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July 2007 Stats for The Big Picture.
From former NY Mayor Ed Koch:
Israel's response to Hezbollah has demonstrated to the enemies of the Jewish state that Israel will stand up and fight. This is in marked contrast to Spain, France and Germany under Schroeder, who have blinked and withdrawn responding to Islamic terror or threatened terror. Thankfully, our country's leaders appreciate that we are at war with international terrorism. The West confronts a war of civilizations that is not for the fainthearted.
There are those who believe that negotiations without the will to engage in military action will suffice. They are wrong. For 58 years, Israel has tried both negotiations and self-defense by its armed forces. The work of its armed forces has given it considerable security vis-à-vis those states and terrorists who seek to destroy it. Negotiations alone never brought peace.
Negotiating after defending oneself -- as Israel did with Egypt and Jordan, with which it now has peace treaties -- is far more successful and preferable to blinking, hesitation and faintheartedness.
...There are those who wishfully conclude that if Israel turns the other cheek and does not respond with armed force to attacks upon it, that such restraint will pay off with an ultimate peace treaty with its neighbors. That is ridiculous. I agree with those who believe that standing up to terrorism and never blinking is the only way to win that war. Remember that it is a war against Jews, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists and all Western civilization. It is a war being waged against Europe, Russia, India, Iraq, the U.S. and elsewhere. It is a war we must win.
From Charles Krauthammer, who previously supported the Gaza pullout:
'Disproportionate' in What Moral Universe?
What other country, when attacked in an unprovoked aggression across a recognized international frontier, is then put on a countdown clock by the world, given a limited time window in which to fight back, regardless of whether it has restored its own security?
What other country sustains 1,500 indiscriminate rocket attacks into its cities -- every one designed to kill, maim and terrorize civilians -- and is then vilified by the world when it tries to destroy the enemy's infrastructure and strongholds with precision-guided munitions that sometimes have the unintended but unavoidable consequence of collateral civilian death and suffering?
...Israel knows that these leaflets and warnings give the Hezbollah fighters time to escape and regroup. The advance notification as to where the next attack is coming has allowed Hezbollah to set up elaborate ambushes. The result? Unexpectedly high Israeli infantry casualties. Moral scrupulousness paid in blood. Israeli soldiers die so that Lebanese civilians will not, and who does the international community condemn for disregarding civilian life?
Victor Davis Hanson takes apart the Orwell-speak of the U.N. and MSM:
The Vocabulary of Untruth
..."Civilians" in Lebanon have munitions in their basements and deliberately wish to draw fire; in Israel they are in bunkers to avoid it. Israel uses precision weapons to avoid hitting them; Hezbollah sends random missiles into Israel to ensure they are struck.
"Collateral damage" refers mostly to casualties among Hezbollah's human shields; it can never be used to describe civilian deaths inside Israel, because everything there is by intent a target.
...Deliberate" reflects the accuracy of Israeli bombs hitting their targets; it never refers to Hezbollah rockets that are meant to destroy anything they can.
"Deplore" is usually evoked against Israel by those who themselves have slaughtered noncombatants or allowed them to perish - such as the Russians in Grozny, the Syrians in Hama, or the U.N. in Rwanda and Dafur.
"Disproportionate" means that the Hezbollah aggressors whose primitive rockets can't kill very many Israeli civilians are losing, while the Israelis' sophisticated response is deadly against the combatants themselves. See "excessive."
Anytime you hear the adjective "excessive," Hezbollah is losing. Anytime you don't, it isn't.
"Eyewitnesses" usually aren't, and their testimony is cited only against Israel.
Even Howard Dean goes after the Prime Minister of Iraq for opposing Israel.
I don't think I've ever seen so much written and said in support of Israel in the U.S.
What kind of nonsense is this? Hezbollah has been intentionally targeting Israeli citizens since day one of this war, with no outrage from the U.N. or the mainstream media. Are we supposed to take this seriously? Is the notion that, it's fine for Hezbollah to intentionally kill civilians, but Israel is subject to outrage if it unintentionally does so?
This is the biggest crock of phony-baloney posturing yet from the dictator-driven U.N.
Meanwhile, the whole story itself is starting to look phony. YNet is reporting that the building in Qana collapsed 8 hours after it took a hit from the IDF.
"The attack on the structure in the Qana village took place between midnight and one in the morning. The gap between the timing of the collapse of the building and the time of the strike on it is unclear," Brigadier General Amir Eshel, Head of the Air Force Headquarters told journalists at the Defense Ministry in Tel Aviv, following the incidents at Qana.
Eshel and the head of the IDF's Operational Branch, Major General Gadi Eisnkot said the structure was not being attacked when it collapsed, at around 8:00 in the morning.
..."From this village rockets are fired almost every day across Israel. The operation carried out overnight is an extension of operations that didn't start last night but before, and during this night we struck a number of targets in the village. All of the targets are being meticulously sifted," Eshel added.
Earlier this year Daniel Pipes discussed and provided many examples of Sudden Jihad Syndrome, the phenomenon in which an apparently non-violent Muslim will attack non-Muslims with murderous intent.
The Seattle attack yesterday is another perfect example.
The gunman, Naveed Afzal Haq, 31, was arrested without a struggle at the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle, where the shooting took place. He was later charged by Seattle police with one count of murder and five counts of attempted murder.
Haq is a U.S. citizen, police said, and their initial conversation with him by phone while he was inside the building indicated that he was a Muslim.
Police would not disclose the content of the conversation, but Amy Wasser-Simpson, the federation's vice president, told the Seattle Times in a story on its Web site the man got past security at the building and shouted, "I'm a Muslim American; I'm angry at Israel," before he began shooting.
There's nothing surprising about this. The Koran says in many verses that it's the duty of Muslims to kill non-Muslims. From the Koran:
[3.151] We will cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve, because they set up with Allah that for which He has sent down no authority, and their abode is the fire, and evil is the abode of the unjust.
[4.89] They desire that you should disbelieve as they have disbelieved, so that you might be (all) alike; therefore take not from among them friends until they fly (their homes) in Allah's way; but if they turn back, then seize them and kill them wherever you find them, and take not from among them a friend or a helper.
[5.33] The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His apostle and strive to make mischief in the land is only this, that they should be murdered or crucified or their hands and their feet should be cut off on opposite sides or they should be imprisoned; this shall be as a disgrace for them in this world, and in the hereafter they shall have a grievous chastisement...
(Additional, similar verses are here.) The guy just did what his sacred text, the Koran, told him to do. The Koran teaches young children who are raised by it to kill non-Muslims.
Islam, far from having reformed over the centuries, embraces these verses in the Koran. From a January post here:
Sheikh Abd Al-Aziz Fawzan Al-Fawzan, a professor of Islamic law at Al-Imam University, who frequently appears on Saudi TV recently made anti-Christian comments on Saudi Al-Majd TV.
Al-Fawzan: "Someone who denies Allah, worships Christ, son of Mary, and claims that God is one third of a trinity - do you like these things he says and does? Don't you hate the faith of such a polytheist who says God is one third of a trinity, or who worships Christ, son of Mary?
[...]
"But if this person is an infidel - even if this person is my mother or father, God forbid, or my son or daughter - I must hate him, his heresy, and his defiance of Allah and His prophet. I must hate his abominable deeds. Moreover, this hatred must be positive hatred. It should make me feel compassion for him, and should make me guide and reform him."
There's no getting around this. This is what the Koran teaches. Islam is not a "love-thy-neighbor" religion. Islam is an "oppress-and-kill-thy-neighbor" religion, as we see in Islamist activity worldwide.
Where is the protest from the Islamic community over yesterday's killings in Seattle? Where is the rally, the march, in which all leading Islamists gather Muslims and say loudly, publicly, for all to hear, that anyone who does such a thing is lost to Islam? Nothing of the kind happens. There are a few lukewarm statements on sites such as the CAIR site, and that's it. Those statements are strictly of the CYA variety. And the reason is that the Islamic community doesn't disapprove. Because they can't. Because the Koran explicitly encourages such actions.
Let's put this in perspective. In many public places, we are banning smoking because of the possible effects of second-hand-smoke on non-smokers.
Should we not apply a similar approach to Islam, which has the possible effect of murder on non-Islamists?
As Cathy Seipp has recently said:
I HAVE NO IDEA how many Mexican immigrants would be reasonable to allow into this country. But obviously for everyone who makes the cut, someone else does not.
And as long as there are millions of hard-working, pro-American immigrants from Latin American and Asia who would like to come here but can't, why are we letting in anyone from a culture where much of the populace is at least sympathetic to the notion of this country being ruled by Sharia law?
That is a very good idea.
We also need to monitor the mosques and find out in detail what they're teaching.
So Ahmadinejad, who has called again and again for the destruction of Israel, now wants a cease-fire since his side is losing.
It reminds me of this recent post by blogger David Bogner:
A difficult lesson.
When I was in the Navy, I once witnessed a bar fight in downtown Olongapo (Philippines) that still haunts my dreams. The fight was between a big oafish Marine and a rather soft-spoken, medium sized Latino sailor from my ship.
All evening the Marine had been trying to pick a fight with one of us and had finally set his sights on this diminutive shipmate of mine... figuring him for a safe target. When my friend refused to be goaded into a fight the Marine sucker punched him from behind on the side of the head so hard that blood instantly started to pour from this poor man's mutilated ear.
Everyone present was horrified and was prepared to absolutely murder this Marine, but my shipmate quickly turned on him and began to single-handedly back him towards a corner with a series of stinging jabs and upper cuts that gave more than a hint to a youth spent boxing in a small gym in the Bronx.
Each punch opened a cut on the Marine's startled face and by the time he had been backed completely into the corner he was blubbering for someone to stop the fight. He invoked his split lips and chipped teeth as reasons to stop the fight. He begged us to stop the fight because he could barely see through the river of blood that was pouring out of his split and swollen brows. Nobody moved. Not one person.
The only sound in the bar was the sickening staccato sound of this sailor's lightning fast fists making contact with new areas of the Marine's head. The only sound I have heard since that was remotely similar was from the first Rocky film when Sylvester Stallone was punching sides of beef in the meat locker.
Finally the Marine's pleading turned to screams.... a high, almost womanly shriek. And still the punches continued relentlessly.
Several people in the bar took a few tentative steps as though they wanted to try to break it up at that point, but hands reached out from the crowd and held them tight. I'm not ashamed to say that mine were two of the hands that held someone back.
You see, in between each blow the sailor had begun chanting a soft cadence: "Say [punch] you [punch] give [punch] up [punch]... say [punch] you [punch]were [punch] wrong [punch]".
He had been repeating it to the Marine almost from the start but we only became aware of it when the typical barroom cheers had died down and we began to be sickened by the sight and sound of the carnage.
This Marine stood there shrieking in the corner of the bar trying futilely to block the carefully timed punches that were cutting his head to tatters... right down to the skull in places. But he refused to say that he gave up... or that he was wrong.
Even in the delirium of his beating he believed in his heart that someone would stop the fight before he had to admit defeat. I'm sure this strategy had served him well in the past and had allowed him to continue on his career as a barroom bully.
Finally, in a wail of agony the Marine shrieked "I give up", and we gently backed the sailor away from him.
I'm sure you can guess why I have shared this story today.
I'm not particularly proud to have been witness to such a bloody spectacle, and the sound of that Marine's woman-like shrieks will haunt me to my grave. But I learned something that evening that Israel had better learn for itself if it is to finally be rid of at least one of its tormentors:
This is one time an Arab aggressor must be allowed to be beaten so badly that every civilized nation will stand in horror, wanting desperately to step in and stop the carnage... but knowing that the fight will only truly be over when one side gives up and finally admits defeat.
Just as every person who had ever rescued that bully from admitting defeat helped create the cowardly brute I saw that evening in the bar, every well-intentioned power that has ever stepped in and negotiated a cease fire for an Arab aggressor has helped create the monsters we see around us today.
President Lahoud of Lebanon, a big Hezbollah supporter and a close ally of Syria, has been shrieking non-stop to the UN Security Council for the past two days to get them to force Israel into a cease fire.
Clearly he has been reading his autographed copy of 'Military Success for Arab Despots' by the late Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt.
There's more. Read the whole thing.
When Ahmadinejad calls for a cease-fire in the Israel-Hezbollah war, it's unmistakable evidence that Israel is winning:
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called for a cease-fire in Lebanon and criticized U.S. policy in the Middle East on Wednesday, saying Washington wants to "recarve the map" of the region with Israel's help.
Ahmadinejad's nation is a major backer of Hezbollah and a sworn enemy of Israel, but he denied that Tehran provides military support to the militant group.
Alan Dershowitz has been working hard to put an end to the antiquated notion that civilians are necessarily non-combatants. This notion is absurd in an age when the combatants we fight wear no uniforms, and when civilians willingly serve the war effort. In the past week, Dershowitz has published three major articles on this subject. The first was in the Wall Street Journal, and has been commented on here in this previous post, which quoted from Dershowitz as follows:
This misuse of civilians as shields and swords requires a reassessment of the laws of war. The distinction between combatants and civilians -- easy when combatants were uniformed members of armies that fought on battlefields distant from civilian centers -- is more difficult in the present context. Now, there is a continuum of "civilianality": Near the most civilian end of this continuum are the pure innocents -- babies, hostages and others completely uninvolved; at the more combatant end are civilians who willingly harbor terrorists, provide material resources and serve as human shields; in the middle are those who support the terrorists politically, or spiritually.
The laws of war and the rules of morality must adapt to these realities. An analogy to domestic criminal law is instructive: A bank robber who takes a teller hostage and fires at police from behind his human shield is guilty of murder if they, in an effort to stop the robber from shooting, accidentally kill the hostage. The same should be true of terrorists who use civilians as shields from behind whom they fire their rockets. The terrorists must be held legally and morally responsible for the deaths of the civilians, even if the direct physical cause was an Israeli rocket aimed at those targeting Israeli citizens.
The second appeared last Saturday in the LA Times:
'Civilian Casualty'? It Depends
We need a new vocabulary to reflect the realities of modern warfare. A new phrase should be introduced into the reporting and analysis of current events in the Middle East: "the continuum of civilianality." Though cumbersome, this concept aptly captures the reality and nuance of warfare today and provides a more fair way to describe those who are killed, wounded and punished.
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.
These differences and others are conflated within the increasingly meaningless word "civilian" - a word that carried great significance when uniformed armies fought other uniformed armies on battlefields far from civilian population centers. Today this same word equates the truly innocent with guilty accessories to terrorism.
The third appeared last Monday in the Boston Globe:
THE HEZBOLLAH and Hamas provocations against Israel once again demonstrate how terrorists can exploit human rights and the media in their attacks on democracies. By hiding behind their own civilians, the Islamic radicals issue a challenge to democracies: Either violate your own morality by coming after us and inevitably killing some innocent civilians, or maintain your morality and leave us with a free hand to target your innocent civilians. This challenge presents democracies such as Israel with a lose-lose option and terrorists with a win-win option.
There is one variable that could change this dynamic and present democracies with a viable option that could make terrorism less attractive as a tactic: The international community, the anti-Israel segment of the media, and human rights organizations should stop falling for this gambit and acknowledge that they are being used to promote the terrorist agenda. Whenever a democracy is presented with the lose-lose option and chooses to defend its citizens by going after the terrorists who are hiding among civilians, this trio of predictable condemners can be counted on by the terrorists to accuse the democracy of ``overreaction," ``disproportionality," and ``violations of human rights." In doing so, they play into the hands of the terrorists and cause more terrorism and more civilian casualties on both sides.
If instead this trio could, for once, be counted on to blame the terrorists for the civilian deaths on both sides, this tactic would no longer be a win-win situation for the terrorists.
It should be obvious by now that Hezbollah and Hamas actually want the Israeli military to kill as many Lebanese and Palestinian civilians as possible. That is why they store their rockets underneath the beds of civilians. That is why they launch their missiles from crowded civilian neighborhoods and hide among civilians. They are seeking to induce Israel to defend its civilians by going after them among their civilian ``shields." They know that every civilian they induce Israel to kill hurts Israel in the media and the international and human rights communities. They regard these human shields as ``Shahids," or martyrs, even if they did not volunteer for the lethal jobs. Under the law, criminals who use human shields are responsible for the deaths of their shields, even if the bullets that kill them come from policemen's guns.
Dershowitz shows that it's time for us to update our notions on this subject.
David Littman, historian and an NGO representative of the Association for World Education to the United Nations in Geneva, forwards the following. It is an examination of the Hamas Charter, prepared for the U.N. by two UN Non-Governmental Organizations.
HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL
First special session
5 July 2006
Joint written statement* submitted by the Association for World Education and the World Union for Progressive Judaism (WUPJ), non-governmental organizations on the Roster
The Secretary-General has received the following written statement which is circulated in accordance with Economic and Social Council resolution 1996/31.
[4 July 2006]
* The present document contains the statement that was to have been delivered orally by the organization(s) concerned at the first special session. It is issued, unedited and in the original language(s), as received. Its contents are the sole responsibility of the author(s).
GE.06-13021
The Binding Charter of the Current Government of the Palestinian Authority Islamic Resistance Movement - Hamas
1. We support wholeheartedly all serious efforts by Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, and like-minded political leaders worldwide,to find an acceptable two-state solution of peaceful coexistence between two peoples in that small region - with human dignity for all.
2. However, to understand events in Gaza (and beyond) there is an urgent need to consider the implications of the 1988 Charter of Hamas - available on the net - since Hamas is the legally elected Government of the Palestinian Authority.1
3. We have been alerting the Commission about the dangers of this binding Charter since January 1989.2
4. Regarding peace, its Article 13 is totally negative: "Initiatives, and so-called peaceful solutions and international conferences, are in contradiction to the principles of the Islamic Resistance Movement. Abusing any part of Palestine is abuse against part of religion. Nationalism of the Islamic Resistance Movement is part of its religion. Its members have been fed on that. (…) There is no solution to the Palestinian question except by Jihad. All initiatives, proposals, and International Conferences are a waste of time and vain endeavours."
5. Religious hatred of Jews (not only of Israel) is expressed by a hadith or 'saying' that concludes Article 7:
"The Day of Judgment will not come about until Muslims fight the Jews (killing the Jews) when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say: O Muslims (…) there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him. "Only the gharkad tree [evidently a certain kind of tree] would not do that because it is one of the trees of the Jews." (this hadith, quoted from al-Bukhari and Muslim, both considered as highly reliable sources for the hadith or 'sayings' of the Prophet Muhammad).
6. Article 8, the slogan of the Islamic Resistance Movement - Hamas (widely quoted by clerics and others) is a blueprint for jihadist terrorism: "Allah is its target, the Prophet is its model, the Koran its Constitution; Jihad is its path, and death for the sake of Allah is the loftiest of its wishes." 3
7. Article 28 widens the circle of hate to include all Jews: "Israel, Judaism and Jews challenge Islam and the Muslim people: 'May the cowards never sleep.'" The Charter in its preface quotes Hassan al-Banna, founder of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, as saying: "Israel will exist and continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it."
8. Article 32 refers to an infamous century-old forgery in almost the identical terms used by Adolf Hitler: "Their plan is embodied in 'The Protocols of the Elders of Zion', and their present conduct is the best proof of what we are saying." 4
9. Article 22 is an update of The Protocols, alleging that "the Jews" control all major world events. It is here quoted in full (but without the koranic verses, which may be found on the various websites in both Arabic and English). This article - and others - indicates the rich 'conspiracy thinking' of the Hamas Charter:
"For a long time, the enemies have been planning, skilfully and with precision, for the achievement of what they have attained. They took into consideration the causes affecting the current of events. They strived to amass great and substantive material wealth which they devoted to the realisation of their dream. With their money, they took control of the world media, news agencies, the press, publishing houses, broad casting stations, and others. With their money they stirred revolutions in various parts of the world with the purpose of achieving their interests and reaping the fruit therein. They were behind the French Revolution [1789], the Communist revolution [1917] and most of the revolutions we heard and hear about, here and there. With their money they formed secret societies, such as Freemasons, Rotary Clubs, the Lions and others in different parts of the world for the purpose of sabotaging societies and achieving Zionist interests. With their money they were able to control imperialistic countries and instigate them to colonize many countries in order to enable them to exploit their resources and spread corruption there. You may speak as much as you want about regional and world wars. They were behind World War I, when they were able to destroy the Islamic Caliphate, making financial gains and controlling resources. They obtained the Balfour Declaration, formed the League of Nations through which they could rule the world. They were behind World War II, through which they made huge financial gains by trading in armaments, and paved the way for the establish- ment of their state. It was they that instigated the replacement of the League of Nations with the United Nations and the Security Council to enable them to rule the world through them. There is no war going on anywhere without them having their finger in it. [quotation from the Koran] The imperialistic forces in the Capitalist West and Communist East, support the enemy with all their might, in money and in men. These forces take turns in doing that. The day Islam appears, the forces of infidelity would unite to challenge it, for the infidels are but one nation." [Koranic quotes follow to prove the point: "if ye understand."]
10. The CONCLUSION has a subheading: The Islamic Resistance Movement is Composed of Soldiers
under which article 36 states, inter alia, that the Islamic Resistance Movement "will only serve as a support for all groupings and organizations operating against the Zionist enemy and its lackeys (…) "The Islamic Resistance Movement adopts Islam as its way of life. Islam is its creed and religion. Whoever takes Islam as his way of life, be it an organization, a grouping, a country or any other body, the Islamic Resistance Movement considers itself as their soldiers and nothing more."
11. With the Hamas Charter now binding the Palestinian leadership, its call for the destruction of a Member State of the United Nations is in contravention to Article 2 (4) of the 1945 UN Charter. Article 3 (c) of the 1948 Genocide Convention condemns "direct and public incitement to commit genocide," which is punishable under its article 4. The grave situation in Gaza - and not only in Gaza - is linked to the Hamas Charter of religious and racial hatred, which merits debate at the Human Rights Council as soon as possible.
Notes:
1. www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/mideast/hamas.htm and others. Co-authored (dated 18 August 1988) by Sheikh Ahmad Yassin and Dr. Abd al-Aziz al-Rantisi. See NGO written statements on Hamas: E/CN.4/Sub.2/2003/NGO/41: The 1988 Charter of Hamas and its evil legacy of 'jihadist-martyrdom bombings'; E/CN.4/Sub.2/2004/NGO/25*: Hamas: Sheikh Yassin / al-Rantisi - The UN and a grave worldwide cultural clash; E/CN.4/Sub.2/2004/NGO/26: Muslim Brotherhood / Hamas / Hizbullah / Al Qaeda: Terror Legacy of 'Jihad-Martyrdom-Bombings'; E/CN.4/2006/NGO/239: The 1988 Covenant of the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement - Hamas
2. Quoted by David G. Littman on 31 January 1989 (45th session, Commission on Human Rights), main representative of the World Union for Progressive Judaism (and again in 1990 and 1991); and since then, repeated regularly by him on behalf of the Association for World Education, and recently again for the WUPJ.
3. Article 8 - the slogan of Hamas - is taken from the 1928 Charter of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood. Article 2 of the Hamas Charter states: "The Islamic Resistance Movement is one of the wings of Muslim Brotherhood in Palestine. Muslim Brotherhood Movement is a universal organisation which constitutes the largest Islamic movement in modern times." And Article 1: "The Movement's programme is Islam."
4. Philip Graves, The Truth about The Protocols: A Literary Forgery (London, 1921 - his articles from The Times); H. Rauschning, Hitler speaks (London, 1939), pp. 235-36; Norman Cohn, Warrant for Genocide: The Myth of the Jewish World Conspiracy and The Protocols of the Elders of Zion (London, 1967); Pierre-André Taguieff, Les Protocoles des Sages de Sion. Introduction à l'étude des Protocoles: un faux et ses usages dans le siécle (Paris, 1992).
Iraqi-American Fawaz Saraf emails:
A BBC headline this evening read something along these lines:
"Israel Captures Lebanese border village".
In my view, a great PR for Israel, especially among the Lebanese, would be the headline above but modified as follows:
"Israel captures Lebanese border village, ready to hand over to Lebanese army". Hezbollah is portraying itself as the resistance that liberated Lebanese land from Israel. Well, Israel left Lebanon so one would think now that Hezbollah would be busying itself rebuilding the south and making the lives of Lebanese shiites better. Sadly, and for myriad of reasons that perhaps take a book to explain, that is not how Arab political movements operate . I think it was important to attack Hezbollah and send a very clear message to the Lebanese, especially the shiites, and the message is Hezbollah is bad for you and we can help make your life better. In my opinion this message should be complemented with the message that states the following: Every village we clear of Hezbollah and then have it controlled by the Lebanese army will be safe from bombing and attacks and life in that village can then return to normal.
Circulating on the net:
(Hat tip: A.M. Whittaker).
5,000 people gathered to rally today in support of Israel in Los Angeles. The mood was upbeat and friendly. Gov. Schwartzenegger and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa spoke to the crowd and spoke strongly in favor of Israel.
These photos will hopefully convey a sense of the event.
First, the protest babes, since it's widely believed that the rally with the best protest babes wins.
Next, a sense of the size and mood of the crowd.
This video gives a look at the size of the crowd. You can hear Gov. Schwartzenegger speaking:
And some photos of the crowd:
(The one above is merged from two smaller photos.)
Finally, here's a look at the signs:
Contrast this upbeat rally, filled with caring for Israel, to the average Islamist rally, which is filled with vows to "dominate" and "destroy" others, as in this example.
This kind of rally shows the kind of support Israel wins for itself, when it stands up to defend its people against attacks.
From Victor Davis Hanson:
What should the United States do? If it really cares about human life and future peace, then we should talk ad nauseam about "restraint" and "proportionality" while privately assuring Israel the leeway to smash both Hamas and Hezbollah - and humiliate Syria and Iran, who may well come off very poorly from their longed-for but bizarre war.
Only then will Israel restore some semblance of deterrence and strengthen nascent democratic movements in both Lebanon and even the West Bank. This is the truth that everyone from London to Cairo knows, but dares not speak.
...In this regard, it is time to stop the silly slurs that American policy in the Middle East is either in shambles or culpable for the present war. In fact, if we keep our cool, the Bush doctrine is working. Both Afghans and Iraqis each day fight and kill Islamist terrorists; neither was doing so before 9/11. Syria and Iran have never been more isolated; neither was isolated when Bill Clinton praised the "democracy" in Tehran or when an American secretary of State sat on the tarmac in Damascus for hours to pay homage to Syria's gangsters. Israel is at last being given an opportunity to unload on jihadists; that was impossible during the Arafat fraud that grew out of the Oslo debacle. Europe is waking up to the dangers of radical Islamism; in the past, it bragged of its aid and arms sales to terrorist governments from the West Bank to Baghdad.
The U.N. is the perfect forum for such meaningless talking. Let everyone in the U.N. say anything they want. It just gives cover to everyone in the world for not supporting the Hezbollah terrorists. Nations can go to the U.N. and complain about Israel, or pretend to complain, all they want, and look like they're trying to do something. Meanwhile Israel goes on blowing the hell out of Hezbollah.
So after 9/11, the London bombings, the Madrid murders, the French riots, the Beslan atrocities, the killings in India, the Danish cartoon debacle, Theo Van Gogh, and the daily arrests of Islamic terrorists trying to blow up, behead, or shoot innocent people around the globe, the world is sick of the jihadist ilk. And for all the efforts of the BBC, Reuters, Western academics, and the horde of appeasers and apologists that usually bail these terrorist killers out when their rhetoric finally outruns their muscle, this time they can't.
Instead, a disgusted world secretly wants these terrorists to get what they deserve. And who knows: This time they just might.
The world is getting sick of the terrorists' phony excuses and their use of human shields. The rules of the game are changing.
From Alan Dershowitz in the Wall Street Journal (no link):
While Israel does everything reasonable to minimize civilian casualties -- not always with success -- Hezbollah and Hamas want to maximize civilian casualties on both sides. Islamic terrorists, a diplomat commented years ago, "have mastered the harsh arithmetic of pain. . . . Palestinian casualties play in their favor and Israeli casualties play in their favor." These are groups that send children to die as suicide bombers, sometimes without the child knowing that he is being sacrificed. Two years ago, an 11-year-old was paid to take a parcel through Israeli security. Unbeknownst to him, it contained a bomb that was to be detonated remotely. (Fortunately the plot was foiled.)
This misuse of civilians as shields and swords requires a reassessment of the laws of war. The distinction between combatants and civilians -- easy when combatants were uniformed members of armies that fought on battlefields distant from civilian centers -- is more difficult in the present context. Now, there is a continuum of "civilianality": Near the most civilian end of this continuum are the pure innocents -- babies, hostages and others completely uninvolved; at the more combatant end are civilians who willingly harbor terrorists, provide material resources and serve as human shields; in the middle are those who support the terrorists politically, or spiritually.
The laws of war and the rules of morality must adapt to these realities. An analogy to domestic criminal law is instructive: A bank robber who takes a teller hostage and fires at police from behind his human shield is guilty of murder if they, in an effort to stop the robber from shooting, accidentally kill the hostage. The same should be true of terrorists who use civilians as shields from behind whom they fire their rockets. The terrorists must be held legally and morally responsible for the deaths of the civilians, even if the direct physical cause was an Israeli rocket aimed at those targeting Israeli citizens....Israel left Lebanon in 2000 and Gaza in 2005. These are not "occupied" territories. Yet they serve as launching pads for attacks on Israeli civilians. Occupation does not cause terrorism, then, but terrorism seems to cause occupation. If Israel is not to reoccupy to prevent terrorism, the Lebanese government and the Palestinian Authority must ensure that these regions cease to be terrorist safe havens.
From commenter Olah Chadasha, of the Greetings from the French Hill weblog:
The UN has not even offered their help to Israel even-though there are over 2 million refugees as a result of the rocketing on the north of Israel. No, instead, the entire and south of Israel has opened its doors to these people. No refugee or DP camps for them. Regardless, not one peep from the UN Human Rights Commission about the Israeli refugee problem. Nope, it's all happening in Lebanon. It's a picnic in Israel right now. The only peep heard from the Human Rights Commission is that Israel might be brought up on war crimes for its actions in Lebanon. Not one peep about charging Hezbollah with the same charges.
Yes, the UN is a very useful and just organization…
This is a powerful example of the unjustness of the dictator-driven U.N.
We've been seeing reports that various people harumphingly expect the Israel-Hezbollah war to stop in a week. This is hilarious.
From The Guardian:
"It's clear the Americans have given the Israelis the green light. They [the Israeli attacks] will be allowed to go on longer, perhaps for another week," a senior European official said yesterday. Diplomatic sources said there was a clear time limit, partly dictated by fears that a prolonged conflict could spin out of control.
This isn't some network TV series that can be canceled at an executive's whim. It can't be interrupted for a special report. It's not a ball game that can be called on account of rain. It's not a water tap that you can turn on and off. This is a real live shooting war. Israel has had enough of having its citizens picked off one by one, and is going to blow the hell out of Hezbollah so that Hezbollah knows the game is over and the rules have changed and that their evil behavior isn't going to be accepted any more.
When Israel declines to stop the war, since doing so would let Hezbollah regroup and continue killing civilians; when Israel declines to do that, and continues its destruction of Hezbollah, the whole world will be favorably impressed, and will admire Israel for protecting its people.
According to AP, Condi supports a U.N. peacekeeping force:
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice also called for the introduction of a strong peacekeeping operation.
As noted in the previous post, any U.N. peacekeeping force would be nothing more than protection for Hezbollah, which Israel is currently destroying.
But this Fox News story provides more detail on the goals of the GWB administration:
White House Wants Cease-Fire That Will Hold, Not Quick Fix
WASHINGTON - The Bush administration is not yielding to international calls for a prompt cease-fire to end Israel's devastating campaign against Hezbollah militia in Lebanon.
Instead, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is trying to drum up diplomatic support for what on Tuesday she called a cease-fire of "lasting value." That is, one that would have the Lebanese army take over the south of the country where Hezbollah guerrillas have conducted a cross-border war against Israel for years.
"The Middle East has been through too many spasms of violence and we have to deal with underlying conditions," Rice said at a news conference.
Sure, there can be U.N. peacekeepers - as long as Hezbollah loses this war decisively.
