War: On Any Given Sunday [Updated]
**Update** This just in from Ken Silverstein: an interview with Wayne White who, until last year, was a ranking Bush State Department officer on the Middle East. Those who think Israel is doing a great job in its retaliation campaign should read closely the words of somebody who actually knows something about this subject. Unless, of course, you think White is one more pro-Hezbollah fifth columnist!
I have been quite discouraged by the dialogue of the deaf that has taken place on this blog and elsewhere as the war in Lebanon deepens.
Too many people around here are way too ready to sit back and watch others die in the name of some very simplistic formulas. There's a facile reductionism at play when one "reasons" that because Hezbollah has attacked Israel, Israel is now licensed to retaliate in any form it desires -- and to hell with the consequences. This same line of logic argues that to criticize Israel, to raise any question around its strategy, to be concerned at any level about the long-term effects of its current campaign, to voice any worry about the way the U.S. responds to the crisis, is to appease or even condone terrorism.
What a stinking load of bull. And very dangerous bull. Warfare is not about keeping score, or getting even. It's about the lives and deaths of real people. And thought it's a cliche, most of them are just like me and you. War should never be a question of what is justified. But rather what is the minimum amount of violence absolutely necessary to achieve whatever that "just" goal might be. Does Hezbollah have a right to camp out in Lebanon and hurl missiles at Israel? Of course not. Hezbollah must be rolled back and disarmed, but not by flattening Lebanon and enflaming the entire Arab world.
Likewise, one might ask: Do Israelis have the right to continue occupying Palestinian territory that -- frankly-- just doesn't belong to them? Does Israel have the right to continue an occupation that deprives Palestinians of their sovereignty, their dignity and their equal rights? Of course not. A two-state solution must be reached and the Israeli domination of the Palestinians must come to an end, but not by supporting Palestinian suicide bombers nor any other atrocity committed against the Israeli civilian population.
I'm sorry to be so blunt, but only a fool -- yes, a fool-- would watch unperturbed as match after match is tossed into the sea of gasoline that is the Middle East. If Israel's retaliation, which now includes wholesale bombardment of Lebanese cities driving hundreds of thousands from their homes, morphs into a wide, regional war will anyone be consoled ten years from now by standing on the smoking ruins and simply saying, "Oh well, you know, the Hezbollah are the ones who started it."
Now even the most staunch ally of the United States, the UK government in the form of Foreign Minister Kim Howells, has condemned the Israeli air strikes as indiscriminate. Should we now classify the Blair government as soft on Arab terrorists? Has London capitulated to the Hezbollah because Mr. Howell has expressed concern about civilian deaths in Lebanon and has actually, omigod, criticized Israel? Here's Howell:
"These have not been surgical strikes. It's very, very difficult to understand the kind of military tactics that have been used," Howells told reporters in Beirut, where he was overseeing the evacuation of British citizens...
"You know, if they're chasing Hizbollah, then go for Hizbollah. You don't go for the entire Lebanese nation."
"I very much hope that the Americans understand what's happening to Lebanon, the destruction of infrastructure, the death of so many children and so many people," he said.
Sorry, Mr. Foreign Minister, but I think too many Americans have no understanding whatsoever of what's happening in Lebanon. I fear they view it a bit too much like one more game in the NFL. The White hats versus The Blacks, the Shirts versus the Skins. How many Americans have any clue at all what it is like to have their cities bombarded by planes night after night after night? How would Americans respond if, say, the entire cities of San Diego and Houston were driven from their homes by waves of bombarding warplanes? I read in the paper yesterday how thousands of people in Phoenix are terrified to go out at night because a serial killer has recently taken a dozen victims. How about going out at night as blockbuster bombs fall on your neighborhood?
The official death toll in Lebanon now stands at 350, though a number of reports say that once the bodies are dug out of the rubble the real figure will be many times that amount.
Let's put this in perspective: How many Americans know what the population of Lebanon is? Answer: about 3 million, or 1% of the U.S. population. In per capita terms, even the figure of 350 dead is the Lebanese equivalent of a dozen 9/11s.
We know how Americans responded to that level of death and sacrifice. Just how do we expect the Lebanese and the rest of Arab world, then, to respond to the current bloodletting?
One other lingering question: Just how big, or small, is the Hezbollah militia? Apparently about 600-1000. By that calculation, the Israeli campaign has already killed or very soon will have killed the same total number of people who populate the entire enemy force. Does that lend some perspective of proportionality to this matter?
I seriously doubt it. Meanwhile, from up here where we sit in the stands, the half-game show should be awesome.
July 23rd, 2006 at 5:28 am
“How would Americans respond if, say, the entire cities of San Diego and Houston were driven from their homes by waves of bombarding warplanes?”
Well, that would depend. You would have to complete the analogy, to supply enough context for me to know what to feel. I’m not even going to try.
Well, yes, I am going to try.
My answer is: if San Diego and Houston were part of some rightwing Christian populist/fascist proto-state in the U.S. Southwest, one that happened to hold a considerable military advantage over the remainder of a rather more divided former nation, the rest of the Disunited States of America might take considerably umbrage at being punished for the excesses and provocations of their erstwhile brethren on the southern flank, but would probably just as soon cut them loose to take the punishment on their own. This is, I suspect, the Israel calculation — not to return *too* abruptly from my highly fanciful analogy, which would require that Mexico be the world’s superpower, operating with military and economic support from some even more powerful off-planet civilization.
Of course, if I were an American in that parallel-universe San Diego or Houston (yes, zooming back into the turgid analogy — will Jerry Bruckheimer option the film rights?), I admit: it would suck to be me. On the other hand, since my brilliant Reichsfuhrer Tom Delay got us into it with his brilliant timing, than which there is none more brilliant, I would not hate him, but rather I would hate the United States of Mexico, the Lesser of the two Great Satans, even more passionately. And when Mexico agreed to stop its depredations in exchange for prisoners and an end to Delay’S missile strikes into Monterrey and Chihuahua, I would bury my dead relatives as martyrs, then soldier on in the great Christian cause, declaring victory with the rest of my fellow Christians, than which there are none more Christian. Death to Mexico! Death to its interstellar supporter, the Greater Satan, the Off-Planet Civilization Representing All That is Vile and Corrupt! War is a Force that Gives Me Meaning! Give Me Meaning or Give Me Death!
We now return you to our regularly scheduled analogies.
July 23rd, 2006 at 6:17 am
Marc, your reminder that “war is Hell” is commendable. “Precision” bombing and suicide bombing have both become spectator sports. We guzzle our lattes and offer our comments as if the Levant were Germany and the war the World Cup.
However, I’m not sure your conclusions are correct. Once war begins, the point is not to respond “proportionally” to a provocation, but to win it both militarily and politically. I don’t think it can be said that a 2:1 ratio of Lebanese to Israeli casualties, would be proportionate, but 10:1 disproportionate. If the Haifa railway station rocketing killed 200 instead of 10 or so, would the bombing of South Beirut become less problematic?
If the war were brutal but made a decisive change in the situation (as the ‘73 war and its aftermath made peace between Israel and Egypt possible), a case could be made that it reduces suffering in the long run. The problem is that not only is the aerial campagin in Lebanon causing great suffering, but also that it has so far proven ineffective, as Ralph Peters argues. A fierce attack might be justified if it brought an end to the struggle, but if it creates misery and anger and leaves no change in its wake, it’s stupid cruelty.
Equally problematic is your apparent belief that a two-state compromise is still viable. I once believed it was the only way out, even if both sides were sabotaging. Now I’m not so certain. The will and the ability of the Palestinians to form a viable state are in question. When the last Israeli left Gaza, the result was internal anarchy and continued rocketing of israeli towns. Although the situation was far from true sovereignty, Israel wanted out. The events of the period do not bode well for a negotiated or imposed “solution.”
Pessimism, in this case, is warranted.
July 23rd, 2006 at 6:33 am
“You know, if they’re chasing Hizbollah, then go for Hizbollah. You don’t go for the entire Lebanese nation.”
One wonders what Kim Howells had to say when, during Gulf War I, U.S. bombers were flattening much of Iraqi civilian infrastructure, with repercussions causing many deaths during the sanctions period, when Brits and Yanks weren’t paying attention anymore?
We do know what Howells has to say about Iraq right now:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kim_Howells
“[Iraq] is a mess that can’t launch an attack now on Iran; a mess that won’t be able to march into Kuwait; it’s a mess that can’t develop nuclear weapons. So yes it’s a mess but it’s starting to look like the sort of mess that most of us live in.”
What a frickin’ idiot. (Maybe he did a Dan Quayle, here, meaning to say “live *with*”).
Going after civilian support infrastructure is how nations with excellent and unassailable civilian support infrastructure of their own (which itself is pretty essential in waging wars sucessfully) now wage wars. Such attacks appear to be relatively clean compared to assaulting the civilian population directly. They usually aren’t, in the long run. But in the long run, well, you’re long gone. It works in protracted asymmetrical asymmetrical warfare, too, not just hit-and-run blitzes — just ask the Iraqi insurgency, which keeps Iraq’s oil exports down to a trickle, and the Baghdad electricity supply down to a few hours a day.
Amateurs talk strategy, generals talk logistics. American generals were exultant in the run-up to Gulf War I: they could order drinking water from K-Mart, and transport troops by buying them tickets on regular passenger airlines. And they denied Iraq every logistical advantage it might gain from civilian infrastructure.
Israel’s message here is clear: they want Lebanon to stop pretending that Hezbollah is an organic element of some healthy democracy. They don’t want a Hezbollah that’s free to move around Lebanon as it wishes, as anyone has a right to expect in a proper democracy. They don’t want a Hezbollah that’s free to use open communications channels, as citizens of a free state reasonably expect. They don’t want a Hezbollah that’s free to help itself to whatever a free people can have by the sweat of their brow from honest labor — after all, an army marches on its stomach; even pita bread is “dual use.”
It’s a brutally conveyed message, no doubt. But remember: amateurs talk strategy, generals talk logistics. And that includes the generals of Hezbollahland. If you were running a statelet within a weak state, wouldn’t you prefer that weak state to be a completely open arena of operation for you? Of course you would. Just like the American generals who helped doom so many Iraqis to an untimely death by just picking up the phone and ordering water from K-Mart, for thirsty pilots that would be coming back from bombing runs on power plants in Iraq.
When Israel bombs a Maronite Christian TV relay station, it’s being like the boot camp sargeant who makes the whole platoon do 60 pushups for the infraction of one member. They aim to whip some discipline into the Cedar Revolutionaries. (”If you didn’t want us to attack your relay station, what the hell were you doing leaving it on the same hill as a Hez transmitter?! You moved it all in ONE DAY during a previous war!”) Or Israel will drum them out, back into the arms of Syria, which was at least more predictable.
Irael hasn’t wreaked one-tenth the havoc of which it is militarily capable. (And I’m excluding its nukes in that statement.) Ultimately, though, everything that can feed, transport and communicate with a fighter, in any economy, has military value, and can be a target. Sure, go ahead: Throw down a flag, blow a whistle, cite the rulebook, express moral outrage. None of this going to stop it, or even slow it down. Either the sides come to terms, or a much larger force has to intervene, and intervene effectively. I don’t see intervention coming soon.
No, maybe we’ll get Kim Howells, some years hence, saying:
“Hezbollah’s territory is a mess that can’t launch an attack now on Israel; a mess that won’t be able to march into Beirut; it’s a mess that can’t launch Katyushas. So yes it’s a mess but it’s starting to look like the sort of mess that most of us live in.”
Or some such blather.
What a frickin’ idiot.
July 23rd, 2006 at 7:31 am
Grumpy Old Man writes: “The problem is that not only is the aerial campagin in Lebanon causing great suffering, but also that it has so far proven ineffective, as Ralph Peters argues. A fierce attack might be justified if it brought an end to the struggle, but if it creates misery and anger and leaves no change in its wake, it’s stupid cruelty.”
Ralph Peters may be arguing from incorrect premises. And one of those premises might be: that Israel aims to destroy Hezbollah.
Yes, Olmert has promised to dismantle Hezbollah and Hamas in a recent speech, and certainly that can’t be done with bombs alone, they’d need boots on the ground. But … remember what I said recently about statements made for public consumption? (And which I myself just now forgot, in calling Kim Howells a “frickin’ idiot”, when he may simply be getting out in front of British public opinion on behalf of the embattled Blairites.) Olmert’s playing to the crowd — about 80% Israeli voter support just now, shades of Bush after 9/11! But he didn’t get where he got today in Israeli politics by being unrealistic.
Ralph Peters says that Israel may be going down the path of what the U.S. calls “force protection” (still its number one priority in Iraq.) And down another path that seems like folly in Iraq: trying to do almost everything with aerial campaigns. Those may indeed be weaknesses in U.S. military posture in Iraq, but Iraq is not Lebanon, and the goal of this war is not politically similar at all.
I agree that if the Israel assault merely “creates misery and anger and leaves no change in its wake, it’s stupid cruelty.” But what if it leaves misery and anger in its wake, but also a change that favors Israel? Then it’s … what? “Smart cruelty”? Hey, an Israeli specialty! And Condi should be happy — she recently said she’s not going into shuttle diplomacy just for restoration of the “status quo ante”.
Olmert’s national rallying speech notwithstanding, I don’t think dismantling Hamas and Hezbollah is in the cards, and I think Olmert knows it. It’s disengenuous rhetoric somewhat on a par with the Arab propaganda refrain of “push the Jews into the sea!” Surely Olmert understands that perpetual conflict through small-time insurgent proxies is in the interests of both the U.S. and the petrostate monarchies it supports.
Rather, the goal of assaulting so much of Lebanon is to get Islamist movements almost everywhere peeled away from anything resembling democratic process — specifically in Lebanon, but also as a favor to autocratic Arab states facing the threat of increasingly enfranchised Islamist parties in what passes for democratic process in those countries. The more enflamed the Hezbollah cheerleading section becomes in countries like Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan, the more visible they become to state authorities — they may as well be painting bulleyes on their chests.
U.S. foreign policy makers will talk (and talk) about how democracy is a long haul in the Middle East, sure, sure, they’ll say, we’re seeing setbacks, but hey, yo, we’re slowly but surely winning! It’s really just a stalling tactic, though. The “democracy process” is the new “peace process.” Any realist in the State Department will tell you that overnight democracy in the region would be a disaster on several levels. Just think of all the newborns dubbed “Osama” in the region, not long after 9/11.
There are probably a few stalwarts in the Bush administration who realize that the election of Hamas in Gaza and representation of Hezbollah in the Lebanese parliament represented embarassments to their Great Middle East Democracy Project. Not to speak of the behavior of Iraqi government Shi’ites, recently derided by Baghdad’s premier crime investigation unit for bailing out apprehended Shi’ite death squad members. But I think for these torchbearers, repression of Islamist representation in other Arab states buys them time to try to figure out how to make it work (or at least appear to work) in Iraq. We’re talking about guys who miss Richard Perle’s frequent drop-in visits back in the good ol’ days of two years ago, guys who kinda liked Ahmed Chalabi at one point, guys who bookmark their favorite old posts on Iraq the Model, and who are still trying to get their bearings in the light of harsh new realities. They must wince at the Lebanon news. But they’ve got to admit: it’s buying them time.
July 23rd, 2006 at 7:43 am
Is it even a viable argument that these kidnappings are the legitimate provcation for these massive attacks? Doesn’t it seem more likely that the U.S., now that Iraq has crumbled, is looking for a diferent entrance, or justification, for war with Iran?
July 23rd, 2006 at 8:11 am
Marc, regarding perspective of numbers and proportionality….
If 1,000 terrorists are offered cover and supported by a population of 100,000, then the entire population needs to be factored into the formula. If you disagree, then the Federal government owes reparations to the city of Atlanta for what Sherman did.
Also, proportionality goes far beyond a head count at one point in time, as 1,000 terrorists over ten years can do the damage of 100,000 in an army if not stopped. You would argue that a $10,000 security system is not warranted in a store because it only had $200 of theft yesterday. The store has to look at the costs over a longer period of time.
Finally, the count should not be measured one-to-one. President Truman and the American people accepted and acted on the philosophy that 100,000 Japanese weren’t worth 1 American soldier’s life–and they weren’t. The Japanese started the fight, lacked all civility in the treatment of our captives, and wanted to fight to the death. We just made it faster and easier for them while protecting our forces.
This proportionality nonsense is out of the left’s response manual. I didn’t know that you were on their mailing list.
July 23rd, 2006 at 8:52 am
Endgame coming soon, I think: the Lebanese foreign minister reports that the captured Israeli soldiers are “in good health” (suggesting that he’s seen them alive and well). Hamas is talking about yielding that corporal.
Not much left to do but eviscerate Woody’s typically silly comment.
“If 1,000 terrorists are offered cover and supported by a population of 100,000, then the entire population needs to be factored into the formula.”
Who says that everybody in that population of 100,000 is supporting them wholeheartedly? Many of them may be “supporting” Hez out of intimidation — Hezbollah is, after all, a religious fascist organization, and not above intimidating anybody who won’t come along willingly. Just recently, I read a story about a doctor in a hospital in southern Lebanon, who prefaced his denunciation of the Israeli attack that overwhelmed his ER ward by saying that he’s no supporter of Hezbollah — which was pretty brave of him, under the circumstances. I hope he wasn’t identified in the article, or by anything particulars of his quotes.
“1,000 terrorists over ten years can do the damage of 100,000 in an army if not stopped.”
Yeah, but how many Israelis has Hezbollah killed with its Katyushas lobbed over the border, over the years? That’s a pretty wimpy Virtual 100,000 Man Army, Woody.
“President Truman and the American people accepted and acted on the philosophy that 100,000 Japanese weren’t worth 1 American soldier’s life–and they weren’t. The Japanese started the fight, lacked all civility in the treatment of our captives, and wanted to fight to the death.”
I see. So, a baby who was born in Japan a day after Pearl Harbor, perhaps with the potential to win a Nobel Prize in Medicine, “started the fight” (in the womb, perhaps?), “lacked all civility in the treatment of our captives” (well, it was a baby, it takes time and maturity to learn how to treat captives), “wanted to fight to the death” (for its pacifier, maybe?), and therefore deserved to be roasted alive in the one of the many savage, unrelenting firebombings of Japanese cities. Because that potential Nobel Prize in Medicine wasn’t worth a single U.S. soldier’s life, even a soldier who might have cowered through the whole battle of Okinawa, emerging only later to herd some hapless Okinawans into a cave and throw a grenade in after them. It’s that simple. Thanks for clarifying all that for me, Woody. I never understood the equation before.
Face it — the U.S. was running a very racist propaganda campaign against Japan, pretty standard dehumanize-the-enemy stuff for its time, perhaps, but nothing we could ever get away with now. Stimson, one of the people organizing the A-bomb effort, was personally appalled at the firebombings, and not at all happy that the A-bomb was going to be used.
I still don’t see why they couldn’t have just set up a naval blockage around the country, bombed the Japanese with leaflets, and waited while Japan peeled away, prefecture by prefecture, into allied arms. All it would have taken was one breakaway area, treated decently by us in the face of all of the Imperial government’s propaganda that we were flesh-eating demons, and word would have gotten around the country: “They aren’t killing us. And they’ve got food and medicine.”
July 23rd, 2006 at 8:58 am
“President Truman and the American people accepted and acted on the philosophy that 100,000 Japanese weren’t worth 1 American soldier’s life–and they weren’t.”
Ahhh…sweet mystery of living with your head up your ass. A near-perfect example of one of those stunners that explains exactly nothing about what it purports to address, in that it’s not even remotely factual or analytically sound, but says everything about the moron who utters it. (Further, the “and they weren’t” line is uttered by one who claims to follow the teachings of Jesus. Compare this outburst regarding “proportionality nonsense” to the history of just war theory in the Judeo-Christian theological tradition.)
If you want a thumbnail discussion of the options and estimates that Truman and the U.S. command were actually weighing as alternatives, go check “Operation Downfall” at Wikipedia or elsewhere. Whatever one thinks about the accuracy or morality of the arguments for dropping atomic weapons on Japan, they were rather dramatically different than the totally shameless barbarism argued above.
July 23rd, 2006 at 9:44 am
reg, so sad that you take things so literally rather than understand an illustration of a point. Also, I don’t consider the lives of 1,000 murdering terrorists worth the life of one victim. Is that barbaric and un-Christian?
You and your cohorts guys remind me of the press when the U.S. first went into Afghanistan and our military was just wiping up on the Taliban:
NBC’s Saturday Night Live (SNL) opened with a skit making fun of the stupidity of questions posed by reporters at Pentagon briefings. The skit featured a parody of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, complete with squinting and a hostile attitude toward the reporters. With C-SPAN graphics on screen, the fake reporters posed these questions:
– A male reporter: “We’re getting reports of U.S. special op forces being dropped into Taliban areas with camouflage and night vision goggles. This means the Taliban soldiers won’t be able to see our troops, but we’ll be able to see them. Is that fair?“
– A female reporter: “With our military campaign stalled and the opposition forces seemingly bogged down in a quagmire, isn’t there a danger the U.S. will look like a weakling and thus lose the support of the Afghan people?”
Rumsfeld character: “Isn’t that the same question you asked last week?”
Reporter: “Oh, I’m sorry. Okay, with our military moving so rapidly and opposition forces easily overrunning Taliban areas, isn’t there a danger the U.S. will look like a bully and thus lose the support of the Afghan people?”
– Another male reporter: “We’re being told that Northern Alliance forces are firing back at Taliban troops who have fired on them even though the Taliban troops missed. Does the U.S. condone that?”
Rumsfeld: “Now what kind of question is that?”
Reporter: “Thought provoking?”
Rumsfeld: “No.”
Reporter: “Incisive?”
Rumsfeld: “No. Remember what I said about your question the other day?”
Reporter: “That it was idiotic?”
Rumsfeld: “And?”
Reporter: “And that I am an embarrassment both to myself and to my newspaper?”
Rumsfeld: “That’s right.”
reg, since your arguments typically are to attack writers personally rather than to discuss points raised, I’ll take the liberty to respond that you and others like you are like the last reporter–acting like idiots and are an embarrassment to truth and reasoned debate. Plus, your approach is very lazy, which often explains why the left is where it is.
July 23rd, 2006 at 9:58 am
Michael Turner, I saw and responded to reg before I saw your comment, for which I don’t have enough time to adequately discuss. But, here’s a quickie.
You people on the left are all about “groups.” Well, if the group of citizens in Lebanon were doing their job, then the Lebanese army would be throwing out the terrorists rather than forcing Israel to do their job for them. If they can’t or don’t, then they defaulted their job to someone who can do it.
If a kid is killed in a fight, I think that the parents and the nation who started the fight or provide cover have the responsibility for his death–not those who are defending themselves and being forced to retaliate.
G.M. referenced an excellent illustration, and I think it’s worth repeating here. Maybe this would help you to understand where the fault lies for civilian deaths: http://drsanity.blogspot.com/2006/07/moral-difference.html
July 23rd, 2006 at 10:12 am
M.T., I’m still shaking my head at your solution to ending WWII. That shows why no one can take proposals of peace settlement by liberals seriously.
July 23rd, 2006 at 10:19 am
Shorter Woody: I said something that was obviously stupid and indefensible, but if you assume I actually mean what I write you’re an idiot like these people on a Saturday Night Live skit I saw once.
Got that. Keep it coming…
While I’m on the subject of public statements that are some combination of preposterous, shameless and demonstrably false, how about at least one post on Bush’s stem cell veto and the attending rhetoric. (Secy. Snowjob actually called embryonic stem cell research “murder”.)
This is a low point in an administration that, with the exception of a couple of photo ops around 9/11, appears to be little more than an unending series of low points. Bush has effectively turned “pandering to the base” into a double entendre.
July 23rd, 2006 at 10:31 am
I have read that Hezbollah has 5000-6000 militiamen in south Lebanon. If I can locate the article, I will cite it.
July 23rd, 2006 at 10:40 am
Juan Cole refers to 5000 Hezbollah fighters.
http://www.juancole.com/2006/07/israels-maximal-option-my-article-on.html
July 23rd, 2006 at 10:49 am
Below is an excerpt from the very anti-Hezbollah “Militant Islam Monitor” analysis of Hez’ numbers. I can’t vouch for their accuracy, but they appear to be reporting the full range and nature of varying estimates as to militias and reserves.
*The State Department’s 1993 report on international terrorism lists Hizbollah’s “strength” at several thousand. Hizbollah sources assert that the organization has about 5,000-10,000 fighters. Other sources report that Hizbollah’s militia consists of a core of about 300-400 fighters, which can be expanded to up to 3,000 within several hours if a battle with Israel develops. These reserves presumably are called in from Hizbollah strongholds in Lebanon, including the Bekaa Valley and Beirut’s southern suburbs. The number of members involved in combat activity in southern Lebanon is under 1,000. But it has many activists and moral supporters. After the Israeli withdrawal Hizballah reduced the number of full time fighters to about 500, though estimates range from 300 to 1,200. There are also several thousand reserves, but these lack training or experience.*
July 23rd, 2006 at 11:06 am
The numbers above refer, of course, to a “pre-crisis” footing. Presumably every reservist and some raw recruits have been drawn into the current conflict.
I have to say I was skeptical of Marc’s figures, but checking further and finding that - outside of megalomaniac Hez propaganda - the number of competent militia appears to be under a thousand and the number of potential fighters a few more thousand, Hezbollah doesn’t appear quite as formidable a force as I had assumed.
Hez also seems to be a rather conventional militia in their current tactics. Which means that the greatest danger to Israel would be, rather than isolating the core of Hezbollah’s militia’s and limiting their response to Hez positions, to widen the war and draw increasing numbers of potential Hez sympathizers and even anti-Hezbollah elements into the fray - something they appear to be doing, and doing rather deliberately as their bombing campaign moves north, hitting infrastucrure and sections of Beirut and elsewhere that could not even remotely be considered pro-Hezbollah neighborhoods, much less military targets.
July 23rd, 2006 at 11:19 am
You are all Woody enablers.
July 23rd, 2006 at 11:27 am
It is always enlightening to see how far away, and ultimately sadistically strange the views are of some armchair idots. Marc makes a post talking about how discouraging the dialogue is because of the response, and he gets more of the same in most instances - how ironic.
I’d like to see what you would say if you were there observing this, it’s about as close as you can get to losing your mind. In the ensuing chaos you have parents running up to you with their children, some of them are already dead, you know it but they don’t. Than you see a group of children fleeing only to witness the side of a building blow out by an Apache hellicopter missle, and by the time you get there (picking yourself up off the ground) there is nothing but chrushed bodies and severed limbs.
So wander like a zombie hearing the screams and agony, and see a woman barely alive dragging her body out of a mangled building with her legs almost gone - and as you rush over you begin to notice she is pregnant. You hear the wailing of people sifting through the rubble screaming names of their loved ones. You can’t breath, you think you are going to die as your body turns to rubber - you do not even have the time nor the will to worry about your relatively minor flesh wounds.
I reprobate your insensitivity, your abject self-satisfaction - you reek of ignorance if you think that people do not feel the same way you would at the loss of a loved one. Many posts have the stench of what they have come to believe - the Arabs feel nothing, they do not bleed.
That was just an “surgical incursion” into Palestinian territory, a bombing campaign of this ferocity and magnitude is beyond imagination, it is a hundred fold worse (probably more). When they get done working through the rubble the death toll will soar. That is, if you hear about it through the filtering process.
Now, it is literally an impossibility for me to conceive of what others feel in this country when it has happened numerous times to them. I would probably come to the conclusion that I would do anything, by any means necessary.
There is no faith left that your enemy will budge but by the same agony and fear that you have experienced (I am just displaying for you the psychologically damaged thought process), there is no faith in the peace process under these conditions. Everything that these people do flows from their experience - you know, those “senseless” and barbaric things you hear about, with absolutely no knowledge or the ability to conceive of what has happened to them because of the purposeful media censorship.
July 23rd, 2006 at 11:40 am
“It’s about the lives and deaths of real people.”
They don’t care about the deaths of real people, even in one of their beloved Muslim democracies; it’s that simple. Nor do the European or Arab elites, who could bring genuine pressure to bear on the Bush administration for its limitless indifference to civilian suffering in Lebanon. In the end though it isn’t the Europeans, or Arabs, or Democrats who can make this thing stop. It is the party that controls the White House and Congress, and they simply don’t give a shit about real people.
July 23rd, 2006 at 12:30 pm
Marc,
I disagree with much of what you write, but you have been totally spot on about this Israel/Hezbollah idiocy. Ten years from now we won’t be looking at Hezbollah having started the confligeration, it will be the American invasion of Afghanistan, yet I agree the point will be moot.
All the little armchair warriors here in the US, lets be honest there’s none worse than the generation who fought so hard to stay out of Vietnam, continue to root and hollar for something they have paid no price, its all on credit card and someone else’s lives, but we can all rest assured at some point one way or other this war is coming home and everyone will have a much different view, and not for the better.
peace
July 23rd, 2006 at 12:34 pm
woops thats conflagration,
July 23rd, 2006 at 12:43 pm
Just in case some of you wre thinking that this is going to be short in duration (Lebanese bombing), I would be interested about your view of the prison being specifically built for the people of Lebanon in Israel. In my view, and most who comment from an informed direction this means it is going to be a long haul - another Abu Ghraib:
http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200607/23/eng20060723_285764.html
July 23rd, 2006 at 1:15 pm
DARLING
1.
I break this toast for the ghost of bread in Lebanon.
The split stone the toppled doorway.
Someone’s kettle has been crushed.
Someone’s sister has a gash above her right eye.
And now our tea has trouble being sweet.
A strawberry softens, turns musty,
overnight each apple grows a bruise.
I tie both shoes on Lebanon’s feet.
All day the sky in Texas that has seen no rain since June
is raining Lebanese mountains, Lebanese trees.
What if the air grew damp with the names of mothers?
The clear-belled voices of first graders
pinned to the map of Lebanon like a shield?
When I visited the camp of the opposition
near the lonely Golan, looking northward toward
Syria and Lebanon, a vine was springing pinkly from a tin can
and a woman with generous hips like my mother’s
said, “Follow me.”
2.
Someone was there. Someone not there now
was standing. In the wrong place
with a small moon-shaped scar on his cheek
and a boy by the hand.
Who had just drunk water, sharing the glass.
Not thinking about it deeply
though they might have, had they known.
Someone grown, and someone not grown.
Who imagined they had different amounts of time left.
This guessing-game ends with our hands in the air,
becoming air.
One who was there is not there, for no reason.
Two who were there.
It was almost too big to see.
3.
Our friend from Turkey says language is so delicate
he likens it to a darling.
We will take this word in our arms.
It will be small and breathing.
We will not wish to scare it.
Pressing lips to the edge of each syllable.
Nothing else will save us now.
The word “together” wants to live in every house.
********
BLOOD
“A true Arab knows how to catch
a fly in his hands,”
my father would say. And he’d prove it,
cupping the buzzer instantly
while the host with the swatter stared.
In the spring our palms peeled.
True Arabs believed watermelon
could heal fifty ways. I changed these to fit the occasion.
Years before, a girl knocked,
wanted to see the Arab.
I said we didn’t have one.
After that, my father told me who he was,
“Shihab” — “shooting star” —
a good name, borrowed from the sky.
Once I said, “When we die, we give it back?”
He said that’s what a true Arab would say.
Today the headlines clot in my blood.
A little Palestinian dangles a truck
on the front page.
Homeless fig, this tragedy with a terrible root
is too big for us. What flag can we wave?
I wave the flag of stone and seed,
table mat stitched in blue.
I call my father, we talk around the news.
It is too much for him,
neither of his two languages can reach it.
I drive into the country to find sheep, cows,
to plead with the air:
Who calls anyone civilized?
Where can the crying heart graze?
What does a true Arab do now?
****************
by Palestinian American poet, Naomi Shihab Nye, 2002
July 23rd, 2006 at 1:18 pm
And in answer to Woody’s question:
“Also, I don’t consider the lives of 1,000 murdering terrorists worth the life of one victim. Is that barbaric and un-Christian?”
Short answer, yes.
For longer answer, see Naomi Shihab Nye poem below:
DURING A WAR
Best wishes to you & yours,
he closes the letter.
For a moment I can’t
fold it up again—
where does “yours†end?
Dark eyes pleading
what could we have done
differently?
Your family,
your community,
circle of earth, we did not want,
we tried to stop,
we were not heard
by dark eyes who are dying
now. How easily they
would have welcomed us in
for coffee, serving it
in a simple room
with a radiant rug.
Your friends & mine.
July 23rd, 2006 at 1:46 pm
Abridged reg says: I\’m too crazed and irrational to debate the substance of comments from the right, so I always resort to personal attacks, and I find that misintrepreting cherry-picked statements helps me to feel superior, which is necessary for someone with my ego and lowly credentials.
Then, you curse and threaten people with other views, such as with your statement to me Woody, go fuck yourself, you little weasel….I would come at you with whatever was at hand and beat you bloody - or, worst case, get hurt trying. I’m not kidding. My disgust runneth over. http://marccooper.com/democrats-enlist/#comment-68903
Such is the cross that I bear against the attacks of the left to take over our country.
Music by which to read reg
==========
Virgil, \”The People\’s Daily???!!!!\” Well, underwear on a prisoner\’s head sure beats blowing them up.
==========
Here\’s another view from the left that\’s amazing: …the United Nations high commissioner for human rights, Louise Arbour, said the fighting might amount to war crimes. NY Times
Let\’s see. If you are in a war, then fighting is a war crime. Got that? Maybe that makes sense to people on the left.
==========
Finally, here\’s something from our buddy Ahmed: Aljazeera features Ahmed Aljazeera never asks me for an interview. Anyway, since we sort of know Ahmed and since he\’s featured in a prominent news source and since he gets his salary from U.S. taxpayers, I thought his views might be of interest. He thinks that the current conflict is part of an international conspiracy, but you can read it for yourself.
July 23rd, 2006 at 1:49 pm
This is an earlier comment now split in half because of link limitations on Marc’s comment filter.
Abridged reg says: I’m too crazed and irrational to debate the substance of comments from the right, so I always resort to personal attacks, and I find that misintrepreting cherry-picked statements helps me to feel superior, which is necessary for someone with my ego and lowly credentials.
Then, you curse and threaten people with other views, such as with your statement to me Woody, go fuck yourself, you little weasel….I would come at you with whatever was at hand and beat you bloody - or, worst case, get hurt trying. I’m not kidding. My disgust runneth over. http://marccooper.com/democrats-enlist/#comment-68903
Such is the cross that I bear against the attacks of the left to take over our country.
Music by which to read reg
July 23rd, 2006 at 1:51 pm
And, this is the second part of the original comment awaiting moderation for excessive links.
Virgil, “The People’s Daily???!!!!” Well, underwear on a prisoner’s head sure beats blowing them up.
==========
Here’s another view from the left that’s amazing: …the United Nations high commissioner for human rights, Louise Arbour, said the fighting might amount to war crimes. NY Times
Let’s see. If you are in a war, then fighting is a war crime. Got that? Maybe that makes sense to people on the left.
==========
Finally, here’s something from our buddy Ahmed: Aljazeera features Ahmed Aljazeera never asks me for an interview. Anyway, since we sort of know Ahmed and since he’s featured in a prominent news source and since he gets his salary from U.S. taxpayers, I thought his views might be of interest. He thinks that the current conflict is part of an international conspiracy, but you can read it for yourself.
July 23rd, 2006 at 1:58 pm
Does anyone remember the great “Doonesberry” cartoons from the Yom Kipur War where a symposium on campus has an Arab scholar leading a cheer:
“push em’ Back! Push em’ back! Way Back!”
That’s what we get here as both sides list their grievances that have claims on the public. I’m beginning to think that Thomas Freidman, of all people, may be right when he argues that time is running out for the Two-State Solution and that, if the Israelis don’t watch out, the Palestinans will opt for one state with “one person - one vote” ala South Africa. Then the choice will be a Jewish state or a Democratic state - but not both.
And how long will the US be able to shield the Israelis from the rest of the world. I think time is runing out as the Europeans and the the Chinese and Japanese are getting tired of their economies being held hostage to a bunch of crazies who hear the voice of God and are enabled by a Government that awaits the rapture. We owe a lot of money and oil could be priced in Euros you know!
July 23rd, 2006 at 2:00 pm
I am so, so sorry for another commetn, but apparently the link to Ahmed’s interview is faulty. Let’s hope this one works: Aljazeera Features Ahmed
==========
rosedog, was the person, who wrote that poem that you used to say that my view was not Christian, a Christian him or herself or does he belong to a religion of violence that calls for beheading non-believers?
July 23rd, 2006 at 2:26 pm
Woody, Reg is just saying, I would imagine, what most of us are thinking. I just think he has to make that final relization, that you flag waving fakes of the right are in fact the American America haters.
Again, I think it’s not cynical, but rather logical, to start looking at what the White House is really trying to do here. I remember not long after “Mission Accomplished” ; Marc Cooper writing that the left should forget about Iraq and start looking at ways to resist the White House’s obvious next step: the invasion of Iran. Granted, a lot has changed, but I’m not sure why we should assume they have given up on this. Every news report (spun pro Israel/U.S.) seems to stress, as best it can, the responsability of Iran and Syria in the conflict.
Just because flaming hippies like William F Buckley and Pat Bucannon are publicly writing off Iraq doesn’t mean such cool heads are anywhere near Cheney. Rice felt one reason for going into Iraq was BECAUSE WE COULD, that is, we are stronger than anybody else, and will prevail in the long run. Why should we assume their thinking has changed?
July 23rd, 2006 at 2:30 pm
Meanwhile the Iraqi PM calls US forces “butchers” and there is talk that the political class in Baghdad is already reconciling itself to partition. And Col. Pat Lang has joined William Lind in explaining how US forces in Iraq could suffer the worst defeat since Pearl Harbor. A Hint: Amateurs talk of strategy while pros talk of logistics. All supplies have to be trucked thru Shia dominated south and the Iranian controlled militias could easily cut them off. Then 130,000 Americans will be beseiged.
So let us review the bidding:
America bogged down down in Iraq
The Taliban making a comback in Afghanistan
Israel engaged in a two front war with Hamas and Hezbollah. The world condemns actions in Lebanon and Gaza
Turkey masses 250,000 troops on Kurdish Iraqi border and threatens invasion if cross border attacks don’t cease.
And our boy-king and Darth Chaney do nothing while telling us things are just fine!
Yeah I’m feeling better already!
July 23rd, 2006 at 2:35 pm
And I’m not sure where it belongs but an honorable mention to Alan Dershowitz for his explanation that Lebanese casualties don’t really matter because they are not really innocent civilians since they support Hezbollah. Way to go Alan! Just keep up the good work mr “Torture Warrant”.
July 23rd, 2006 at 2:52 pm
I’m not sure I agree with the proposition that Hezbollah is a kind of bottomless well that can continually be replenished by the allegedly limitless supply of Israel-hating young Arab-Muslims.
To the extent that Israel is delusional, I think the real danger here is that the sectarian faultlines in Lebanon, like those in Iraq, split open again, and a second phase of the country’s civil war erupts, perhaps drawing in Iran and Syria (and more catastrophically Sunni Arabs from the gulf) - even spreading throughout the region - and ending in the partition of Lebanon, and perhaps other Arab states as well.
Who will thank Mr. Bush for that?
July 23rd, 2006 at 2:54 pm
Woody, most here are going to have to excuse your comments as utter banal ignorance - the alternative would mean something like Reg\’s reaction you quote. Are you so jaded and ignorant that you think Abu Ghraib consisted merely of \”underwear on a prisoners head?\” I hope this is not your view.
This is NOT a left or right issue, unless of course your repertoire is as limited as your mind is closed, and as hard as your heart. Do not speak to me about Christianity, you embrace a mere caricature of Christianity and you display a ignorant caricature of Islam. I think it would be best if you reconsidered your positions and not display such self-centered screed.
For someone who trumpets Christianity as their belief I would hope you learn soon to embrace the weighter matters of the law which can be summed up in part \”love your neighbor as yourself (as Jesus did),\” some Rabin could quote this while standing on one foot - it is just the practice and application of it that is the bitch. If you espoused these views in a REAL church, with individuals who understand the Christian faith, you would be in danger of being accused of being a reprobate.
July 23rd, 2006 at 3:23 pm
Incidentally, I was actually tempted to make a tepid defense of Woody’s comment that he didn’t value the life of “1000 murderous terrorists” over the life of one of their victims, because assuming that as stated it’s pure fact, it’s arguable and posited on a rational morality, i.e. the innocence of victims vs. the culpability of murderers. But then I realized that he’d pushed just his argument a bit too far by asking if it’s “unChristian”, and that of course rosedog was absolutely right. “Christian” is a pretty high bar. As anyone who’s familiar with the Gospel of St. Mathew can tell you. In the political world that Woody apparently inhabits, some “Christians” take their extra special morality so far that even frozen embryos are sacred persons. Incidentally, with less than 200 frozen embryos adopted and brought to term by the highly refined Christian moralists that BushCo consults with on scientific and medical issues and 400,000 of the little boogers still out there on ice, I’d say that right-wing nutcases would do well to spend less time bloviating and hectoring liberals on the internet and more time and energy trying to grow nearly a half million little Republicans from scratch.
With 70% of the electorate against Bush on this one, you’ll probably be needing the votes when this administration’s smoke finally clears. Certainly aren’t likely to pick them up by continuing the assault on science and medical research or making wild charges about how embryonic stem cell research is “murder”.
July 23rd, 2006 at 3:25 pm
I keep dropping in extra words that make no syntactical sense - could use a preview but no biggie.
July 23rd, 2006 at 3:33 pm
Reg,
I will tell you this as a regular mass-attending Roman Catholic, Matthew (my favorite of the gospels) is probably the least referred to by Southern evangelicals, and one wonders if any of them have read the sermon on the Mount.
July 23rd, 2006 at 3:46 pm
My favorite book of the New Testament too. And Pasolini made a beauty of a film from it.
July 23rd, 2006 at 5:14 pm
Apparently some think my verbal scalpel is a bit too sharp, but in matters of life and death I think irt is best that some just keep their comments to themselves. If you are going to condemn thousands to death by your ideology than you should be able to take whatever verbal punchs come to you.
July 23rd, 2006 at 5:53 pm
Since there was some question about the source for the Lebanese prison being built earlier, I have a source that some might be more willing to embrace:
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3279762,00.html
Maybe this will help some to understand that I am not fooling around in regard to this subject, maybe not.
July 23rd, 2006 at 6:17 pm
Here is another strange statement out of Israel, from the Army Intelligence chief:
“our goal is that our neigbors will be countries wit the responsibility and capability to act against those who carry out terror attacks from within their territory. We want Lebanon to take responsibility for acts against Israel that originate from it’s territory.”
I only add - and how do you make sure they are capable of doing this? You bomb the shit out of their infrastructure and take out their communications!? Come on folks, this is so patently disingenuous that it is laughable. Do people really believe this bullshit?
July 23rd, 2006 at 7:18 pm
This isn’t our fight. We should not offer moral or materiel support to either side. Frankly, I would withdraw from Iraq today, too. Again not our fight.
I’m not a Christian so perhaps I can be honest. I could careless if the whole Middle East erupted into a conflagaration that laid waste their pretense of civillization for 5,000 years.
Can’t we just sit tight, focus our efforts on energy independence and let them kill each other? It’s been the fashion since the birth of civillization and I for one see no reason to stop it.
If we become energy independent, the entire Middle East is inconsequential. Wow — I wonder how many pebble-bed nuclear reactors we could have built for $300 billion. I’m wagering quite a few.
It’s terrible to see suffering. I feel for the civillians in a remote way. But let’s be honest, there’s a lot of suffering here at home and it would be better if we focused on that and didn’t become embroiled in such foreign adventurism.
July 23rd, 2006 at 8:07 pm
“here’s something from our buddy Ahmed”
That’s not ahmed. Ahmed is a white female afrikkaner.
July 23rd, 2006 at 8:10 pm
Nuts, well, I’m sorry. I tried to keep this straight but didn’t. So, Amed, I’m truly sorry for my confusing you for someone else.
Well, I have seen the “Angry Arab” posting here before, but I don’t remember what name he uses. Maybe someone can refresh my memory. I know that Marc and rosedog know the professor.
July 23rd, 2006 at 9:25 pm
Israeli Army intelligence chief: “our goal is that our neigbors will be countries wit the responsibility and capability to act against those who carry out terror attacks from within their territory. We want Lebanon to take responsibility for acts against Israel that originate from it’s territory.â€
Virgil protests: \”I only add - and how do you make sure they are capable of doing this? You bomb the shit out of their infrastructure and take out their communications!? Come on folks, this is so patently disingenuous that it is laughable. Do people really believe this bullshit?\”
If Israel wanted to utterly disable Lebanon\’s, economy, transportation and communications, it could have done so by now, rather easily. If Lebanon were utterly flattened, devastated and disabled by now, one wonders why its economics minister is predicting that, with a little patching up, everything should be ready to go for the seasonal tourism peak next summer?
Richard lo Cicero thinks Alan Dershowitz said Lebanese casualties \”don\’t matter.\” As with Dershowitz\’s stance on \”torture warrants\”, people seem to be getting him wrong again. Here\’s what he actually a few months ago about Palestinian terrorism:
—
\”The goal of Palestinian terrorism is to increase the number of civilian deaths on both sides. Yes the Palestinian terrorists who now fire rockets into Israel from Gaza want the IDF to kill Palestinian women children and old men. If they did not they would fire their rockets from isolated areas where there are no civilians. Instead they deliberately fire their rockets from heavily populated civilian areas in order to induce Israel to cause the highest possible number of Palestinian civilian casualties. Every time the Israeli military accidentally kills a Palestinian civilian the Palestinian terrorists win a propaganda and political victory. …
\”This despicable \”culture of death\” promoted by extremist Islamic imams in which an honorable death–even if not voluntarily chosen–is deemed preferable to life is the major cause of Islamic terrorism. Nor can terrorism of this sort be deterred by the prospect of imprisonment or even death. It must be prevented before it can be carried out. That is why the Israeli military has been aggressively attacking those who are preparing to fire rockets into Israeli towns and cities. …
\”[Israel] must continue to attack those who are in the process of firing rockets at Israeli civilians; but it must do a better job of reducing the number of civilian casualties. If it is true that Palestinian terrorists benefit from every increase in both Palestinian and Israeli civilian casualties then it is equally true that Israel benefits from every decrease in such casualties. Among the best deterrents against Palestinian rocket attacks would be for Israel to stop creating martyrs–and propaganda objects–among Palestinian civilians.\”
—
Got that straight? No? Then you\’re illiterate or simply too stupid to be part of the debate.
Now here\’s what Dershowitz said more recently, in the LA Times, when he suggested a \”new vocabulary\”, including the term \”civilianality\” (which I admit isn\’t likely to fly any more than \”torture warrants\” did).
—
\”There is a vast difference — both moral and legal — between a 2-year-old who is killed by an enemy rocket and a 30-year-old civilian who has allowed his house to be used to store Katyusha rockets. Both are technically civilians, but the former is far more innocent than the latter. There is also a difference between a civilian who merely favors or even votes for a terrorist group and one who provides financial or other material support for terrorism.
\”Finally, there is a difference between civilians who are held hostage against their will by terrorists who use them as involuntary human shields, and civilians who voluntarily place themselves in harm\’s way in order to protect terrorists from enemy fire. \”
—
I don\’t know how a sentiment like that somehow compresses down to \”Lebanese civilians don\’t matter\”, a statement so cloddish and brutal that you\’d think Dershowitz was, well, Woody, rather than what he is: one of the sharper legal minds in America. Dershowitz may be an attention-seeking lightning-rod egomaniac as well, I don\’t know, but that doesn\’t make his statements wrong.
Endgame watch: Condi points out, on the plane, that, Y\’know, we actually *do* talk to Syria, we have offices in Damascus, there is dialogue.
Expect Syria to be closely involved in how this settles out. And to come out ahead of the game.
Second attempt at a correction: Richard lo Cicero is nattering again about 250,000 Turkish troops on the border with northern Iraq. Why, oh why, is this idiocy being repeated? Turkey routinely keeps about 200,000 troops in Kurdish areas of Turkey. There are larger numbers of them on the border at the moment (the PKK strikes seasonally, and Turkey responds seasonally), but now Turkey is talking about taking out the PKK stronghold across the border if the U.S. (which categorizes the PKK as a terrorist group) and the Iraqi Kurds (which have fought the PKK themselves in the past) don\’t finally do something about it. Recently Turkey is citing the Israeli attack on Lebanon as support for their right to go in, since PKK violence in Turkey is on the rise. What\’s the excuse so far, for the U.S. and the Kurdish regional government NOT taking out the PKK on their own? A pretty good one: that U.S. troops are pretty damn busy with more important stuff, and so is the Pesh Merga, a force that undoubtedly includes some battle-seasoned troops who have direct experience coordinating with Turkish troops to contain the PKK in past years.
Richard, Virgil, Woody: \”Exaggerations R US\”. I could lengthen the list. But especially Virgil:
\”That was just an “surgical incursion†into Palestinian territory, a bombing campaign of this ferocity and magnitude is beyond imagination, it is a hundred fold worse (probably more). \”
You\’d think Beirut was Dresden.
The Syrians have recently released their own figures for the number of displaced in southern Lebanon: about 130,000. One imagines Virgil placing a panicky call to the Syrian foreign ministry, asking if they haven\’t perhaps dropped a zero somewhere?
Truth is the first casualty of war. 250,000 Turkish troops massed on the border with northern Iraq would be visible from orbit. 500,000 refugees in Lebanon would be visible from orbit. Show me the satellite photographs. Or shut up until you actually know that you\’re not just parroting the propaganda of one side or another.
July 23rd, 2006 at 10:41 pm
Here is an interesting bit of of information, or at least it was interesting to me. We all know that there are many Israelis which do not agree with their governments actions. Here we find a good portion of the Israeli filmmakers community squarely making this statement of disagreement - and I mean they do not mince any words:
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3280381,00.html
No mistaking their position.
July 23rd, 2006 at 10:49 pm
I take issue with the premise of this post: that there must be some way to stop this current installment of blood-letting AND get a Palestinian-Israeli, Israeli-Hizbullah peace. The assumption is that all parties should or do desire peace.
Strictly for the sake of argument (nothing monstrous here–I am just talking and speculating), let’s suppose the opposite, that none of them should desire peace and that none of them do.
In that case, how could you possibly explain this war? What weapons do either Hizbullah and the Palestinians have at their disposal, that they have failed to use?
What weapons do the Israelis have at their disposal, that they have failed to use?
The answer is none that anyone knows about and most of them.
The Israelis have the military means to murder, and it would be murder, most men, women and children within the borders of both Lebanon and the “disputed” territories. The Israelis also have the means to expel the complete populations of these same areas.
Why don’t they do it?
Restraint, even if it is the restraint of enlightened self-interest. Israel has never practiced Total War and is not currently practicing anything close to it. This isn’t a matter of opinion. Total War means mobilizing your population, your political apparat and your economy to exterminate your enemies. Israel has the means to do so and declines.
This is not a defense of Israel’s current campaign (though on blance I support it—seperate argument).
This is a statement of fact. Israel declines to wage Total War. Israel tolerates peace demonstrations and peace activists within its borders. Israel tolerates people who freely state, on Israeli soil, that the state of Israel is illegitimate.
I am not atempting to convert people who blame Israel anymore than I am people who blame Israel and its enemies equally. The fatuos, sickening arguments of moral equivelance will never end. Anyone who believes that Fatah and Hamas and Hizbullah has ever practiced any form of restraint or has ever tolerated freedom of speech, freedom of the press or freedom of opinion, well, let’s see your evidence.
The declared aim of Hizbulla is to eliminate the Jewish state. The declared aim of its Godfather, Iran, is to eliminate the Jewish state. The declared aim of Hamas is to eliminate the Jewish state.
The declared aim of Israel is Lebanese sovereignty, Iranian soveriegnty, Palestinian soveriegnty and Israeli soveriegnty.
Mr. Cooper suggests that Americans are blood-thirsty simpletons for thinking that some issues are black and white. Americans are neither blood-thirsty nor simple. They are so intelligent that they see the difference, one of black and white, between Israel and its enemies.
July 23rd, 2006 at 11:57 pm
Sott: Ur post cannot be taken seriously as it reflects not facts but rather articles of belief.
Israel aims for the sovereignty of Palestinians? By occupying Palestinian territory for 39 years and building settelements on it?
Come back when you are willing to be intellectually honest.
There is absolutely NO assumption that any of these parties desire peace, by the way. Perhaps that’s why some muscular diplomacy from the world’s only superpower might have come in handy.
It might be an interesting exercise for you to go back a few years in history and review what it was that Ariel Sharon gae such encouragement to Hamas. How odd that Islam has been around for all this time but we dont see the rise of Hamas until several decades into the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands. You dont think Israel’s intransigence had anything to do with the rise of the extremist wing of the Pals, do you? What an amazing coincidence.
July 24th, 2006 at 12:35 am
Thanks Marc for giving this issue the attention it deserved. Youve been pretty moral on the whole issue as well. And Woody nice try buddy Although an avid reader of the Angry Arab News Service, Im not asad. Im not sure why i bother with Mark York (publius) anymore but for the record im not a \”white female\” either. I can only suppose that yorster says that as a way of projecting his lifelong failures with women onto me. As for Woody more than 300 citizens are dead, there has been rond the clock bombing of everything imiginable, children with physchological scars that will bot be forgotten. Let me suggest that the kind of \”christianity\” youre evoking to defend this horror is the same kind of christianity which justiified slavery, racism and colonial brutality. More so that comic which suggested that palestinains dont value the lives of thier children is one the more disgusting displays of xenophobia ive seen posted here
July 24th, 2006 at 7:30 am
He has some points, and as usual with these people destroys them with his attitude. Screw ‘im. (That’s just my instinctive reaction. Must be really great writing.)
July 24th, 2006 at 7:31 am
(Backed by spectacular thinking.)
July 24th, 2006 at 7:47 am
“It’s a new, evolving and somewhat complex situation, and anybody who doesn’t IMMEDIATELY agree with me is a fool - yes a fool.”
I may even agree with him. This makes me want to disagree with him.
July 24th, 2006 at 3:18 pm
Um, wasn’t this area called Palestine a hundred years ago? Didn’t the Israelis have militant groups that were classified as terrorist organizations in the early 20th century?
94% Arab is the number you should remember. That was the population of what is now Israel around 1920.
Alls I know is that if you put two strong religious groups next to each other, they are going to fight. It’s been happening since the dawn of time.
July 25th, 2006 at 11:33 am
Um, no. The nation-states currently known as Jordan and Israel constituted Transjordan. There was never a nation-state called Palestine, though the Romans renamed Judea, Palestine, in honor of the Phillistines who had given those nettlesome Hebrews so much trouble in years past.
July 26th, 2006 at 12:16 pm
Marc:
I doubt, purely by the standard of human nature and selfishness, that any country cares about the Palestinian people’s sovereignty. But you are right that Israel is bullying and spinning; they want the terrorists/extremists/freedom-fighters/… to be boshed and their sovereignty be damned.
The only reason Jewish lands haven’t been settled upon in current times is because of Israeli aggression, but you cant’ blame them for wanting a buffer zone; any country by the above standard of selfishness would. Yet Israel is pulling a double standard of wanting that and allowing settlements of their own. That is good reason why peace isn’t coming; however, I believe the encroachment bias complaint is moot if you consider why Palestinians for the passed 60+ years haven’t been allowed to reciprocate: …invasions of their own…
Concerning occupation, wouldn’t the occupation have ended a long time ago if PLO then Hizbollah then Hamas hadn’t come along? Honestly, no one else is getting rid of them.
If you think Israel is occupying those lands for gold and glory you don’t get the primary function of a government: to defend its borders, and for the last 60+ years its borders have been - how do you put it Marc - intransigent?
Also, concerning the 94% Arab population percentage of circa 1920 Israel: What is their total and how spread out and nomadic were their villages. That is the mystery that I want to know. Until I know more about that, I can’t say whether their claims to ‘owning’ that land are good.
July 26th, 2006 at 8:05 pm
Coleman has it correct here.
July 26th, 2006 at 8:07 pm
And as usual ahmed is stuck on…well everyone knows.
July 27th, 2006 at 11:41 pm
wagering wagering
July 30th, 2006 at 7:26 am
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