Lebanon refuses contact with Israel
BEIRUT, Lebanon — Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora said Wednesday that he refused to have any direct contact with Israel and Lebanon would be the last Arab country to ever sign a peace deal with the Jewish state."Let it be clear, we are not seeking any agreement until there is just and comprehensive peace based on the Arab initiative," he said.
He was referring to a plan that came out of a 2002 Arab League summit in Beirut. It calls for Israel to return all territories it conquered in the 1967 Mideast war, the establishment of a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital and a solution to the Palestinian refugee problem - all in exchange for peace and full normalization of Arab relations with Israel....
Saniora said Lebanon wants to go back to the 1949 armistice agreement that formally ended the Arab-Israeli war over Israel's creation.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said earlier Wednesday that the Israel-Hezbollah cease-fire could be "a cornerstone to build a new reality between Israel and Lebanon."
While the Arabs keep wanting to turn the clock back, everything with Olmert has to be "new." His "new reality" with Lebanon sounds a lot like his "new morning of great hope" with the Palestinians. And we all know what happened with that.
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