Barak: UN resolution on Lebanon war is a failure
Defense Minister Ehud Barak on Monday branded the United Nations resolution that ended the Second Lebanon War a failure, saying that it had not achieved the aim of disarming the Hezbollah guerilla organization in Lebanon.
UN Security Council resolution 1701 ended the month-long 2006 conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, which broke out after the latter abducted two Israeli reservists in a cross-border raid.
Barak told his Labor Party on Monday that the resolution had not worked, does not work now and will probably never work.
Israel has complained that despite the resolution’s call for a strict ban on arms shipments to Hezbollah, the group has rearmed and now has a larger rocket arsenal than it did during the war.
“Hezbollah is continuing to ignore [the resolution] with the ongoing intimate assistance of the Syrian,” the defense minister said. “It is important not to disturb the delicate balance currently maintained along the northern border, two years after the Second Lebanon War.”
According to Army Radio, Barak also addressed the upcoming prisoner exchange, scheduled for Wednesday, in which Israel will release five Lebanese fighters and the remains of several others in return for the two Israel Defense Forces reservists, Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev.
Barak said that returning the abducted troops from Lebanon does not mean that “Israel can rest on its laurels.”
He stressed the importance of also securing the release of Gilad Shalit, an IDF corporal held hostage in the Gaza Strip by Palestinian militants since his abduction in June 2006.
- Associated Press and Haaretz Service
