1. Israel

1. Israel

The Jerusalem Post: Samar Alhaj, a Lebanese lawyer and female activist with ties to Hezbollah, proposes transforming women into “the new secret weapon” against Israel.

That’s why, says Alhaj, the ship Mariam — named after the Virgin Mary — which is slated to set sail from Lebanon to challenge Israel’s naval blockade on Gaza, is making room for ladies only.

“We are (all) women in order not to give the thieving enemy (Israel) an excuse to use arms against the ship,” Alhaj told a local Israeli Arab-language radio station. “The (Zionist) entity ... will be defeated by women that will come on the boat ... We don’t have Scud missiles or any other missiles and you will see what they will do to us.”

United by their hatred for Israel, Sunni, Shi’ite and Christian women from Lebanon, the U.S., France, Britain, Japan, Kuwait and Egypt hope to present a particularly thorny challenge to Israel’s predominantly male naval force, who will have to contend with a boat full of “the gentler sex” on the open sea resolved to force their way into the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip.

Alhaj and her colleagues know that video footage of almost any rough physical contact between Israel Defense Forces and the women would cause further enormous damage to Israel’s already much-battered image.

Hopefully, Lebanese officials will regain their senses and stop the ship. Then the very idea of dispatching the Mariam will merely remain another symptom of the tragic failure of Lebanon’s Cedar Revolution.