SOBELMAN

Thursday, February 18, 1999

Human rights group to monitor S. Lebanon

By Daniel Sobelman, Ha'aretz Correspondent

                  After more than a decade of documenting human rights
                  violations in the occupied territories, the B'Tselem
                  organization has decided to extend the area it covers to
                  include the Israeli-controlled security zone in southern
                  Lebanon.

B'Tselem will thus become the first Israeli group to deal on
a permanent basis with human rights violations in Lebanon.

                  "We hope to make the subject of human rights part of the
                  public discourse in southern Lebanon," Eitan Felner, the
                  organization's executive director, said yesterday. "We
                  cannot rely solely on what the IDF says, since the army has
                  a vested interest." And the same holds for Lebanese
                  groups, he added.

                  Felner said the new mission would present problems
                  "because access to Lebanon is more difficult than access
                  to the West Bank or Gaza." He noted that the decision to
                  deal with southern Lebanon was made some time ago, but
                  implementation was delayed "due to logistic reasons."

                  A key problem will be the difficulty in obtaining first-hand
                  testimony from "primary sources," Felner said, adding that
                  one planned method of obtaining information will be to
                  interview IDF soldiers who serve in Lebanon.

                  "If soldiers were witnesses to any sort of rights violations,
                  let them come to us, even anonymously," Felner said.
                  B'Tselem was also cooperating with various organizations
                  in Lebanon and would also rely on sources such as
                  newspaper reports, the diplomatic community and
                  international organizations.

                  Felner said it was time "to put an end to the conspiracy of
                  silence regarding human rights violations in southern
                  Lebanon."

                  An Israeli defense source said he doubted that B'Tselem
                  would be able to produce reports that reflect the situation in
                  southern Lebanon. He predicted that the organization
                  would find it difficult to get information from sources other
                  than Lebanese newspapers.

                  The end result, the defense source said, could be "to assist
                  Hezbollah, while the IDF continues to fight in Lebanon."
                  The IDF spokesman said his office had not been contacted
                  by B'Tselem on the subject.