FROM OUR ARCHIVES
50 YEARS AGO
On July 21, 1966, The Jerusalem Post reported that the meeting of the UN Security Council, requested by Syria to discuss the Israeli air reprisal action of a week earlier, was expected to conclude with submitting of a “balanced” resolution which would be vetoed by the Soviet Union.
Gen. Odd Bull, UNTSO chief of staff, back from his talks in Damascus, called on the acting director of armistice affairs in the Foreign Ministry, Yosef Tekoa. He was understood to have declared the latest Syrian position of the Syrian government – that Syria was interested in quiet on the border.
A coastal patrol boat was the target of a burst of Syrian machinegun fire from the village of Kursi, some 500 meters away, on the eastern shore of Lake Kinneret. The boat returned the fire.
No reply was yet received in Jerusalem to Israel’s inquiry addressed to UN headquarters in New York and to the UNEF on the fate of 17-yearold Erwin Owitz, abducted five days earlier by marauders from Gaza.
An alert watchman at Margaliot, an upper Galilee border settlement, averted disaster around midnight when he discovered two charges of explosives under the home of the Marjani family and their five children, and warned them to leave the house. A few minutes later another charge damaged the family’s chicken coop, empty at that time. A systematic search discovered another charge under the tractor. Altogether nine charges were found and tracks of four men led towards the Lebanese border.
In Cairo, the Commissioner-General of UNRWA, Lawrence Michelmore, said he had begun discussions with Arab host countries on halting refugee rations going to members of Ahmed Shukeiry’s Palestine Liberation Army. He said he was hopeful of reaching agreement.
25 YEARS AGO
On July 21, 1991, The Jerusalem Post reported that on the eve of US secretary of state James Baker’s visit to Jerusalem, Saudi Arabia that it would suspend its economic boycott against Israel if Jerusalem froze its settlement activities in the territories. A Saudi government statement was issued after Baker met King Fahd, who supported this proposal as a contribution to the peace effort. Egypt accepted this proposal as well.
Lebanon agreed to take part in peace talks, while Egypt invited foreign minister David Levy for an official visit. The Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem announced that a two-day visit would take place at the end of the month. However, Jordan was skeptical that the US would get prime minister Yitzhak Shamir to change his stand when he would be confronted with Baker’s requests for compromise in their upcoming meeting.
10 YEARS AGO
On July 21, 2006, The Jerusalem Post reported that the UN Security Council inched closer to substantive involvement in the Lebanese crisis as secretary-general Kofi Annan placed the blame for the violence on Hezbollah’s unprovoked attacks, while slamming Israel for its “disproportionate response.”
The IDF sustained heavy casualties in extensive fighting that went on all day and into the night just inside Lebanon near Moshav Avivim. IDF sources said 30 to 40 Hezbollah gunmen were killed during the combat. Military censorship prevented publication of further details as the Post went to press with this item. A high-ranking IDF officer said that the difficulties troops encountered in the fighting could prompt a larger-scale offensive into southern Lebanon. Meanwhile Hezbollah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah told Al-Jazeera for the first time in some four days that Hezbollah’s entire infrastructure was still intact. He added that the kidnapped Israeli soldiers would only be released in return for Lebanese and Palestinian prisoners currently in Israeli jail.