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By Michelle A. Vu www.christianpost.com

Millions of Christians around the world are praying for their persecuted brothers and sisters in Christ today in observance of the International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church.

In its 14th year, IDOP is one of the largest prayer events in the world. Last year, an estimated half a million churches in 150 countries participated in the event, according to Open Doors, an international Christian ministry that supports persecuted believers.

“The International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church presents a tremendous opportunity for millions of people to make a difference in the lives of those being persecuted for their faith in countries like North Korea, Iran, Iraq, China, India and many more,” said Open Doors USA President and CEO Dr. Carl Moeller.

He noted that the number one request by persecuted believers is always for those living in freedom to pray for them.

“And on Nov. 8 we have the opportunity to collectively lift our petitions to the Lord on their behalf,” Moeller said.

According to Open Doors, an estimated 100 million Christians worldwide suffer from some form of persecution for their faith in Christ – ranging from interrogation to death. Millions more face discrimination and alienation.

The World Evangelical Alliance, the largest network of evangelicals in the world, cited Hebrews 13:3 as a reminder why Christians should pray on IDOP. The verse states: “Remember those in prison as if you were their fellow prisoners and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering.”

Godfrey Yogarajah, executive director of The Religious Liberty Commission of WEA, recalled recently visiting several widows of Christian leaders who were killed in the violence last year in India’s Orissa state. He said they had lost everything: their homes, their possessions and their husbands.

“’We have lost everything except our faith,’” Yogarajah recalled one widow telling him as she held her baby tightly. “’Pray that we stay strong and bring up our children in the faith for which their fathers gave their lives.’”

Last year, Hindu extremists carried out the worst religious persecution in India’s 60 years of democracy. At least 120 people were murdered, 250 churches destroyed and over 50,000 individuals displaced in Orissa, India.

Jubilee Campaign USA, an advocacy group for persecuted Christians, says while IDOP is a time to pray for persecuted, it also serves another purpose.

“It is also a time to pray for the souls of the oppressors, the nations that promote persecution, and those who ignore it,” wrote Ann Buwalda, director of Jubilee Campaign USA, in an e-mail newsletter.

Jubilee Campaign along with WEA and Open Doors all call for prayers especially for North Korea, where Christians are persecuted the most.

Open Doors, which has ranked North Korea as the worst religious freedom violator for seven years in a row, estimates that the totalitarian regime detains at least 200,000 political and religious prisoners – more than any other country in the world. An estimated 40,000 to 60,000 of the prisoners are thought to be Christians.

Christians living in free countries are also asked to pray specifically for Iranian converts Maryam Rostampour, 27, and MarziehAmirizadeh Esmaeilabad, 30, who have been held in an Iranian prison for eight months for their faith.

Despite deteriorating physical health and psychological pressure, both women have refused to recant their faith in Jesus Christ.

Open Doors USA launched a campaign this past week to urge Iran to immediately release the two women.

“Each year, The International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church gives us the privilege of joining together with over half a million churches in 150 countries to pray for the suffering church,” WEA’s Yogarajah said.

“It plays a vital role in encouraging and strengthening the persecuted church and also awakening churches in places where there is no persecution,” he added.

To get more churches involved, Open Doors is providing free resources including church bulletin inserts, a Power Point slide, facts for pastors, and list of suggested activities.

Other groups currently active in serving the persecuted Church include Christian Freedom International, Christian Solidarity Worldwide, Gospel for Asia, International Christian Concern, and The Voice of the Martyrs, among others.

By Rabbi Tzvi Nightingale,  www.aish.com

Was that my father standing behind the barbed wire?

Looking through some photographs I found inside a drawer
I was taken by a photograph of you
There were one or two I know that you would have liked a little more
But they didn’t show your spirit quite as true
-Jackson Browne

My father has three birthdays. Yes, three. His biological birthday is May 10, 1924. When he came to Canada after the war, he was too old to qualify as an orphan, so he had to rearrange his age a bit and make himself younger. 5/10/24 became 10/5/27 and he was now born on October 5, 1927. (Please don’t tell the Canadian government about this. I would hate to see him deported at this stage of his life.) Oddly, our family has been celebrating this completely fictitious birthday ever since.

My father was finally liberated from Dachau on April 29, 1945.

But it is his third birthday that he speaks about with the most emotion; the one that carries the most meaning for him. He spent years in various forced labor and death camps after his town of Staszow, Poland was liquidated by the Nazis in 1942. He was finally liberated on April 29, 1945 from Dachau concentration camp in Germany. My father has never been one to speak at length about his experiences as a survivor of the Holocaust, but he does talk about this one particular day. Among other things, I have heard him praise the American army for quickly delousing the inmates soon after they freed the camp. Being free from the Nazi hell and from the lice that infested his body for so long gave him a new lease on life.

The day after Yom Kippur I went to my office and did what I do after every Yom Kippur — not much. Not only am I tired from the fasting and teaching, but truth be told, I find the next day to be a bit of a downer. After intensely thinking about life, God, goals and being a better person, and trying to inspire 150 people who come to our Aish center for services, I am just not up to the everyday mundane grind that comes rushing back. So trying to recapture some of the seriousness and meaning of Yom Kippur, I found myself on YouTube and typed in “Dachau” in the search box. The top of the list was a film called Dachau Concentration Camp Liberation.

It was not a sophisticated piece, by any means. It consisted of photos slowly being panned to the background music from Schindler’s List. There were photos of soldiers approaching the camp and arresting surrendering Nazis, a bird’s eye view of the camp and photos of the main entrance and a gate with the infamous Arbeit Macht Frei.

A picture appeared of an American soldier walking on a wall perpendicular to a building, and I wondered, If my father were to see this short film, would he remember some of the structures and buildings? I briefly thought of showing him the film but knew I would not follow through due to his extreme sensitivity whenever the subject of the Holocaust comes up. In all the years I have known my dad, I have only heard snippets here and there.

At 1:50 into the film a photo appeared that made me hit the pause button. It was a relatively clear photo, a close up of sorts, of three inmates behind barbed wire, all smiling and waving — presumably at their saviors. The short man on the left has an overcoat, obviously given to him by one of the soldiers. The man on the right with the moustache is taller and appears to be saluting. They are wearing the familiar striped concentration camp garb.

And the man in the middle looks like my father.

Could this really be my father?

I began to stare intensely and analyze every detail of the physical features to see if they match my dad’s. The widow’s peak hairline, the shape of the face, the somewhat larger ear, the gap between his front teeth — all were consistent with his look. Could it be? Could this really be him? I kept asking myself. But the trait that made me think it was him the most was the shape of his waving hand. I have always noticed this about my father, how his index finger curls and seems slightly raised higher than his middle fingers and how his thumb comes to almost meet them. Today, thanks to his arthritis, his hand is almost frozen in that position, and this was the shape of the hand of the man in this photo.

I immediately emailed the link to my three brothers in Toronto with the subject line, “Something very weird” and told them to pause the film and tell me what they think. By next morning, they agreed that this could indeed be our father in the photo.

Then things got a little complicated. We were faced with the dilemma of showing this photo to my father. Will it bring back too many painful memories? Should we subject him to an image of himself from so long ago of the most horrible time in his life? What effect would possibly seeing himself in Nazi prisoner garb have on his psyche?

My oldest brother, Reuben, has always been closest to my father ever since he went to work for him in his meat packing plant at the age of 15. My dad gave him the most noxious job there to discourage him from working at Grace Meats, but packing tripe did not turn Reuben away. They have been very tight ever since. Reuben felt that we should think this through and “sit on it” for a while. “He has not seen the photo for all these years, another day or so will not change things.”

Sid, the next oldest brother and the peacemaker in our family, agreed. Murray and I wanted to show it to him but for the time being we deferred to the elder siblings. But the following day Murray came up with a Solomonic solution: Let’s show the picture to my dad’s one surviving sibling, Henya, who was with him in the camps earlier in the war and would be able to recognize if this indeed was him.

Murray called me that morning on his way to Auntie Henya. I told him to call me on my cell as soon as he spoke with her. Murray called me at 12:30 pm. “She was unequivocal – it’s him. And not only that, but the man standing next to him with the overcoat was his childhood friend, Herschel D.”

With that Murray then called my dad and asked if he wished to see a photo of himself on the day of his liberation from Dachau. He did. Murray went up to his condo and showed him the picture. With tears in his eyes my father declared, “Yeah, that’s me.”

On April 29, 1945 a handful of photos of the liberation of Dachau were taken by Robert Spring, an X-Ray technician serving with the 59th Evacuation Hospital of the U.S. Army Medical Corps. There were 32,000 inmates on that day and most of the photos taken by soldiers were of men too skeletal to discern their identities, too grainy to see any specific faces, or group shots taken from far away. But Mr. Spring decided to take one photo of a random group of nameless survivors whom he would never see again.To the Nazis, the man in the photo was prisoner number 147 963 and for 64 years and five months it was a photo of a nameless prisoner experiencing freedom for the first time in many years.

On the day after Yom Kippur in the year 5770, Tuesday September 29, 2009, it was discovered that the smiling inmate in Nazi prisoner garb was not just prisoner 147 963 , and he was not a random nameless survivor that a heroic soldier happened to capture on camera. He was born Icek Nachtigal, Yitzchak Dovid ben Reuvain, and he goes by the name of Irving Nightingale. He was born on May 10, 1924 but he will tell you that his real birthday is April 29, 1945.

And he is my father.

The photo we found.

Two stories follow, provoking a little less sympathy for the OPEC oil sheiks’ request.

Story 1:

Sheik flies Lamborghini 6,500 miles to Britain for oil change

By Neil Syson, The Sun www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article1493291.ece

Flashy ... the Lamborghini is same model as Batman’s

Oil be blowed ... the supercar at Heathrow with Qatar Airways jet

A rich Arab sent his Lamborghini on a 6,500-mile round trip to Britain for a service.

The £190,000 supercar was put on a scheduled flight from Qatar to Heathrow – then flown BACK after the oil check.

Money was no object as the flight would have cost the owner – thought to be a Sheikh – around £20,000.

The move sparked fury from green campaigners.

An airport worker said: “This car doesn’t have a carbon footprint – more of a crater.”

The overall cost of sending the Lamborghini to London for the oil change would have cost more than £23,000.

His black-and-gold supercar costs £3,552 to service at an approved dealer – on top of the £20,000 to freight from Qatar to Britain.

The Murciélago LP640 – driven by Batman in movie The Dark Knight – arrived from the Middle Eastern country on Friday.

It cleared customs and was trucked to specialist mechanics in London for the service.

On Monday it was flown back 3,250 miles to the oil-rich state where it was collected by the owner.

A cargo handler at Heathrow blasted the car’s environmental damage.

He said: “It would have been far more efficient to fly mechanics out there.”

And Jenny Evans, of pressure group Plane Stupid, said: “This horrifies me. It is another example of how rich people exploit and pollute the planet because of their money.”

She said the role of the super-wealthy in climate change was not properly recognised – while poor people were rapped for going on holiday.

Friends of the Earth’s transport campaigner Richard Dyer said: “Flying a car thousands of miles for a service is ludicrous when planes are one of the most polluting ways to transport goods. We urge the individual to get their car serviced closer to home.”

But David Price, of Lamborghini Club UK, said: “If an owner wants to service his car in that way, it is his choice.

“I’m not surprised. Thankfully the age of excess in some areas continues.”

Lamborghini UK spokeswoman Juliet Jarvis said there could be “kudos” for a Middle Eastern owner in servicing a car in London.

She said the exclusive Italian brand had a network of authorised dealers around the world – and most cars were looked after in the country where they were bought.

But she added: “This sort of thing is not unheard of.”

Qatar Airways confirmed it carried the Lamborghini.

The cars are popular with celebs including Rod Stewart and David Beckham.

Story 2:

The Sultan’s 5,000 personal vehicles

www.sacarfan.co.za/2009/02/whos-personal-car-collection-numbers-over-5000/

If you were rich enough to drive any car you wanted, absolutely any car, and money is no object, what would you go for? A Lamborghini, Bugatti, Mercedes, Aston Martin, or how about something outrageous like a Formula 1 car.

Sultan’s palace

But what if you were truly rich, not just “getting by” like Bill Gates or Sir Richard Branson, but truly rich. The Sultan of Brunei is the richest man on earth; he is not counted on rich lists because he does not earn his money it comes from his tiny country’s oil reserves which are essentially his. Estimates of his wealth pop up from time to time but the truth is that no one really knows how much money he has.

Sultan of Brunei

So which car do you think the richest man in the world drives, well if you said Lamborghini, you’d be correct, if you said Aston Martin that would be right too, and if you guessed F1 Race-car you would have been nearly right because he owns every Formula One championship-winning car for the last thirty years.

Sultan’s garage

These cars fit very nicely into his garage which is a bit bigger than your garage at home, it has to be to be able to accommodate the estimated 5000 personal vehicles owned by the Sultan. If he picked one car to drive down to his local corner café for bread and milk each day, it would take him thirteen and a half years to use each one.

Outside the Sultan’s garage

He seems to quite like the Rolls Royce range he has over 500 hundred of those, if you tried unsuccessfully to buy a Rolls during the 1990’s that would be because he accounted for over half of their entire sales for that decade.

Ferrari FX

His collection, which may well be far more than 5000 vehicles, is estimated to have cost over US$4 billion. Filling them all up may be a little expensive, at $1 per litre that’s estimated at a minimum of half a million US dollars.

Mercedes F400

Those that voted for the Lamborghini will be happy to know that he has 20 of those, but he seems to prefer the sleeker appearance of the Ferrari’s as he opted for 367 of those, Jaguars are nice little run-arounds, all 177 of them, as are the 362 Bentleys.

Mercedes CLK-GTR

He’s also not into buying boring, run-of-the-mill BMW’s (185 of them) and likes something a bit more exotic such as the Bentley Dominator 4X4 and Bentley Java, Ferrari FX (6), the worlds only right hand drive Mercedes CLK-GTR and the Cizeta Moroder V16T (3).

Cizeta Moroder V16T

Added to the burden of deciding which car to use each day a visitor of the sultan’s garage’s once said: “It can take an hour and a half just to get a certain car out if it’s been parked right at the back.”

By Shmuel Rosner– Chief U.S. Correspondent, www.Haaretz.com

(written in 2007 when Letters From Nuremberg was first published)

There are too many Jews around here, thought the prosecutor, Thomas Dodd. “Col. Kaplan is now here, as a mate I assume for Commander Kaplan. Dr. Newman has arrived… it is all a silly business.” In the prosecution team of the Nuremberg trials, in which Nazi high officials are indicted, there is no need for such number of Jews, that’s what Dodd was thinking. “One would expect that some of these people would have sense enough to put an end to this kind of parade.”

“Grace, my dearest one,” thus Dodd opens many of his letters from those stormy days to his wife. They are very personal, and let the reader peep into the nature of relationships between Thomas and Grace. But these letters also constitute a fascinating historical documentation of the many back stage events of the Nuremberg trials. Dodd was the right hand man of Judge Robert Jackson, the leading prosecutor. He later became a Congressman and a Senator. The letters he sent are now published in a new book, Letters from Nuremberg, authored by his son, Connecticut Senator Chris Dodd, with the help of a friend, Lary Bloom. One should assume that timing it is no mere coincidence: Dodd is now running for President.

Focusing of the too-much-Jews letter doesn’t do justice to Dodd. There’s no reason to believe that he didn’t want them around him because of personal dislike or racist prejudice. “You know how I have despised anti-Semitism,” he writes to his wife, who stayed at home, in the US, while he was spending more than a year abroad. The trials failed to make the case against the Nazi persecution of the Jews. They were blamed for war crimes, but left unspoken the truth about the nature of the war they have declared against one particular nation.

“Jews should stay away from this trial – for their own sake,” Dodd explains. He doesn’t want them to supply anti-Semites and isolationists with ammunition – afraid of a possible growing sentiment to describe the war as “war for the Jews.” His son, the Senator, added a foot note reminding readers of comment made by Charles Lindbergh, leading the anti-war movement, back in 1941. Three forces are pushing America to get involved in the war, he said: The Brits, the President, the Jews.

Senator Dodd told me that he doesn’t necessarily agree with the sentiment articulated by his father in the letter sited above. He is convinced, though, that this was an honest assessment. Thomas Dodd really thought the number of Jewish members in the team was bad for the Jews themselves. There was no doubt in the son’s mind that the letters should be published in full, not censored. While speaking to three Jewish reporters about the book, he focused more on its political implications, in the broader sense, that on the events of those long-gone times.

Much more than the content of any letter, this is the really controversial side of this book. The son is using the father’s writings to promote his beliefs regarding foreign policy, the international law, human rights. Quoting them, he is trying building a case against the Bush administration, blaming it for a “fundamental shift” in America’s policy, as far as international norms of justice and the rule of law are concerned. Dodd argues that there’s a stark difference between the way America chose to react to the crimes of the Nazis, hence, his fathers’ letters, and the path it has taken after the events of September 11. In conversation, Dodd agrees that the differences between now and then are more than cosmetic. However, the first part of the book is mostly dedicated to drawing the political lessons he sees fit.

“Civilized nations respond differently,” Dodd says, armed with the proof: these newly released letters. Civilized nations do not execute, hold people in secret prisons indefinitely, circumvent the courts – but rather prosecute. The letters show that this is what the father believed. But most of them don’t deal with politics, or philosophy, but rather describe the daily struggles of a man in a unique position. In the morning, he was questioning Hitler’s deputy, Rudolph Hess; in the evening writing about it to his wife, “He is gone mentally and I doubt that he can answer for his offenses.” In the next letter he describes an encounter between Hess and Herman Goering, the Air-Force chief and second in command to the Fuhrer. “Don’t you recall me?” he asks Hess. “I am really very sorry,” Hess replies. “It is genuine,” writes Dodd. He really couldn’t recognize him.

In one of the most dramatic moments of this trial, Dodd was the one presenting to the world the shrunken head of a Polish prisoner. The photo depicting him holding this dreadful piece of evidence is still memorable. The head was used as a paper holder at the office of a Nazi officer. But from the letters, one learns about the personal relations that developed between Dodd and some defendants. Franz Von Papen, short-time deputy to Hitler and one of the few to be found not guilty at the end of the trial, is called “my friend Papen.”

Dodd the father died relatively young, at the age of 64. His political career ended in turmoil and he was censured by the Senate for personal usage of public funds. His son, as one expects, wants this book to serve as a tribute to the better days of the father (he had many good days and some achievements as a legislator too). He said that publishing the letters now, a decade after they were discovered, is the culmination of a long and slow process. There are many family members involved, and making decisions takes time. If he doesn’t mention the campaign as a reason, one should assume that it is only because this will be just stating the obvious.

No dramatic revelations can be found in this book. But it is a fascinating history lesson, and a great way to learn more about the people taking part in the trial of the century. And as it is always with people, much space is dedicated to rivalries, maneuvers, egos. “The worst of [Colonel Robert] Gill, however, is his disloyalty to Jackson,” writes Dodd about one member of the team. But he also remembers that this is not the everyday trial, that he is playing a part in one great drama. “I like the assignment,” he writes. “It is an important and worthwhile one.”

By Farnaz Fassihi and Chip Cummins,  online.wsj.com

Nov 4 — Iranian security forces battled with opposition protesters in Tehran Wednesday, after demonstrators used the 30th anniversary of the storming of the U.S. Embassy as cover for their first significant protest in weeks.

Iranian demonstrators burned an U.S. flag outside the former U.S. Embassy in Tehran. Raheb Homavandi/Reuters

The scale of the opposition protests — and the government crackdown — was unclear early Wednesday, but wire services and state-controlled media reported police using tear gas and clashing violently with protesters. Iran has largely banned media coverage of non-sanctioned rallies and protests, and international newswires with reporters in the country must rely on eyewitness accounts.

Still, initial reports suggest large antiregime protests erupted in several locations across Tehran. Large crowds of demonstrators gathered in central districts of the capital near the former U.S. embassy, where an annual pro-government rally was also taking place, according to eyewitnesses and video posted on Iranian websites.

Antiriot police on motorcycle and on foot chased the crowd with batons and plain-clothed Basij militia attacked demonstrators with wooden sticks, according to these accounts.

At one point, one crowd of protesters turned its message toward the American President Barack Obama, chanting, “Obama, Obama, you are either with us or with them.”

Basij forces attacked opposition leader and former presidential candidate Mahdi Karroubi, firing teargas at him, according to Mohamad Taghi Karroubi, the cleric’s son, in a post on the opposition’s “Mowjcamp” Web site. Mr. Karroubi suffered light skin injury, but one of his bodyguards was seriously injured and was take to the hospital, according to the account. It wasn’t possible to immediately verify the incident.

“Today the government of the coup proved once again that it will stop at nothing to crush the massive wave of demonstrations,” said a statement by the opposition posted on their Web site.

Some marchers through Tehran’s streets wore green clothing that symbolized the campaign of opposition leader Mir Hossein Moussavi. It wasn’t clear whether Mr. Mousavi was among the protestors.

At Tehran University, students brought down President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s picture to whooping cheers and chants of “God is Great,” according to video posts circulating on the Internet.

Witnesses told the Associated Press that security forces, mainly paramilitary units from the elite Revolutionary Guard Corps, swept through several hundred demonstrators at Haft-e-Tir Square in central Tehran, clubbing, kicking and slapping protesters.

The unrest provides another significant challenge for Mr. Ahmadinejad and Iran’s conservative clerical leadership, headed by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. For months, the regime has struggled to put a lid on simmering unrest, which erupted after contested presidential elections in June, in which Mr. Ahmadinejad was declared the landslide victor.

Mr. Ahmadinejad’s attempts at enforcing domestic calm come amid unrest along its restive border with Pakistan and Afghanistan, where antigovernment rebels have stepped up a violent campaign against the regime, killing several senior Revolutionary Guard commanders last month.

Antigovernment protestors chanted slogans on the sidelines of state-sanctioned rallies. Associated Press

At the same time, Tehran officials are negotiating with Western powers over Iran’s nuclear program. The fresh protests come as Mr. Ahmadinejad and other leaders have tried to present a unified front in its deliberations with the West.

After appearing to agree to a deal to send out the bulk of its fissile material for enrichment in Russia, Iranian officials have balked at ratifying the agreement, frustrating Washington and its allies. Western officials have warned they won’t wait forever for progress in talks, suggesting an end-of-year deadline.

After that, Washington has suggested it will push for tough new economic sanctions, and Israeli officials have long suggested they would consider a military strike if they felt Iran was close to building a nuclear weapon. Iran says its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes.

In the days immediately following the election, supporters of presidential candidates Mr. Moussavi, a former prime minister, and senior cleric Mahdi Karroubi, took to the streets, staging the regime’s largest antigovernment demonstrations since the founding of the Islamic Republic thirty years ago.

Mr. Ahmadinejad’s government cracked down violently, clashing with protesters and jailing scores. Government officials put the death toll at several dozen, though human-rights groups have claimed the number of deaths was much higher. The government has put on trial more than a hundred people it alleges agitated against the regime, in cahoots with foreign powers such as the U.S. and Britain.

The bloody crackdown quieted most large street protests by the end of the summer. But opposition leaders, organizing underground, have increasingly hijacked state-sponsored holidays and rallies to come back out on the streets in force. In September, antigovernment protesters spilled out into the streets during Quds Day, a state-sponsored holiday aimed at rallying support for the Palestinians and condemning Israel.

By Gwen Ackerman and Calev Ben-David, www.Bloomberg.com

Nov. 4  – The Israeli navy intercepted a ship heading for Syria and seized an unprecedented 500-ton haul of weapons from Iran intended for the Shiite Muslim Hezbollah militia in Lebanon, the army said.

“This is the largest cache of smuggled weapons ever to be seized by Israel,” army spokeswoman Avital Leibovitz said in a phone interview today. “The cache includes thousands of rockets as well as hand grenades and mortar shells.”

Israel seized the ship 100 miles off its Mediterranean coast and discovered 40 containers carrying the weapons, Leibovitz said. The vessel was flying the flag of Antigua and was stopped late yesterday due to “suspicions” about the vessel, she added.

The seizure reflected “a well-known Iranian technique, taking advantage of cargo ships flying different flags in order to smuggle containers loaded with large amounts of highly volatile weaponry to terrorist organizations such as Hezbollah,” the army said in a statement. Israeli officials have accused Iran and Syria previously of supplying weapons to Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Islamic Hamas movement in the Gaza Strip.

“This is another success in the continuous struggle against attempts to smuggle weapons and military equipment with the goal of strengthening terrorist elements that threaten the security of Israel,” Defense Minister Ehud Barak said in an e- mailed statement.

‘Supplier of Arms’

In December, Israel launched a three-week military initiative against Hamas to stop cross-border rocket attacks from Gaza. It fought a monthlong war against Hezbollah in 2006 after two soldiers were abducted.

“Iran is the major supplier of arms to Hezbollah, usually via Syria by air or over land,” Ephraim Kam, deputy director of Tel Aviv University’s Institute for National Security, said today in a telephone interview. “Maybe they used a sea route this time because of the types of weapons involved.”

In 2002, Israel seized the ship Karine A, which it said was bringing arms from Iran to the Gaza Strip. In January, Cyprus seized an Iranian ship that it said may have been taking arms to Gaza in violation of United Nations sanctions.

Israeli officials said yesterday that Hamas had tested a rocket with a range of 60 kilometers, enabling it to reach from Gaza to the Tel Aviv metropolitan area. “This is the type of weapon that could not be made in Gaza, and had to be brought in from outside,” Kam said.