Here are some of the latest that I've found notable in some way.
This is a rather bizarre piece on "Christian Zionism", i.e., fundamentalist and Pentecostal Christians who eagerly greet every new conflict in the Middle East as a sign of the imminent Second Coming of Christ: I Want Falwell In My Foxhole by Zev Chafets Los Angeles Times 07/23/06.
Speaking of a Pentecostal minister and her husband, he writes:
Exactly a year ago, she and her husband, Bill, a retired brigadier general in the Georgia National Guard, took me on a tour of Armageddon. Connie read aloud obscure biblical prophecies about the apocalypse, taken from the Old Testament books of Ezekiel and Daniel and the New Testament's Book of Revelation. Later, Bill pointed out the military terrain in the Jezreel Valley, where he expects 2 billion enemy soldiers to gather against the forces of good. He wasn't sure what God's strategy would be, but applying military principles, he envisioned something like Sherman's capture of Atlanta, or so it seemed to me.
Secular liberals find this scenario preposterous. On the other hand, many of these same scoffers profoundly believe that high-octane gasoline and the profligate use of electric home appliances will heat planet Earth to a doomsday temperature last experienced 420,000 years ago (when, presumably, gas was a dime a gallon and it was OK to leave the TV on all night).
What a strange framework for this phenomenon! He equates crackpot fundamentalist apocalypticism with concern about global warming. But one of those is based on actual science - experiments and observation and measurement - and the other is based on a goofy interpretation of the Jewish and Christian Scriptures. "Secular liberals" find the common fundi notions of the End of the World "preposterous"? Even a little inquiry would show that mainstream Christians also find those ideas ridiculous.
Chafets welcomes the support of the Christian Zionists. He doesn't inform his readers about the imagined fate of the Jews of the world in the fundi End Times scenario: that most of them will be slaughtered and the few remaining will convert to Christianity, i.e., stop being Jews. He talks about donations of "tens of millions of dollars from evangelicals for Jewish causes" but doesn't mention that much of the money from fundi "supporters of Israel" goes to illegal settlement activity in the occupied West Bank, the single biggest barriet to a permanent peace settlement with the Palestinians.
Also from the Times, Who Says War Has to Be Proportional? by Jonathan Chait 07/23/06. Some immediate answer to the question in the title would be: international law, the morality of every major religion, plain good sense, elemental good judgment, a desire to avoid escalating war and killing unnecessarily.
Chait's argument is mainly an alibi for civilian casualties inflicted by Israel in Lebanon. Of course, what's a good argument for discarding law and morality to kill civilians without some fatuous analogy from the Second World War, and that's not missing. His argument:
Now, it is true that Israel's counteroffensive has taken the lives of several hundred Lebanese civilians (many entirely innocent, others who sheltered Hezbollah rockets) and displaced perhaps half a million more. Every innocent death is a tragedy.
But the brutal fact is that civilian deaths are Hezbollah's strongest weapon. As Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, once said: "We have discovered how to hit the Jews where they are the most vulnerable. The Jews love life, so that is what we shall take away from them. We are going to win because they love life and we love death."
Thus Hezbollah places its rockets and other potential targets in homes, knowing that Israel cannot hit back without creating collateral damage. This does not relieve Israel of the burden of minimizing civilian casualties as best it can. The point is that if Israel has to operate under a code of ethics that renders civilian deaths unacceptable, then it automatically loses. The ramifications would be dire and ultimately aid the cause of Islamic radicals in such a way as to bring about many more innocent deaths over the long run.
By Pallas Athena, if hackneyed sayings were weapons, American hawks would have crushed every Muslim terrorist in the world long ago. That "they love life and we love death" saying, which Bush has also used, would seem to mean on the face of it that Our Side is more willing to sacrifice for our cause than Your Side. American conservatives seem to find some deeper meaning in it that's most likely not there.
Chait's article is one more illustration among unfortunately many, many others, that straightforwardly obscene ideas have become "respectable" among large numbers of good Republican white folks. In the case, the argument that in order to defeat the Evil Muslims who love death more than life, we (or at least Israel) have to discard any "code of ethics that renders civilian deaths unacceptable". Otherwise people who value death more than life would win out over our Western Civilization that is much superior to that.
This is just another cynical argument from killing civilians. Plus, I've yet to see more than official Israeli government claims to verify that Hizbullah actually places so many missiles and missile launchers among residential neighborhoods.
And this is another Deep Thought:
Sure, there are hawks who are predisposed to believe in the efficacy of military force. The doves, though, have an equally strong disposition to believe that military force inevitably fails.
As the Daily Howler has been known to ask, what planet do these people we call our "press corps" come from? In what alternative reality do "doves" even say that "military force inevitably fails", much less have a "strong disposition to believe" it? Do they make it up on their own? Or is their some kind of secret journalists' guild that trains people on how to cough up airhead nonsense on a regular basis. I realize that's a dismissal rather than a refutation. But what's to refute? I've never met any "doves" who I've heard say anything like that.
Now, anyone who's not fully aware that every war causes terrible suffering, and that even when war is necessary it's a necessary evil, should really just shut the hell up talking about war at all. Of course they won't.
So, Pakistán construye un reactor nuclear capaz de fabricar 50 bombas al año, según expertos de EE UU El País 24.07.06 (Pakistan is constructing a nuclear reactor capable of producing 50 bombs per year, according to American experts). Another victory for the Cheney-Bush nonproliferation policy.
Spain's ruling Socialist Party(PSOE) has criticized Israel for seeking out "civilian victims" (El PSOE asegura que las 'víctimas civiles' son uno de los objetivos buscados por Israel El Mundo 24.07.06. Israel was predictably unhappy about that. But the PSOE stuck to its criticism. The party secretary's statement on the issue also very clearly condemned Hizbullah for terrorist acts and for aiming missiles at civilian targets in Israel.
Laura Rozen writes about Bush's diplomacy allergy Salon 07/25/06:
Increasingly, some former U.S. policymakers and diplomats, including self-described conservatives, are losing patience with the Bush administration's allergy to talking, and are challenging its underlying assumption. The rationale for not talking to rogue regimes and extremist groups is that it rewards or legitimates them, demonstrates appeasement, and therefore sets back U.S. security interests.
"In diplomacy, you do not negotiate peace with your friends," says former Undersecretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Edward Djerejian, who served as ambassador to Syria and Lebanon during the George H.W. Bush administration. "You negotiate peace with your enemies and your adversaries. That is one of the highest tasks of diplomacy.
"In the Arab-Israeli equation, people often say we have to put pressure on the parties to make peace," Djerejian continued. "There's some truth to that. At the same time, you have to deal with all relevant parties in order to obtain the political buy-in and chart out the common ground to make necessary compromises to come to an agreement. For that, you need dialogue and muscular diplomacy."
Blair broke with the Cheney-Bush administration relatively early, or so it appears from his public position. But Blair has been such a faithful servant, it's hard to know how much this means: Blair: Situation in Lebanon a catastrophe Yedioth Ahronoth 07/24/06:
British Prime Minister Tony Blair on Monday afternoon defined what is taking place in Lebanon as a "catastrophe." According to Blair, the situation is harming the state and weakening democracy.
He said he hoped a peace plan for Lebanon can emerge within days that could lead to a cessation of hostilities, but said details need to be worked out for an international force before a ceasefire could be declared that would hold on both sides.
"I don't want the killing to go on. I want the killing to stop. Now. It's got to stop on both sides and it's not going to stop on both sides without a plan to make it stop," Blair said. ...
Egypt is also calling for a cease-fire:
Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak on Monday also called for an immediate ceasefire in Israel's military campaign against Hizbullah in Lebanon, saying a longer term solution could be worked out later.
In a statement carried by the nation's Middle East News Agency, Mubarak also warned that the onslaught could cause "a humanitarian catastrophe."
"The situation is very grave and needs an urgent action to reach a cease-fire and put an endto hostilities," Mubarak said. "After the cease fire we can deal with all issues causing the current problem."
I don't cite this guy enough: Collateral Damage: An Israeli air strike in southern Lebanon hits a bus filled with women and children trying to flee the region, raising questions about whether Israel is doing enough to avoid civilian casualties by Kevin Sites, In The Hot Zone, Yahoo! 07/23/06
Israeli air strikes are taking a tremendous toll on the civilian population in southern Lebanon, with an attack Sunday on a bus filled with women and children that left three dead and 13 injured, many of them severely. ...
A nurse at the hospital says the victims were traveling from their village of Tairi, fleeing north because of the air strikes, when their own bus was hit. ...
The bus incident is the latest, and one of the most dramatic, illustrations of civilians being killed and wounded by Israeli air strikes, which Israel claims are focused on Hezbollah forces and weapons. Yet the strikes are having a punishing effect on the general Lebanese population and infrastructure.
"People are starting to realize this isn't a war against Hezbollah," says Timor Goksel, former head of the U.N. peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon for more than 25 years. "It's a war against the country, against the infrastructure."
Some analysts have theorized that with attacks against civilians and non-military installations, Israel is trying to turn the Lebanese population against Hezbollah by making them pay a price as Hezbollah's host nation. Goksel says the strategy will never work, since Hezbollah isn't just an organization, but part of the fabric of Shia society.
This is from a Lebanese paper: A new Middle East, or Rice's fantasy ride? by Rami Khouri Daily Star 07/24/06.
Short-term, the US would like Israel to wipe out Hizbullah, allow the Lebanese government to send its troops to the South of the country, ensure the safety of northern Israel, cut Syria's influence down to size, and apply greater pressure on Hizbullah supporter Iran.
The US opposes a cease-fire, therefore, because, "a cease-fire would be a false promise if it simply returns us to the status quo," Rice said.
This diplomatic position to support Israel's attacks on Lebanon, coupled with rushing sophisticated precision-guided bombs to Israel from the US arsenal, indicates that Washington seriously aims to fundamentally redraw the political and ideological map of the Middle East in the longer term. If this means yet another Arab land goes up in flames and war, so be it, Washington seems to be saying. So we now have three Arab countries where American policies and arms have played a major role in promoting chaos, disintegration and mass death and suffering: Iraq, Palestine and Lebanon. You can watch them burn, live on your television sets.
Ironically, these were the three countries that Bush-Rice & Co. have held up as models and pioneers of the American policy to promote freedom and democracy as antidotes to Arab despotism and terrorism. ...
The numbing fact that Bush-Rice fail to acknowledge - perhaps understandably, given the alcoholic's tendency to evade reality - is that Washington now can only speak to a few Arab governments (in Saudi Arabia, Egypt and elsewhere) who are in almost no position to impact on anyone other than their immediate families and many guards. (my emphasis)
The following three articles are from the Egyptian Al-Ahram Weekly 07/20-26/06. I'm not familiar enough with Al-Ahram to have a good sense of how useful their articles are. But here are three of them, for what they're worth. These articles are not individually dated. But presumably they were all completed no later than mid-week of last week, before Israel moved significant numbers of ground troops into Lebanon.
The wrath to come by Graham Usher
It is all eerily similar to the hubris that accompanied the first weeks of Israel's 1982 invasion. Then too there were predictions that the PLO would be vanquished "within a week." The PLO fought for over 100 days. Hizbullah is an indigenous movement, with a solid Shia constituency which views it as their only protector. The idea that Hizbullah can somehow be "removed from Lebanon" is an Israeli fantasy. "We will never leave, even if Lebanon is reduced to scorched earth," says Hizbullah cadre, Abdullah Kassir. He means it.
Israel's ambition is driven by the "regional equation." Since 2002, Israel has ploughed a unilateralist path in the Palestinian occupied territories with the encouragement of the United States, complicity of Europe and passivity of the Arab League. The only consistent resistance has come from Hamasand Hizbullah and their regional allies, Syria and Iran. By delivering Hizbullah a mortal blow in Lebanon, Israel believes it can "serve deterrence" on Tehran and Damascus without resort to a regional war. It also believes it can remove the last barrier to knocking over the Hamas government in Gaza.
This is particularly important for Olmert. A shibboleth of the Israeli right and many in the army is that Israel's flight from Lebanon in 2000 cleared the way for the Intifada. The same forces think the Gaza disengagement enabled the Qassam rockets and Hamas's electoral victory. The centrepiece of Olmert's political programme is some kind of territorial redeployment on the occupied West Bank. He knows that "realignment" cannot happen, domestically, if Hamas and the other Palestinian resistance forces are fighting in Gaza and Hizbullah remains armed and in place on the Lebanese border.
Beirut burns by Lucy Fielder
... Hizbullah's support remains strong and Nasrallah's calm, eloquent televised addresses show he is determined not to blink first. "Just as I always promised you victory, now I promise you victory once again," he said late last week as he literally worked his way up to the bomb-shell - that an Israeli battleship being used to strike Lebanon was burning off the coast. One youth on Beirut's sea front at the weekend summed up the situation of many Sunnis and others in the country who are torn between support for their usual preferred leaders and fury about the Israeli strikes. "A week ago, I would have told you I hated Nasrallah. But now I pray for victory." The government's pro-Western stance sits uncomfortably with the West's support for the country that is bombing their state back to the dark ages of 1990, when the civil war ended.
With its carefully planned capture of two Israeli soldiers, Hizbullah sought an escalation that would prove what it sees as the logic of force, says Amal Saad-Ghoreyeb, a professor of politics at the Lebanese American University. It seeks to show once and for all that Israel remains Lebanon's enemy and that the state is powerless to protect the long-suffering Shiaof the south, in particular. Israel's actions play into their hands. "This disproportionate response to a military strike will simply show that Israel remains a serious threat and will seize any opportunity to attack Lebanese territory," she said.
Together we stand by Serene Assir
Today, the political line-up [in Lebanon] that preceded the attack remains more or less extant, and calls for the disarmament of Hizbullah continue to be heard, in some ways louder than ever and to a chorus of approval from the international community. "Hizbullah's operation was unfounded," prominent MP and member of the 14 March Movement Samir Franjiyye told Al-Ahram Weekly, adding that during the course of the failed Lebanese National Dialogue, "we had worked to prevent this situation by trying to come to an agreement that Hizbullah had to disarm."
Given continued postponements and a total lack of commitment by participants to openness, the dialogue quickly became a non-starter. Now, however, some say that Hizbullah's decision to go it alone has crushed the legitimacy of Lebanon's government. "Hizbullah has essentially denied the state the entirety of its legitimacy by this single act," Franjiyye added. "Only the Lebanese elected government, which represents the will of the people, has the legitimacy to act on issues determining war and peace, and Hizbullah has unjustly claimed it for itself."
The complexity surrounding the current situation in Lebanon is further inflamed by unanswered questions regarding what exactly led Hizbullah to act now. Even more accusatory than Franjiyye was Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, also a member of parliament, who declared Hizbullah is fighting Iran's proxy war with Israel on Lebanese soil. "The war is no longer Lebanon's - it is an Iranian war," he said, adding to the din of voices that appear more than eager to escalate conflict in the Middle East even beyond their means, including that of United States President George W Bush on open mic at the recent G8 summit.
This is a very disturbing report: High-ranking officer: Halutz ordered retaliation policy by Yaakov Katz Jerusalem Post 07/24/06.
A high-ranking IAF officer caused a storm on Monday in an off-record briefing during which he told reporters that IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Dan Halutz had ordered the military to destroy 10 buildings in Beirut in retaliation to every Katyusha rocket strike onHaifa.
The officer said that the equation was created by Halutz and that every rocket strike on Haifa would be answered by IAF missile strikes on 10 12-story buildings in the Beirut neighborhood of Dahiya, a Hizbullah stronghold. Since the beginning of Operation Change of Direction, launched on July 12 following the abduction of two soldiers during a Hizbullah cross-border attack, over 80 buildings in the neighborhood have been destroyed.
An official denial followed publication of that news.
Firepower versus brainpower by Yoel Marcus Ha'aretz 07/25/06 reflects some of the concerns about the performance of the IDF that have accompanied the Israel-Lebanon War:
Two weeks after Israel set out to defeat Hezbollah, its military achievements are pretty limited. A country that stood up to seven Arab nations in the War of Independence, a war of the "few against the many," with an army that pulverized the invading forces of three Arab nations in the span of six days, is now facing an embarrassing role reversal: a war of the "many against the few" in which Israel is on the floorboards.
Who would have believed that a guerrilla organization with a few hundred regular fighters, something like a brigade and a half, could paralyze half a country, firing off hundreds of missiles every day? A total of 2,200 by Sunday morning, says the defense minister. Who would have believed that cities like Safed, Acre, Nahariya, Tiberias and especially Haifa, the capital of the North, would wake up every morning to the sound of sirens and deadly rocket fire that would turn tens of thousands of people into refugees and shut down life in a large part of the country? And that's even before Hezbollah has tried to use its long-range missiles on Tel Aviv.
Saudi king warns of Middle East war Aljazeera 07/25/06 reports on Saudi Arabia's position:
The king of Saudi Arabia has warned that war could break out in the Middle East if attempts to broker peace in the region fail.
In a statement read out on state televisionon Tuesday, KingAbdullah said, "If the option of peace fails as a result of Israeli arrogance, then the only option remaining will be war, and God alone knows what the region would witness in a conflict that would spare no one."
The king appealed to the world to stop Israeli attacks on Lebanon, and also pledged to donate over $1.5 billion to the country, according to the statement by the royal court.
The king has assigned $500 million for the reconstruction of Lebanon, and $1 billion to be deposited in Lebanon's central bank to support the economy.
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