Feel the racism. Richard Cohen writes in the Washington Post:

But the lesson of Iraq and, now, Lebanon, is that zealots make tough enemies. It was one thing for Israel to fight apathetic and hapless Egyptians, Iraqis, Jordanians, Syrians and Lebanese. Those armies consisted of the indifferent: Sure, these Arabs opposed Israel, but they were mostly unaffected by it and would rather live with it than die fighting it. Even the Palestinians proved to be not much of a battlefield foe. This has not been the case with Hezbollah or, in Iraq, the various groups of fanatics who would blow themselves up for reasons that we could not begin to fathom. Hezbollah is now described in terms once reserved for the Japanese army of World War II. "If you are waiting for a white flag coming out of the Hezbollah bunker, I can assure you it won't come," said Brig. Gen. Ido Nehushtan, a member of the Israeli army's general staff.
This zealotry, this ideology, this religious fervor is not something we in the West -- and that includes Israel -- know how to deal with.

According to Mr. Cohen, "apathetic and happless" Arabs are normal and understandable, but determined ones who resist the attacker/occupier are consumed by incomprehenciple "zealotry" and "religious fervor". In his world view "we could not begin to fathom" resistence to the forces of good exemplified by the US/Israeli war machines.

Mr. Cohen, history teaches us that defence of ones homeland is quite normal, even for non fanatic islamo facist rag heads (or whatever you may want to call those who resist the crusading forces of good).

Today is the first day of the ceasefire in Lebanon. From the BBC monitoring service:

LI XUEJIANG IN CHINA'S RENMIN WANG:
The UN Security Council actually could not secure any achievements because of US obstruction... So were there really no winners? Not exactly - US arms dealers certainly made ill-gotten gains.

Good to see something positive in these dark times

From Haaretz, this uplifting quote from Israel:

"If our fighters deep in Lebanese territory are left without food our water, I believe they can break into local Lebanese stores to solve that problem," Brigadier General Avi Mizrahi, the head of the Israel Defense Forces logistics branch, said Monday.

I guess not enough US tax dollars are being sent for rations. Quite right that the Lebanese civilians should pay for the Israeli destruction occupation of their country.

Interesting though is the last sentence of this article:

According to Mizrahi, the logistics branch is prepared for the possibility that combat soldiers will have to remain in Lebanon during the winter.

No doubt, if Israel is still occupying Lebanon in Januarry Condy/Bush will be "surprised"...

This reminds me of another Condi fragent from July 21:

I think we are beginning to see the outlines of a political framework that might allow the cessation of violence in a more sustainable way tied to 1559, tied to -- what is there in the G-8 statement. The elements are becoming quite clear. But I have no interest in diplomacy for the sake of returning Lebanon and Israel to the status quo ante. I think it would be a mistake.
What we're seeing here, in a sense, is the growing -- the birth pangs of a new Middle East and whatever we do we have to be certain that we're pushing forward to the new Middle East not going back to the old one.

Note that she want a cessation of violence for "1559", not to stop the killing and destruction. I'm sure in her reading 1559 ias all about dissarming Hezbollah...

And a final observation. I have not heard much mention of an important paragraph in the new UN resolution:

18. Stresses the importance of, and the need to achieve, a comprehensive, just and lasting peace in the Middle East, based on all its relevant resolutions including its resolutions 242 (1967) of 22 November 1967 and 338 (1973) of 22 October 1973;

Resolution 242 is the one calling for "Withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict".
I find it positive that there is official recognition that the latest Lebanon war is linked to the 1967 war and resultant occupations.

George Bush once again demonstrates the depth of his understanding of the reasons for animosity against the United States. Describing the alleged plot to bomb planes from the UK to the US he said it was a:

stark reminder that this nation is at war with Islamic fascists who will use any means to destroy those of us who love freedom.

It could not possibly have anything to do with US/UK policies in recent years towards Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, Israel, Palestine, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, ...

No it is because the bad guys hate that Bush and others "love freedom".

The thousands of dead Afghanis, Iraqis, Palestinians, Lebanese are birth-pangs of freedom love and democracy exporting.

I had a hard time locating the 7 point plan presented by the Lebanese government for a ceasefire. But finally found it here.
It was presented I believe on July 26:

1. An undertaking to release the Lebanese and Israeli prisoners and detainees through the ICRC.


2. The withdrawal of the Israeli army behind the Blue Line, and the return of the displaced to their villages.


3. A commitment from the Security Council to place the Shebaa Farms area and the Kfarshouba Hills under UN jurisdiction until border delineation and Lebanese sovereignty over them are fully settled. While in UN custody, the area will be accessible to Lebanese property owners there. Further, Israel surrenders all remaining landmine maps in South Lebanon to the UN.


4. The Lebanese government extends its authority over its territory through its own legitimate armed forces, such that there will be no weapons or authority other than that of the Lebanese state as stipulated in the Taef national reconciliation document.


5. The UN international force, operating in South Lebanon, is supplemented and enhanced in numbers, equipment, mandate and scope of operation, as needed, in order to undertake urgent humanitarian and relief work and guarantee stability and security in the south so that those who fled their homes can return.


6. The UN, in cooperation with the relevant parties, undertakes the necessary measures to once again put into effect the Armistice Agreement signed by Lebanon and Israel in 1949, and to insure adherence to the provisions of that agreement, as well as to explore possible amendments to or development of said provisions, as necessary.


7. The international community commits to support Lebanon on all levels, and to assist it in facing the tremendous burden resulting from the human, social and economic tragedy which has afflicted the country, especially in the areas of relief, reconstruction and rebuilding of the national economy.

Compare and contrast to the US/French plan

A few naive questions:

1. Why this plan did not get much reporting in the press?


2. Why Siniora's speech contained in the above link was under reported?


3. Since BushBlair are all for promoting democracy in the Middle East, why this plan was not used as the basis of the UN proposal?


4. Why the UN proposal is asymmetric in who can continue violence?


5. Why the UN proposal allows continuation of Israeli occupation?

By the way, there are constant references in the press in recent days of how Hezbollah was responsible for the killing of US marines in Lebanon in 1982. To the best of my knowledge this was never proved.

According to Caspar Weinberger who was Secretary of Defense in the Reagan administration from 1981 to 1987, in a 2001 interview:

But we still do not have the actual knowledge of who did the bombing of the Marine barracks at the Beirut Airport, and we certainly didn't then.

Today I was listening to NPR morning edition, when this wonderful piece came along (To listen, go here and move forward to about 1:50)

Scott Simon: I know you have been out to see a port area there in town that has been struck recently. What can you tell us?

Ivan Watson: Scott, It’s called Uzai - it’s a little fishing port to the south of the city [Tyre] and it was hit 2 nights ago repeatedly.

Ah – the buildings around the port have largely been demolished and I cannot tell whether or not they were some kind of Hezbollah installation or not.

What was striking though was the port itself.

There were several hundred fishing boats had been stationed there and it appeared that Israeli aircraft had repeatedly straffed those little fishing boats destroying all of them but not really bombing the concrete pier that ran out into the port.

Ah – these boats were the livelihood for fishermen who make maybe $600 a month.

Um - the fishermen were joking, calling their sunken boats “Hezbollah aircraft carriers” and were questioning what the strategic value of such an attack could have been.

Scott Simon: mmmhmm. I, I suppose the Israelis were worried that small boats can in fact be used to transport missiles in and out?

Ivan Watson: [3 seconds silence] Perhaps eh Hezbollah has claimed several rocket attacks though, against Israeli warships over this three week conflict.

Mr. Simon's joke is almost as good as that of the fishermen!!!
At least I hope that was a joke. And not an attempt to make this latest destruction appear justified for military reasons.

A fine example of the New York Times's way of using omission to create propaganda. In an article entitled Hezbollah Leader Says Attacks Are Justified they state

"The Islamic resistance will hit Tel Aviv, and it is capable of doing that with God’s help," Sheik Nasrallah said in the speech, broadcast on the group’s television network, al Manar.

In most other reports, including this one from Haaretz (Israel):

"If you bomb our capital Beirut, we will bomb the capital of your usurping entity... We will bomb Tel Aviv," Nasrallah said.

So the a reader of the NYT would be unaware that the threat to bomb Tel Aviv was in response to an attack by Israel.

Now for the big question, is Hezbollah a "terrorist" organization? Most of the world does not think so. An interesting article in today's Guardian explains:

Interestingly, some of the earliest suicide bombings commonly attributed to Hizbullah, such as the 1983 attacks on the US embassy and marine barracks in Beirut, were believed by American intelligence sources at the time to have been orchestrated by the Iraqi Dawa party. Hizbullah barely existed in 1983 and Dawa cadres are said to have been instrumental in setting it up at Tehran's behest. Dawa's current leadership includes none other than the new Iraqi prime minister, Nuri al-Maliki, feted last week in London and Washington as the great hope for the future of the Middle East. As the old saying goes, today's terrorist is tomorrow's statesman - at least when it suits us.

and this very interesting comment on why the US calls organizations like Hezbollah terrorist:

The US state department's annual reports on terrorism also list operations carried out against the Israeli Defence Force as examples of terrorism. The US government justifies this conclusion by way of a logical contortion that defines Israeli troops as "non-combatants", despite the fact that Israel continues to occupy territory in Lebanon and Palestine with military force. The intention is not just to stamp out terrorism as commonly understood, but also to stigmatise perfectly legitimate acts of resistance.

The NYT can at times be comical. In an article entitled "From Carnage, U.S. Gains a Concession" we are told:

The contents of the diplomatic package are basically set, and Bush officials said Ms. Rice would lay out its terms on Monday. Under the proposal, Israel and Lebanon would agree to a cease-fire as part of a larger pact that would include installing 15,000 to 20,000 international peacekeepers throughout southern Lebanon, American and Israeli officials said. The Lebanese government would work to disband Hezbollah, and the United States and other countries would funnel money and send military officials to help train the Lebanese Army, so that it could work to prevent future attacks on Israel. Israel would agree to talks on whether it would withdraw from a disputed border area known as Shabaa Farms, a Hezbollah demand.

Where to start?

So the US needed carnage to “gain a concession”? The enormous aid the US gives the state of Israel gave it no leverage?

The Lebanese army will be trained “so that it could work to prevent future attacks on Israel”? I was under the impression that that was the role of the Israeli army, which already gets massive aid from the US. Surely the role of the Lebanese army should be to prevent attacks BY Israel.

Hezbollah should be disbanded. The force that was most fundamental in freeing Lebanon from decades of Israeli occupation should be disbanded? Why?

And Israel's "concessions" in all this? To "agree to talks on whether it would withdraw from a disputed border area known as Shabaa Farms". How painful. And while I know that the dispute about the Shabaa farms is about whether they are part of Lebanon or Syria. But the naive reader will think that the dispute is about whether these are occupied in the first place.

Bush/Blair/Olmert are helping to unify the Middle East. From a poll in Lebanon:

The survey showed 87 percent support for Hizbullah's retaliatory attacks on northern Israel.

The survey showed that a large majority of Lebanese do not consider the US to be an honest mediator (89.5 percent). A similar survey conducted by the Beirut Center for Research and Information published in As-Safir on January 31 showed 38.2 percent support for the US role in Lebanon. This drop is due to the close political cooperation between the US and Israel.

The war on Lebanon continues (bbc):

More than 54 civilians, at least 34 of them children, have been killed in a town in south Lebanon in the deadliest Israeli strike of the conflict so far.

As we all know, because Bush told us so, while explaining the lack of urgency in getting a cease fire:

And secondly, it's really important for people to understand that terrorists are trying to stop the advance of freedom, and therefore, it's essential that we do what's right and not necessarily what appears to be immediately popular.

and, as we all know, because we were told so by the Israeli minister of justice (!!!!), this is a perfectly justified step in the war on terror:

Everyone in southern Lebanon is a terrorist and is connected to Hizbollah.

If people remembered past last week, they would recall the name of the village where this happened, Qana

Qana, southern Lebanon - It was a massacre. Not since Sabra and Chatila had I seen the innocent slaughtered like this. The Lebanese refugee women and children and men lay in heaps, their hands or arms or legs missing, beheaded or disembowelled. There were well over a hundred of them. A baby lay without a head. The Israeli shells had scythed through them as they lay in the United Nations shelter, believing that they were safe under the world's protection. Like the Muslims of Srebrenica, the Muslims of Qana were wrong.

As usual, Rami G. Khouri makes interesting points in the Daily Star:

Two important markers of Arab public opinion emerged this week. The first is the Saudi Arabian royal court statement issued Wednesday warning against the "grave and unpredictable consequences" of the continued Israeli aggression against Lebanon. It simultaneously appealed to and warned the international community - with the US singled out by name - that if the Arab offer to live in peace with Israel fell victim to Israeli "arrogance," only the war option would remain. For the normally discreet, patient and peaceful Saudis to issue such a statement was about a strong a signal as we are ever likely to get of elite Arab concern with the consequences of the current mood among Arab publics.

The second important marker is a national public opinion poll of Lebanese, conducted this week by the respected Beirut Center for Research and Information with Lebanese-American University political science professor Amal Saad-Ghorayeb, measuring public attitudes to the current situation. The striking results showed 87 percent of all Lebanese supported Hizbullah's military response to the Israeli attacks (including, notably, 89 percent of Sunnis and 80 percent of Christians). Five months ago, just 58 percent supported the resistance movement's right to remain armed. And 89 percent of respondents said the US was not an honest broker and did not respond positively to Lebanon's concerns.
...
Most Arabs ignore their regimes and applaud or support those who actively resist Anglo-American-Israeli aggression. The face of Arab public opinion will continue to change in these directions, until legitimate grievances are redressed and people throughout the Arab world feel they are treated like dignified human beings rather than disposable animals.

How can Thomas Friedman be regarded as an expert on the Middle East?
From his latest diarrhoea:

And I mean madness. We've seen Sunni Muslims in Iraq suicide-bomb a Shiite mosque on Ramadan; we've seen Shiite militiamen torture Sunnis in Iraq by drilling holes in their heads with power tools; we've seen Jordanian Islamist parliamentarians mourning the terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, even though he once blew up a Jordanian wedding; we've seen hundreds of Palestinian suicide bombings of Israeli cafes and buses; and we've seen Israel retaliating by, at times, leveling whole buildings, with the guilty and the innocent inside.

According to the wise man, the Israelis "retaliate", "at times", whereas the Moslems...

No doubt the 700 civilians killed by the Israelis in Lebanon are all accidents.

Friedman sees "hundreds of Palestinian suicide bombings of Israeli cafes and buses" but not the thousands of Palestinians killed during the same period by Israeli, US supplied weapons. He does not see the tens of thousands of Palestinians made homeless. He does not see the millions having their lives made hell by a 40 year occupation.

He forgets the tens of thousands killed in Lebanon in previous Israeli invasions.

He forgets to mention the 10s (maybe 100s) of thousands of Iraqis and Afghans killed by US and UK forces in Bush's war of terror.

No, all he sees is Moslem attrocities and Israeli accidents, all caused by lack of modernity of them thar Arbs.

From the daily star

Hizbullah has already agreed to a five-point package that can be quickly implemented once a cease-fire is in place: the exchange of prisoners, and end to Israel's occupation of the Shebaa Farms, maps of Israeli-laid mindefields in South Lebanon, an end to Israeli air, land and sea incursions into Lebanese territory, and the deployment of the Lebanese Army in South Lebanon. If Israel is actually serious about not returning to the previous status quo - or to an even worse future - these five points provide an excellent formula for reaching that objective.

Sir Stephen Wall, a former top foreign policy adviser to Tony Blair, writing in the New Statesman:

There are times, such as the past two weeks, when a British prime minister should have been thinking less about private influence and more about public advocacy. Could the Prime Minister really not speak up for the simple proposition that the slaughter of innocent people in Lebanon, the destruction of their country and the ruin of half a million lives were wrong and should stop immediately? "What kind of ceasefire?" Blair asks. One that stopped the horror, even for 24 hours, would be a start.

Fisk has been writing about Lebanon. Interesting little vignette:

The only civilian walking these frightening roads was a goatherd, shepherding his animals around the huge craters. Talking to him, it emerged that he was almost stone deaf and could not hear the bombs. In this, it seemed, he had a lot in common with Condoleezza Rice.

Lebanese Prime Minister Signora says:

"what future other than one of fear, frustration, financial ruin and fanaticism can stem from the rubble?" "Is the value of human life less than in Lebanon than that of citizens elsewhere? Are we children of a lesser God? Is an Israeli teardrop worth more than a drop of Lebanese blood?" "Can the international community continue to stand by while such callous retribution by the state of Israel is inflicted upon us?" "Is this what is called legitimate self-defence?"

The result of the summit:

For an immediate ceasefire: UN, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Greece, Jordan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Canada and Cyprus
Against: US and Britain.
Result: no immediate ceasefire

Israel's response:

"We received yesterday at the Rome conference permission from the world... to continue the operation," Justice Minister Haim Ramon said.

He said that in order to prevent casualties among Israeli soldiers battling Hezbollah militants in southern Lebanon, villages should be flattened by the Israeli air force before ground troops move in.

"All those now in south Lebanon are terrorists who are related in some way to Hezbollah," Mr Ramon said.

We have been warned. Let no one say "we did not know".

And remember that Dianne Feinstein's only statement on all this is: "we will not waver in our support", support for the Israeli government, whatever its policies, not support for civilians of any ethnicity killed in this conflict.

In the washington post we get this

The Rice delegation also hinted that it was exploring actions against outside governments subverting Lebanon's sovereignty, Welch said. The United States strongly believes that Iran in particular facilitated and encouraged the July 12 Hezbollah cross-border raid that seized two Israeli soldiers and sparked the crisis. The administration also holds Syria responsible for abetting the radical Shiite Muslim group."

The "amusing" part is that Condi does not see Israel's actions as "subverting Lebanon's sovereignty", as of course the US did not subvert Iraq's sovereignty. From a different perspective, see At the heart of the Lebanon crisis lie the lethal mistakes of George Bush:

As for complaints from Britain and Europe about the 390 civilians killed in Lebanon, those are a reminder of the more than 3,000 civilians killed in the 2001 onslaught against Afghanistan: how was that proportionate exactly? Kim Howells was right to be appalled by what he saw in Beirut. But he surely would have been just as shocked had he visited the Iraqi city of Falluja after the Americans had turned it to rubble.

Interesting too that the New York Times uses this title Israel to Occupy Area of Lebanon as Security Zone to inform us of the killing of UN observers by Israeli forces.

The BBC reports:
Israel troops 'ignored' UN plea

UN peacekeepers in south Lebanon contacted Israeli troops 10 times before an Israeli bomb killed four of them, an initial UN report says.

but does not neglect to carry a long piece informing us how Israel is behaving completely correctly.

On Sunday Dianne Feinstein chose to attend a "Israel Solidarity Rally"

Stand Against Terrorism... Stand With Israel
Stand Together

Join Senator Dianne Feinstein in Supporting Israel THIS Sunday, July 23 at 12 NOON at Justin Herman Plaza in San Francisco!

Original invite here.


This is while the Israeli actions have led to some 400 civilian deaths and 500,000 refugees.

This morning, in the New York Times, in an article titled To Flee or to Stay? Family Chooses Too Late and Pays Dearly, we read:

An Israeli rocket, which Lebanese officials said was likely fired from a helicopter, slammed into the center of the Shaitos’ van as it sped round a bend a few miles west of their village, and the van crashed into a hillside. Three occupants were killed: an uncle, Mohammad; the grandmother, Nazira; and a Syrian man who had guarded their home. The missile also critically wounded Mrs. Shaito and her sister. Eleven others suffered less severe wounds.

Looks like the same sort of propaganda that was used on Iraq, the Serbs, ... to convince the US populace of the inhumanity of the enemy is now being applied to Iran.
Those of us with memories that extend further than last week may remember, in preparation for the first Gulf War, the false reports of how Iraqi soldiers in Kuwait threw babies out of incubators.

In preparation for a potential attack on Iran, the new, completely false, allegation is that Iran has passed laws to force non Muslims to wear colored badges, similar to those forced on Jews, homosexuals and others by Nazis. It was later retracted, but not before it had spread round the world reinforcing the required message Iran=Nazi Germany.

What makes the propaganda almost comical is the retraction published by the paper which carried the original story. It went like this:

Experts say report of badges for Jews in Iran is untrue

and was accompanied by a photo of a "A yellow badge worn by Jews in Nazi Germany during the 1940s".
So, imagine this report:

Experts say that George W. Bush is not a child molester

accompanied by a picture of "A 12 year old child molested by a German SS soldier."

Today we hear of a triple suicide in Guantanamo. Prisoners there are held without charge or trial, in a prison set up intentionally outside the jurisdiction of US, or any other, law. What do the purveyors of democracy have to say?

Colleen Graffy, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy:

good PR move to draw attention

Rear Admiral Harris, comander of Guantanamo prison camp:

They have no regard for life, either ours or their own. I believe this was not an act of desperation, but an act of asymmetrical warfare waged against us.

From the BBC

In a Zogby poll of US soldiers in Iraq, amongst other interesting opinions

Almost 90% think war is retaliation for Saddam’s role in 9/11...

and

...An overwhelming majority of 72% of American troops serving in Iraq think the U.S. should exit the country within the next year,...

Today Anne Applebaum in Tolerating the Intolerable (Washington Post,) informs us of problems in modern Britain including

the nasty strain of anti-Semitism on the far side of the British left (Livingstone has just called Ariel Sharon a war criminal, clearly a favorite insult, as well)

If an utterance that Sharon may be a war criminal is proof of anti-Semitism then anti-Semitism, surely this diminishes the evil of that term. If I were to accuse Idi Amin of being a war criminal would that prove that I was an anti black racist?

Conflating criticism of Israeli policies or of Israeli politicians with anti-Semitism just diminishes the stigma attached to a very real evil of racism.

For reference, Sharon was found personally responsible by the Israeli Kahan Commission for the Sabra and Shatilla massacres in Lebanon and it was recommended that he resign as defense minister.