Israel rejects U.N. blockade appeal

[tocqueville]

By Luke Baker
24 minutes ago

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel rejected a call by U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan on Wednesday to lift its air and sea blockade of Lebanon, saying it would only end the 7-week-old siege once all aspects of a ceasefire were in place.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert also told Annan he would not withdraw Israeli troops from southern Lebanon until the full implementation of the ceasefire, which took effect on August 14 and put an end to 34 days of conflict with Hizbollah.

Olmert's statements effectively amounted to a rejection of the two main requests Annan had come to Jerusalem to discuss, but Annan later played down the differences of opinion, saying his and Olmert's thinking were not so far apart.

"There isn't that much of a difference between Prime Minister Olmert and myself," Annan told a news conference in the West Bank city of Ramallah when asked about the apparent failure of his bid to strengthen the 2-week-old ceasefire.

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=578&u=/nm/20060830/ts_nm/mideast_dc_365

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

1. Since we used the logic that UN resolutions must be enforced to go into

Iraq, when are we going to invade Israel? :shrug:

[feduppuke]

2. The first step would be to get a UN resolution

Israel is rejecting the SG's call for them to lift the blockade. There has been no resolution passed on this, and the US would likely veto any measure that was introduced.

[MrPrax]

3. More UN stumbling around...

No wonder the Lebanese protested Annan -- he is little more than a puppet at this point and the UN has no crediblity on anything anymore. Even the French let him down...bwahahaha