A Snowball Arrives in Hell…Film at 6:00
Ministers at the meeting traded barbs over whether Lebanese guerrilla group Hezbollah bore any responsibility for the escalation in violence that followed its capture of two Israeli soldiers.I must be dreaming. The Saudi whacking Hezbollah!!The Saudi foreign minister appeared to be leading a camp of ministers criticizing the guerrilla group’s actions, calling them “unexpected, inappropriate and irresponsible acts.”
“These acts will pull the whole region back to years ago, and we cannot simply accept them,” Saudi al-Faisal told his counterparts.
Supporting his stance were representatives of Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Iraq, the Palestinian Authority, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, delegates said on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the talks.
haaretz
In fact this is not that surprising given the fact that Iran an Syria are Hezbollah’s chief sponsors and neither are exactly persona graita in Sunni land. But, still, the fact that the PA and Iraq are supporting the dissing of Hezbollah is a huge step forward.
The likelyhood is that the Israelis will reduce Hezbollah to smoke and cinders. If Syria intervenes Assad may enjoy the same fate. Iran is a very long way away and there are 135,000 American troops on station to prevent the arrival of assorted bunches of revolutionary guards. The big worry is that the Iraqi WMDs might be in the hands of the Hezbollah thugs and those could be rather nasty. (Yup, I do still believe they were shipped out and yes, I do indeed believe that Hezbollah mya very well ahve chemical weapons available to it. Not a good thought but one which must be considered when we think about Israel’s current position.)
At this point Israel is entirely capable of reducing Hezbollah all on its own. The EU will wet its panties but that is pretty much SOP. The more interesting question is whether or not the Anglosphere will continue to support Israel’s right to self defence. I was encouraged by Harper and Howard and Bush. I was less encouraged y Blair but he has lots of problems with the Short end of Labour.
For the moment Israel enjoys a freehand. Let’s hope they use it effectively and with an eye to the main chance. Killing the leadership of Hezbollah is a start. Taking down the Syrian regime would be rather better. Bombing the Hell out of the Lebanon is a sideshow. Killing the Lebanonese tourist season is a good way of suggesting that thee Lebanon has a responsibility to rein in Hezbollah; but the fact is that Lebanon may not have the capacity to finish these thug off.
Right now Isreal has something on the order of weeks, perhaps days, to reduce Hezbollah to a joke. With luck they will also be able to throw the Baathists in Syria into terminal turmoil; but that part is not assured.
The poor Palis and Hezbollah have blown it by offering the perfect excuse to Israel to take out the apparatus of terror. I just hope that Israel is able to get the job done in the limited window Hamas and Hezbollah have opened.
Update: This story is beginning to gain some traction on the right side of the blogosphere. Captain Ed keeps track of the trackbacks.
The fact that Saudi Arabia is willing to stand up for Israel is good news. However, I have to ask: what is different now than what has gone before? We’ve seen Israel roll in and occupy the West Bank, the Golan Heights, the Gaza Strip and southern Lebanon, presumably crushing whatever resistence was in their way. And yet the terrorism has continued.
Brute force doesn’t seem to have the requisite effectiveness to achieve lasting peace; Israel saw a greater dent in its casualty rates from terrorist attacks by pulling back from Gaza and mounting a wall around the West bank. So, what makes you think that these attacks will be any different from previous military campaigns?
Oh brother… an advocate of “The WMD’s got shipped to Syria” crackpot theory Jay?
What’s your proof? The National Review? Anne Coulter?
Even the US government hasnt been so idiotic as to try and push that conspiracy theory.
Come on, Scott. We all know they were shipped out in black helicopters, contained in rabbit-wire cages/a>.
Interesting how deeply the left needs to deny the very possibility of WMDs. There is now substantive evidence that the mobile labs – funded to the tune of 32 million dollars – were not, as the Survey group suggested, designed to make hydrogen for weather balloons. There have been large number of chemical shells recovered.
Now, what happened to the WMDs? the theory on the left seems to be that there were none and that the Iraqi scientists were just stringing Uncle Cuddles along. (I would think this would be a tad risky….but what the heck.)
I remain skeptical of the official position – that there were no WMDs – which means I have to take a bit seriously the idea that along with trackloads of cash and gold (the existence of which no one disputes) some WMDs were shipped to Syria.
Frankly, I hope I am wrong on this. I would much rather be wrong on WMDs than have them used against anyone in the Middle East.
(And Scott, NRO has a rather impressive record of getting this stuff right. Not all the time but no less correct than the NYT or WaPo.)
Well.. I’m sorry Jay.. but with all due respect (as you’ve probably already seen), you’ve sunk to the wingnut category if you honestly believe that position.
Claiming NRO is “right” on anything doesnt exactly chqange my mind either. As Idealistic Pragmatist said at Andrew’s site in his thread on Israel.. you used to be a reasonable guy with most of your views.. but you’ve gone Tom Friedman on us.