Apples, Lies and Assassination

Quote of the Day:
The richest soil, if uncultivated, produces the rankest weeds.
~ Plutarch ~

Every gardner pulls weeds. Those who tend the inner garden of Truth are no exception. There is, however, a huge gulf between weeding a regular garden and a garden trying to nurture the Soul. The lies found in the inner garden kill.

Lies kill through manipulation, subversion, deception, and often direct emotions towards unspeakable acts. Such a scene is, at this very moment, taking place in the Middle East.

The assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri has been blamed on Syria. Why? Such an act would elevate Syria to a position which could bring the wrath of the world to it's doorstep.

Who benefits from such a horrendous deed? Certainly not Syria. The Syrian government was just beginning negotiations with Israel for apples grown by Arab farmers in the Golan Heights.

Recently, Syria has been engaged in trying to rebuild it's position in the Middle East.

Syria to Host Meeting of Israel’s Neighbors

DAMASCUS, 11 February 2005 — Syria is to host a five-way meeting of all Israel’s neighbors following this week’s peace summit in Egypt to which it was not invited, Foreign Minister Faroul Al-Shara said yesterday.

“Our colleagues wanted such a gathering held in Damascus, so we are going to host it, maybe very soon,” Shara told reporters after talks with his Jordanian counterpart Hani Mulki. Mulki said Jordan was keen to see the momentum from Tuesday’s summit in Sharm El-Sheikh carried forward to all the tracks of the Middle East peace process.

“We discussed supporting the peace process on the Palestinian, Syrian and Lebanese tracks,” he said. Neither Lebanon nor Syria were invited to the talks in Egypt, at which Israel and the Palestinians agreed a mutual cease-fire, but host President Hosni Mubarak expressed hope at the meeting of a resumption of talks on the Syrian and Lebanese tracks.

Shara told Syria’s official SANA news agency yesterday that Damascus was happy with the progress made at Sharm El-Sheikh.

“Syria welcomes the efforts aimed at ending the suffering of the Palestinian people and allowing it to set up an independent state, as well as establishing a just and lasting peace in the region,” he said.

Late last year, Syria announced that it was ready to resume without precondition peace talks with Israel which broke off in early 2000. Previously it had insisted that the talks take up where they left off — with what it insists was a firm, if unwritten, Israeli commitment to withdraw from the whole of the Golan Heights, captured in the 1967 Middle East war and unilaterally annexed in 1981.

Meanwhile, a senior United Nations envoy said yesterday he had held highly encouraging talks with the Syrian president about a UN resolution calling for Syrian troops to pull out of neighboring Lebanon.

“I am encouraged and hopeful and look with optimism forward toward the fulfilment of my assignment,” Terje Roed-Larsen, sent to oversee implementing the controversial resolution, told reporters after meeting President Bashar Assad in Damascus.

Syria is ready to talk to Israel concerning the Golan Heights and wants to "end the suffering of the Palestinian people?" Nope, can't let that happen.

Israeli Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz has been quoted as saying his assessment was "that a pro-Syrian group murdered Hariri because of his opposition to the Syrian presence." The US has recalled it's ambassador from Damasacus and is threatening serious sanctions against Syria.

Blame the victim is a favorite method used by Psychopaths to create an image of the hero or guardian of all that is good and true.

"For sure, it is not in Syria's interest for Lebanon to be rocked by such a massive security breach. After all Syria is responsible for Lebanon's security," the leading Saudi newspaper al-Watan said in an editorial.

Iran said Israel, which invaded the Lebanese capital in 1982, had the resources to carry out the attack. Security sources said the bomb which killed Hariri had the explosive power of 300 kg (660 pounds) of dynamite.

"An organised terrorist entity like that of the Zionist regime has the capability to carry out such operations and it targets breaking unity and solidarity in Lebanon," a state-owned Iranian newspaper quoted the foreign ministry as saying.

The Economist has stated, "Some detect the work of an intelligence service—if not Syria’s, some other foreign power’s—in the method of the attack. Certainly, the size and sophistication of the bomb suggest it was the work of a well-organised and experienced group, or a government. The blast was big enough to leave a huge crater and shatter windows hundreds of metres away. Moreover, it was sophisticated enough to defeat jamming mechanisms, which the billionaire Mr Hariri’s convoy always used while travelling, to forestall such remotely triggered attacks. Mr Hariri, who made his fortune in construction in Saudi Arabia, knew he had many enemies and took what countermeasures he could."

"While the US and Israel both make much of their bogus "war on terrorism", both countries have long since realized that it is by fomenting "terrorism" and "terrorist" groups that their control of the Middle East can be assured."

The emotional response in Lebanon, ignited and fanned by propaganda, could grow into another inferno in the Middle East.