News and Notable
-John Kerry was in Detroit, home to one of the largest Lebanese Muslim communities. Visiting Honest John's Bar and Grill (Kerry? Honest John? HA!) referred to the crisis in the Middle East saying "If I was president, this wouldn't have happened." You're right "Honest John" you would have allowed Israel to be destroyed by now.
-Kerry's got to keep those MoveOn.Org fanatics happy if he's thinking of running for President again and the anti-semitism of those folks is downright scary. The Daily Standard held their nose and took a dive into the sewer of online leftwing lunatics. Comments at the Daily Kos such as "Israel is showing the entire world why the Iranian President was absolutely right to suggest that Israel cease being a sovereign state as is" are typical of the "anti-war" crowd that seems to have no problem if war eliminates Israel.
-Speaking of "anti-war" "peace" lovers, City Troll sends this link to photographs from the protest rally against Israel on July 22 in London. Take a look at the sign that says "Iran needs nuclear weapons (larger image here). The signs are the product of the International Communist League. And you thought all lefties were against nuclear weapons? WRONG! They're only against nukes when WE have them. No problem if crazy Iranians get nukes.-The crisis has been pretty tough on the Lebanese. And the deaths of civilians is indeed tragic. But Ralph Peters points out the media bias: "Rocket attacks on Israel were reported clinically, but IDF strikes on Lebanon have been milked for every last drop of emotion. We hear about broken glass in Haifa - and bleeding babies in Beirut. "
-The current figure of 380 deaths in Lebanon is roughly ten times that on the Israeli side. But how many of those are actually Hezbollah terrorist fighters? UN High Muckity-Muck Jan Egeland (who referred to America's aid to Tsunami victims as "stingy") Declares that : "Consistently, from the Hezbollah heartland, my message was that Hezbollah must stop this cowardly blending ... among women and children," he said. "I heard they were proud because they lost very few fighters and that it was the civilians bearing the brunt of this. I don't think anyone should be proud of having many more children and women dead than armed men."
-Wires From the Bunker cites the report that questions whether Hezbollah is actually preventing civilians from leaving areas under siege by Israel to act as human shields. Wires also includes the news that the bodies of Iranian troops killed in the fighting are being sent home to Iran. According to the New York Sun, there are reports of hundreds of Iranian fighters in Lebanon. City Troll also reports that Iranian suicide bombers may also be heading to the region. Perhaps as part of the promised Hezbollah "surprises."
-In another City Troll report, we ask whether those Hezbollah "surprises" might also include adding spent nuclear fuel from Iran to the warheads of rockets and missiles targeting civilians in Israel. Also of some concern is this report that Iran was recently caught "red handed" trying to smuggle highly radioactive Cessium out of Europe.
Commentary and Strategy
-In an op-ed on July 18, Newt Gingrich asked: "United Nations Resolution 1559, supported by the European Union, called for Hezbollah to be disarmed. If not now, when? If not by the Israelis, who?" He goes on to say that "The key steps to ending the violence in Lebanon first requires recognizing that Hezbollah in its military form must be eliminated, that the 100-plus Iranian guard in southern Lebanon must be removed and that the allowing of the Syrian and Iranian dictatorships to supply, train and equip the terrorists must be stopped.
-Similar thoughts were echoed by former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu:
"Some 44 years ago, when Soviet missiles in neighboring Cuba threatened American cities, John F. Kennedy set one goal and ultimately prevailed in achieving it: Remove the missiles. Today, when Israel's cities are pummeled by Hezbollah missiles launched from neighboring Lebanon, our goal should be the same: Remove the missiles. Or destroy them....any cease-fire or diplomatic effort that does not have as its objective the disarming of Hezbollah will only strengthen the forces of terror. And that is also why the world should fully support Israel in disarming Hezbollah--for Israel's sake, for Lebanon's sake and for the sake of our common future."- Mark Steyn reminds us that the goal of terrorists goes beyond destruction of Israel and cannot be appeased through negotiation. He cites the words of Hussein Massawi, the Hezbollah leader behind the slaughter of U.S. and French forces 20 years ago: "We are not fighting so that you will offer us something. We are fighting to eliminate you." Steyn also tackles head on the idiotic notion that Islamic terrorism directed at the West is nothing more than a protest against Israel:
In 1971, in the lobby of the Cairo Sheraton, Palestinian terrorists shot Wasfi al-Tal, the prime minister of Jordan at point-blank range. As he fell to the floor dying, one of his killers began drinking the blood gushing from his wounds. Doesn't that strike you as a little, um, overwrought? Three decades later, when bombs went off in Bali killing hundreds of tourists plus local waiters and barmen, Bruce Haigh, a former Aussie diplomat in Indonesia, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, had no doubt where to put the blame. As he told Australia's Nine Network: "The root cause of this issue has been America's backing of Israel on Palestine."
Suppose this were true -- that terrorists blew up Oz honeymooners and Scandinavian stoners in Balinese nightclubs because of "the Palestinian question." Doesn't this suggest that these people are, at a certain level, nuts? After all, there are plenty of IRA sympathizers around the world (try making the Ulster Unionist case in a Boston bar) and yet they never thought to protest British rule in Northern Ireland by blowing up, say, German tourists in Thailand.
-Ralph Peters, who we cited above, is concerned that Israel may be going too slow and too soft in their operations in Lebanon: "The situation is grave. A perceived Hezbollah win will be a massive victory for terror, as well as a triumph for Iran and Syria. And everybody loves a winner - especially in the Middle East, where Arabs and Persians have been losing so long.
Israel can't afford a Hezbollah win. America can't afford it. Civilization can't afford it. Yet it just might happen. Israel tried to make war halfway, and only made a mess."
-Finally, nearly every time we discuss military issues, some lefty who has never served their country in any way comes around to pull the Chicken Hawk routine. Jeff Jacoby has the answer to this ridiculous game:
OK That should be enough reading to fill a couple hours. Don't forget, you will be quizzed on this material!"Chicken hawk" isn't an argument. It is a slur -- a dishonest and incoherent slur. It is dishonest because those who invoke it don't really mean what they imply -- that only those with combat experience have the moral authority or the necessary understanding to advocate military force. After all, US foreign policy would be more hawkish, not less, if decisions about war and peace were left up to members of the armed forces.
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If only those who served in uniform during wartime have the moral standing and experience to back a war, then only they have the moral standing and experience to oppose a war. Those who mock the views of ``chicken hawks" ought to be just as dismissive of ``chicken doves."
In any case, the whole premise of the ``chicken hawk" attack -- that military experience is a prerequisite for making sound pronouncements on foreign policy -- is illogical and ahistorical.
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Some combat veterans display great sagacity when it comes to matters of state and strategy. Some display none at all. General George B. McLellan had a distinguished military career, eventually rising to general in chief of the Union armies; Abraham Lincoln served but a few weeks in a militia unit that saw no action. Whose wisdom better served the nation -- the military man who was hypercautious about sending men into battle, or the "chicken hawk" president who pressed aggressively for military action?
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