasons for it.

Firstly, when we talk of ‘peace constituency’ the term has political connotations. It implies that within the Pakistani governing elite and establishment and whatever passes for representative political opinion in Pakistan, a sizeable segment exists, which as opposed to rhetoric, has a genuine and abiding investment in a peace process with India. It does not exist.

Western interpretations of the truthfulness of intentions of Pakistan’s governing military establishment for peace with India are politically motivated to serve their own strategic interests. They cannot be taken as ‘givens’ in India’s policy formulations.

Secondly, having conceded that a sizeable number of Pakistani average citizens aspire for peace with India, however, does not obliterate the reality that this aspiration of such Pakistani citizens is not ‘translatable’ to a determining political force to impel the Pakistani governing establishment to forge a viable peace with India.

Hence, it is a mistaken notion for the Indian Government and the Indian media to constantly flaunt that a sizeable peace constituency exists in Pakistan and that it is an enlarging one. Further, that India as the larger country can be generous and accommodative on contentious issues as a contributory factor towards growth of a ‘peace constituency’ in Pakistan. This argument is untenable. It is the people of Pakistan that need to be politically vociferous for peace with India and towards that end organise a mass political mobilisation which brings about a transformation of Pakistan's political landscape in which a 'civil society' and 'peace constituency' emerge as strong determinants of Pakistan's policies.

India can hope for that whenever democracy is restored in Pakistan, such a ‘peace constituency’ will emerge there. Currently it cannot be taken as a determinant for India’s peace dialogue policy formulations.

Concluding Observations

Policy planners and decision- makers in India, or even elsewhere, must resist the common failing of applying the templates of political and social conditions existent in their own country to other countries while devising policy formulations and responses. In the instant case while India does have a ‘civil society’ and ‘peace constituency’ the same cannot be said of Pakistan.

It is in India’s interests that such segments emerge on Pakistan’s political firmament. But for these to emerge, India will have to actively espouse and be pro-active in the cause for the restoration of democracy in Pakistan, Democracy in Pakistan is an imperative for India’s national security interests and the surest way of ensuring this imperative is to make the ‘India-Pakistan peace dialogue’ contingent on the return of democracy to Pakistan. There cannot be a purposeful peace dialogue with Pakistan in the absence of representative and responsive political governance.

(The author is an International Relations and Strategic Affairs analyst. He is the Consultant, Strategic Affairs with South Asia Analysis Group. Email:drsubhashkapila@yahoo.com)

Can Pakistan Govt. still say that it is not Anti-India?

For those still are startled by what is being taught in Pakistani schools as exposed by Amir Mir, this could be too much.

'Hindu, Enemy Of Islam'
These are extracts from government-sponsored textbooks approved by the National Curriculum Wing of the Federal Ministry of Education.


"Before the Arab conquest people were fed up with the teachings of Buddhists & Hindus." "Before Islam people lived in untold misery."

"European nations have been working during the past three centuries...to subjugate countries of the Muslim world."

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Class IV

• The Muslims of Pakistan provided all facilities to the Hindus and the Sikhs who left for India. But the Hindus and the Sikhs looted the Muslims in India with both hands and they attacked their caravans, buses and railway trains. Therefore, about one million Muslims were martyred on their way to Pakistan.
  
• The Hindus treated the ancient population of the Indus Valley very badly. They set fire to their houses and butchered them.
  
• The religion of Hindus did not teach them good things, Hindus did not respect women.

Class V

• After the war of 1965, India with the help of Hindus living in East Pakistan, incited the people of East Pakistan against West Pakistanis. In December 1971, the Indians themselves also attacked East Pakistan. As a result...East Pakistan separated from us. We should all receive military training so that we can foil the designs of the enemy in the future.
  
• The Hindu has always been an enemy of Islam.

Class VI

• In the middle of the city of Deebal (Sindh), there was a Hindu temple. There was a flag hoisted on top of it. The Hindus believed that as long as the flag kept flying, nobody could harm them. Mohd bin Qasim found out about this.... The Muslims began to catapult stones at the temple and at the flag, ultimately making it fall to the ground. The whole city became tumultuous and the Hindus lost heart. Some Muslims clambered up the walls of the temple and forced open the door. Qasim's army entered the city and after conquering it, announced peace. The Muslims treated the vanquished so well many Hindus converted to Islam.
  
• Before the Arab conquest the people were fed up with the teachings of Buddhists and Hindus.
  
• The foundation of the Hindu setup was based on injustice and cruelty.
  
• The Hindus who had always been opportunists cooperated with the British.
  
• The Hindus used to please the goddess Kali by slaughtering people of other religions.

Class VII

• Some Jewish tribes also lived in Arabia. They lent money to workers and peasants on high rates of interest and usurped their earnings. They held the whole society in their tight grip because of the ever-increasing compound interest.
  
• History has no parallel to the extremely kind treatment of the Christians by the Muslims. Still the Christian kingdoms of Europe were constantly trying to gain control of Jerusalem. This was the cause of the Crusades.
  
• European nations have been working during the past three centuries, through conspiracies or naked aggression, to subjugate countries of the Muslim world.
  
  w Hindus always desired to crush the Muslims as a nation. Several attempts were made by the Hindus to erase Muslim culture and civilisation.
  
• The Hindus too wished to ruin Muslim civilisation and culture by destroying Urdu which has been closely associated with the Pakistan Movement.

Class VIII

• During the Khilafat Movement Hindus and Muslims were completely united and like brothers and they started to cooperate and live in peaceful togetherness. But as soon as this movement ended, Hindu hatred of the Muslim re-emerged.
  
• Before Islam people lived in untold misery all over the world.

Class IX

• The Hindus and the Muslims...could not amalgamate each other's way of life to become one nation. The main reason for this difference of cultures, civilisation and outlook was the religion of Islam which cannot be assimilated in any other system as it is based on the principle of...oneness of God....On the other hand, Hinduism is based on the concept of multiple Gods....There lies the difference between the Hindu and Muslim way of thinking.
  
• In connivance with the (British) government the Hindus started communal riots and caused loss of life and property. At the time of prayers the Hindus tortured the Muslims by playing music in front of the mosques. Before the commencement of classes the students saluted the portrait of Mahatma Gandhi and Muslim students were also forced to do so.
  
• Muslims promoted equality and social justice as against the division (created by) the (Hindu) caste system.

Class X

• (The ideology of) Pakistan...was a revolt against the prevailing system of India in which Hindu nationalism was imposed on the Muslims....
  
• Islam gives a message of peace and brotherhood.... There is no such concept in Hinduism. Moreover Islam preaches brotherhood, equality and justice.... On the other hand, the Hindu society is based on caste system which downgrades the entire mankind.
  
• After the establishment of Pakistan the Hindus and Sikhs created a day of doom for the Muslims in East Punjab.
  
• The Hindus were encouraged by the (British) government to force the Muslims to join the Congress.

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(These extracts have been translated from Urdu which is the standard medium of instruction in government schools in Pakistan.)

After all these extracts, which clrealy shows how the hate is being instilled in the minds of pakistanis on India and Hindus, pakistan still has the cheeks to say that they aren't Anti-India.... who are the fools here, they or those who are willing to buy pakistans stupid stories.

India on Lebanon Issue.

ISRAEL: INDIA’S CONDEMNATION OVER LEBANON OPERATIONS WAS AVOIDABLE

By Dr. Subhash Kapila

Introductory Observations

India’s condemnation of Israel over its current military operations in Lebanon through a resolution in Parliament was avoidable. It has arisen from the Leftists pressure in the Coalition Government and the other disparate political groupings that masquerade as “secularists” but in reality pander to Indian Muslim vote banks.

Strangely, a press report (The Tribune, August, 2006) states that there is strong pressure also within the Congress Party that a Working Committee Resolution should be passed by the Party separately. The arguments advanced in support of such a move is that with UP Assembly elections coming up early next year a strong political message needs to be sent out condemning Israel’s military strikes in Lebanon.

More strangely, this report indicates that within Congress Party circles, linkages are being drawn that the Party’s silence on Lebanon would indicate a pro-US stand and that when added to the Indo-US nuclear deal (also seen as a pro-US step), a wrong political message to the minorities would be conveyed.

India’s Doubtful Foreign Policy Attitudes: Questions

Such stances of the Congress Party, the Leftists and those of the “secular brigade” raise the following questions:

• Is India’s foreign policy going to be determined by Leftists and Indian Muslims?
• In what way Israel’s military operations against the Islamic militias, adversely affect India’s security or strategic interests?
• Is such condemnation of Israel balanced, politically?
• Why is there no parallel condemnation of Syria and Iran which are providing the Hezbollah in Lebanon with heavy military hardware and long-range rockets which daily endanger Israeli civilians security?
• Is it not high time that Indian Governments learn to use restraint in their foreign policy pronouncements, irrespective of doubtful domestic pressures?
• If Indian domestic pressures count so much, then why in the wake of 7/11, the Congress Government, the Leftists and the “secular brigade” were tongue-tied in condemning Pakistan for terrorism attack against Indian civilians resulting in the loss of 200 lives?
• Why are we running to support Palestinian Hamas and the Hezbollah in Lebanon and condemn Israel? Did the Hamas and Hezbollah or the entire Arab community come out vociferously to condemn Pakistan’s religious terrorism ongoing against India?

Sadly, India’s foreign policy has been hijacked from its institutionalised care-takers, the Indian Foreign Service. India’s foreign policy presently is communised and communalised as surveyed in the author’s last paper (SAAG Paper No. 1892 dated 26.07.2006).

Foreign policy today stands divorced from India’s strategic and security determinants and overtaken by the domestic electoral compulsions of political parties.

Coming back to Israel’s military operations in Lebanon, the following need to be analysed:

• Israel’s Military Operations in Lebanon: The Genesis of the Case.
• Israel’s Present Military Strikes are Against Proxy War Militants Infrastructure in Lebanon.
• United Nations Resolution No. 1559: Why Lebanon Has Not Implemented it?
• Crucial Questions for International Community on Counter-Terrorism Operations Against Proxy War and Religious Terrorism Outfits/Militias.

Israel’s Military Operations in Lebanon: The Genesis of the Case.

The Hezbollah has been involved in terrorism violence and asymmetrical armed warfare against Israel for years. Its military hardware and rocket artillery are being supplied by Syria and Iran. Over the years it stands entrenched in Southern Lebanon bordering Israel, which has served as a base for its violent operations and rocket attacks on Northern Israel communities. Till 2000, for a number of years, Israel had occupied a strip of Southern Lebanon as a “buffer zone” to preclude Hezbollah attacks. Under international pressure and on the assurance that Lebanon would not allow Hezbollah to operate in Southern Lebanon, the Israeli forces withdrew.

In the last six years, not only has Hezbollah been made to withdraw by Lebanon, on the contrary they have established a fortification line with concrete bunkers and a network of underground tunnels to make their positions unassailable. It is from here that they have continued their operations against Israel. The latest incident which sparked the present conflagration was the Hezbollah attack on an Israeli patrol, within Israel territory, killing three soldiers and abducting two Israeli soldiers.

Israel as a consequence, against this act of terror, launched military strikes in Southern Lebanon and other sites in Lebanon housing Hezbollah rocket sites, infrastructure and facilities. This has continued for the last three weeks now.

The present military conflict, it must be noted is between Israel and the Hezbollah militia. The Lebanese Army is not involved and nor has Israel targeted Lebanese Army positions or military infrastructure.

It also needs to be noted that the Hezbollah today is a “state within a state”, defiant and unmindful of Lebanon’s government writ, secure as it is with the powerful backing of powerful external Shia patrons.

Israel’s Present Military Strikes are Against Proxy War Militia and Infrastructure in Lebanon

Hezbollah’s operations against Israel from Southern Lebanon and other places in Lebanon stand reported in the international media for a number of years. It appears that besides the Islamic fundamentalist urges and motivations, the Hezbollah is fighting a proxy war against Israel and the United States on behalf of Syria and Iran.

Seemingly, Syria uses the Hezbollah as a proxy to gain bargaining leverage over Israel for return of Golan Heights. Iran in the present context would welcome a Hezbollah escalation as it would divert American and international focus on its nuclear weapons programme. Such a preoccupation would pre-empt a joint US-Israel military strikes against Iranian nuclear weapons facilities.

As stated above Israeli military strikes are primarily against Hezbollah as the proxy war militia, its infrastructure and the arteries and means which support this heavily armed militia operating against Israel. It is not aimed at the Lebanese Army or the Lebanese State.

As far as collateral damages in civilian casualties, one would tend to believe Israel that these are not deliberately targeted. These arise as the Hezbollah rocket artillery uses civilian population centres as human shields for their rocket strikes against Israel.

United Nations Resolution 1559: Why Lebanon Has Not Implemented It?

This UN Resolution under which Israeli forces withdrew from Southern Lebanon gave the following guarantees which Lebanon had to implement.

• Lebanese Army would occupy Southern Lebanon.
• It would ensure that the Hezbollah militia is uprooted from Southern Lebanon.
• Lebanon was to disarm all religious militias and establish a secure Southern Lebanon.
• Hezbollah was to re-invent itself as a political entity.

The position in 2006 is just the opposite. Hezbollah is in full military control over Southern Lebanon and its militia now equipped with much more potent military hardware. It has now politically managed to be a part of Lebanon’s Government Lebanon stands powerless against Hezbollah. Nor has it in these six years sought international assistance to ensure UN Resolution 1559 is implemented.

So logically Lebanon has invited the present conflagration by its inactivity to rein in the Hezbollah. No extenuating reasons exist to absolve it from the blame and its losses, however tragic.

Crucial Questions for International Community on Counter-Terrorism Operations Against Proxy War and Religious Terrorism Outfits/Militias

The present conflict in Lebanon throws up some pertinent questions for the international community.

• Can the United Nations or UN Resolutions control proxy war and religious terrorism?
• Can a self-respecting nation with its security endangered and civilian lives lost await international condemnation and support to counter proxy war/ religious terrorism?
• Does the UN or the international community have the moral right to condemn counter-terrorism military operations against proxy war/ religious terrorism entities undertaken by nations which become a victim of such asymmetrical warfare?
• Can states who by reasons of state failure (incidently or otherwise) be absolved from harbouring proxy war/ religious terrorism entities?

All of the above, infirmities are presently being found in the Israeli military operations against Lebanon. Lebanon’s state failure to neutralize Hezbollah as a combined proxy war/ religious terrorism entity is inexcusable. So is the international community which should have stepped in much earlier to preempt the proxy war raging against Israel.

India also needs to ponder seriously on the above questions as similar challenges are emerging to confront it.

Concluding Observations

Israel is well within its rights to use military force against the Hezbollah to neutralize it. The right of self-defence is enshrined in the UN Charter. It is unfortunate that the whole world reacts when 50 civilians are killed in Qana in a collateral damage in Israeli strikes, but nobody whimpers when Israeli civilians in scores die every second day by religious terrorism strikes. The silence is also similarly deafening when 200 lives were lost last month in 7/11 bombings by Pakistan controlled and based Islamic religious terrorist organisations.

The Indian condemnation of Israel in political forums and by the Government is singularly unfortunate. Israel has been a staunch friend of India for nearly two decades now. Its military aid to India during this Kargil War is unparalleled in terms of speed and response. Calls for breaking of military relations with Israel by the Leftists are politically motivated by reasons other than India’s national interests.

The least that the Indian Government could have done in recognition of Israel’s special relationship with India was to have been reticent, like the Pakistani Government or followed President Putin of Russia in his measured response to the Saudi Foreign Minister that : “The State of Israel has the right to and should live in security.”

(The author is an International Relations and Strategic Affairs analyst. He is the Consultant, Strategic Affairs with South Asia Analysis Group. Email:drsubhashkapila@yahoo.com)

Hezbollywood? Evidence mounts that Qana collapse and deaths were staged

By Reuven Koret July 31, 2006 It was to be a perfect Hollywood ending for Hezbollah. Just as the Israeli bombing of the village of Qana in 1996 brought a premature end to Israel's Operation "Grapes of Wrath," so too a sequel of Qana II could change, once and for all, the direction of Israel's current summer blockbuster, "Change of Direction." Ten years ago, world condemnation of an errant Israeli shell that hit a civilian compound forced then-PM Shimon Peres to curtail the offensive against terror bases. The setting was also perfect: Kana was again being used as a primary site for launching rockets against Israeli cities. The IDF reported that more than 150 rockets had been launched from Qana and its vicinity at Israeli civilians, wreaking destruction in Kiryat Shmona, Maalot, Nahariya and Haifa. It was only a matter of time before the Israeli Air Force would come for a visit, using pinpoint targeting of the sites used to launch rockets, Hezbollah logistical centers and weapon storage facilities. On the morning of July 30, according to the IDF, the air force came in three waves. In the first, between midnight and one in the morning, there was a strike at or near the building that eventually collapsed. Brent Sadler of CNN reports that the Israeli ordnance did not even hit the building but landed "20 or 30 meters" from the structure. There was a second strike at other targets far from the collapse building several hours later, and a third strike at around 7:30 in the morning. There too the nearest hit was some 460 meters away, according to the IDF. But first reports of a building collapse came only around 8 am. Thus there was an unexplained 7 to 8 hour gap between the time of the helicopter strike and the building collapse. Brigadier General Amir Eshel, Head of the Air Force Headquarters, in a press briefing, told journalists that "the attack on the structure in the Qana village took place between midnight and one in the morning. The gap between the timing of the collapse of the building and the time of the strike on it is unclear." Gen. Eshel appeared genuinely mystified by the gap in time. He "I'm saying this very carefully, because at this time I don't have a clue as to what the explanation could be for this gap," he added. The army's only explanation was that somehow there was unexploded Hezbollah ordnance in the building that only detonated much later. "It could be that inside the building, things that could eventually cause an explosion were being housed, things that we could not blow up in the attack, and maybe remained there, Brigadier General Eshel said. Eshel reported that as recently as two days ago, military intelligence reported the building area had been used by the terrorists for storage or firing of weapons. It was a bad place to cram dozens of women and children. There are other mysteries. The roof of the building was intact. Journalist Ben Wedeman of CNN noted that there was a larger crater next to the building, but observed that the building appeared not to have collapsed as a result of the Israeli strike. Why would the civilians who had supposedly taken shelter in the basement of the building not leave after the post-midnight attack? They just went back to sleep and had the bad luck to wait for the building to collapse in the morning? National Public Radio's correspondent reported that residents of that building had left and the victims were non-residents who chose to shelter in the building that night. They were "too poor" to leave the down, one resident told CNN's Wedeman. Who were these people? What we do know is that sometime after dawn a call went hour to journalists and rescue workers to come to the scene. And come they did, in droves. While Hezbollah and its apologists have been claiming that civilians could not freely flee the scene due to Israeli destruction of bridges and roads, the journalists and rescue teams from nearby Tyre had no problem getting there. Lebanese rescue teams did not start evacuating the building until the morning and only after the camera crews came. The absence of a real rescue effort was explained by saying that equipment was lacking. There were no scenes of live or injured people being extracted. There was little blood, CNN's Wedeman noted: all the victims, he concluded, appeared to have died while as they were sleeping -- sleeping, apparently, through thunderous Israeli air attacks. Rescue workers equipped with cameras were removing the bodies from the same opening in the collapsed structure. Journalists were not allowed near the collapsed building. Rescue workers filmed as they went carried the victims on the stretchers, occasionally flipping up the blankets so that cameras could show the faces and bodies of the dead. But Israelis steeled to scenes of carnage from Palestinian suicide bombings and Hezbollah rocket attack could not help but notice that these victims did not look like our victims. Their faces were ashen gray. While medical examination clearly is called for to arrive at a definitive dating and cause of their deaths, they do not appear to have died hours before. The bodies looked like they had been dead for days. Viewers can judge for themselves. But the accumulating evidence suggests another explanation for what happened at Kana. The scenario would be a setup in which the time between the initial Israeli bombing near the building and morning reports of its collapse would have been used to "plant" bodies killed in previous fighting -- reports in previous days indicated that nearby Tyre was used as a temporary morgue -- place them in the basement, and then engineer a "controlled demolition" to fake another Israeli attack. The well-documented use by Palestinians of this kind of faked footage -- from the alleged shooting of Mohammed Dura in Gaza, scenes from Jenin of "dead" victims falling off gurneys and then climbing back on -- have merited the creation of a new film genre called "Palliwood." There is increasing evidence that the Kana sequel is another episode in this genre, a variety which might be called Hezbollywood. The Hezbollah have evidently learned their craft well. The current suspension of Israeli military air activity is supposedly intended, among other things, to be used for the investigation of what really happened at Qana. It is to be hoped that there are real journalists on the scene, and unbiased medical examiners, who will have the courage and intelligence to sort out the anomalies and contradictions, and get to the buried truth of what happened. There is no shortage of victims in Lebanon and Israel these days. From this vantage point, at this time, it looks like in the case of Qana, the world's media was duped in a cruel and colossal hoax by a terror organization that knows no moral bounds in its exploitation of suffering and anti-Israel hatred. But, as usual, the only party expected to pay the full price will be Israelis. Yes, it would be a Hollywood ending for it all to end in Qana, exactly as it did a decade ago. But perfect endings, and perfect crimes, are rarely pulled off in real life. Israelis will not be able to investigate this claim directly. The question remains whether honest men and women of other nationalities will let this likely lie stand or press for the revelation of the improbable and inconvenient truth.

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Here are some startling evidences from photograps taken at Qana & other evidences that raises serious doubts about the authencity of hezbollah [1], [2], [3], [4], [5].

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