A report in the Washington Post has cast doubt on the imminence of the threat of a nuclear armed Iran, saying the Islamic republic would not be able to produce weapons-grade uranium until 2013. This contrasts with another report from the New York Times earlier in the week which said Iran could build a nuclear bomb within a year.

The report from the Post was sourced to the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research.

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Remember all those stories about the evil Israelis preventing medical supplies from reaching Gaza? Remember the BBC and all the other western outlets parading UN officials as objective observers of the conflict? Well, in a story that is not running on the BBC, it now appears that the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) in Gaza has covered up the theft of three of its ambulances by Hamas.

According to a report from Israel’s Army Radio which is related in today’s Jerusalem Post, the three ambulances were transferred to the UNRWA two weeks ago. Upon arriving in Gaza, the ambulances were hijacked by gunmen. The UNRWA refused to report the incident, presumably for fear of offending Hamas.

Obviously this story needs further verification. However, the evidence for the UNRWA’s friendly leanings towards Hamas and to the Palestinian cause in general is not in dispute. Nor is the fact that Hamas uses medical facilities and ambulances as shields against the Israelis. Consider the following, extraordinary video.

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According to a report in the Times (of London) today, the Lebanese based terror group Hezbollah has stockpiled 40,000 missiles over the last three years, some capable of hitting Tel Aviv. Brigadier-General Alon Friedman, the deputy head of the Israeli Northern Command, was quoted by the paper as saying that war could break out “at any minute”.

It is not hard to see what might be at work here. Hezbollah, an Iranian proxy, could be activated by Tehran to divert attention from the brutal repression in that country following the disputed elections. Any attempt by Israel to knock out Iran’s nuclear facilities could also result in a Hezbollah attack. Of course, Hezbollah is committed to Israel’s destruction and might now feel that it is sufficiently strong to launch an attack of its own volition. In any event, the situation is clearly extremely dangerous.

So what are Western countries doing about all this?

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The Israel-Palestine conflict is surely complicated enough without the British government injecting ambiguity into the situation via statements which appear to contradict Britain’s commitment to the rule of law.

Responding to Israel’s decision to evict nine Palestinian families from two houses in east Jerusalem, the British Consulate in Jerusalem has issued an extraordinarily aggressive press statement condemning the move. The evictions followed long and complicated court cases in which it was established that Jewish families held the title to the properties while documents produced by the Palestinian residents were found to be forgeries. On Sunday, the police moved in to enforce the court decision.

The British consulate’s statement says:

“We are appalled by the evictions in East Jerusalem. Israel’s claim that the imposition of extremist Jewish settlers into this ancient Arab neighbourhood is a matter for the courts or the municipality is unacceptable. Their actions are incompatible with Israel’s desire for peace. We urge Israel not to allow extremists to set the Agenda.”

I’m struggling with this. In countries governed by the rule of law, it would seem clear that matters of such complexity can only be decided by the courts. Could the British embassy explain who else should have been called upon to adjudicate? And whilst we’re at it, I wonder if they could issue clarifications on a couple of other matters?

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In the world of human rights, certain names pack a weighty punch: Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch (HRW) first among them. The obvious hostility felt by such organisations to the State of Israel is now well known. But where precisely does all this hostility come from?

In an important contribution to the discussion in today’s Jerusalem Post, Gerald M. Steinberg, executive director of NGO Monitor, proffers an explanation. For Steinberg, much of this has to do with the shift in the terms of the debate at the end of the Cold War during which groups like Amnesty and HRW had largely, though not exclusively, made their reputations through documentation of human rights abuses in communist countries.

“When the Cold War ended,” he says, “HRW and its London-based twin – Amnesty International – adjusted their agendas to maintain influence and donations. They redefined themselves by claiming expertise they do not have on international law in armed conflicts, and their obsessive condemnations of Israel endeared them to the UN, while keeping HRW in the headlines. They were embraced by the anti-Zionist post-colonialists who maintain the flame and adrenalin in the Left-Right battles that raged during the Cold War.”

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