The state of Israel awoke this morning to the realization that their world has suddenly become a lot more dangerous.
And that’s saying something. Given that their country is surrounded by enemies that wish to annihilate them, it is hard to imagine how their precarious situation could have gotten any worse. But the sad fact is that the forces representing anti-modernism, anti-Semitism, and genocide are in the ascendancy today over those who represent freedom, tolerance, and civilization.
Welcome to the new Middle East, a place where purposefully ordering the launching of thousands upon thousands of lethal rockets into towns and villages with the sole and exclusive goal of killing as many civilians as possible makes one a hero to the overwhelming majority of its people rather than a monster to be stoned in the street on sight. It is also a tactic that has been green lighted by the United Nations in that they have given these gleeful, murderous, rocketeers the opportunity to start their bombardment all over again just as soon as the international community loses interest and moves on to the next outrage that the world body also will be unable to do anything to stop.
A true United Nations, one that would live up to one tenth of the noble sentiments contained in its charter, would have voted to join with Israel to destroy Hizbullah. In fact, their actions have now enabled the terrorists to look forward to round two in their genocidal war against the Jews.
For make no mistake, this “cease fire” is nothing of the sort. It is a pause in Hizbullah’s undeclared war on the Jewish state that has been going on since Israel voluntarily left southern Lebanon in 2000. The aggression from Hizbullah didn’t start with their incursion into Israel’s territory on July 12. It has been going on for more than two years with nary a peep from this same international community that now seeks to dictate to Israel how it should best defend itself. Where was the outrage when Hizbullah carried out unprovoked attacks on IDF outposts? Where were the tears from these slobbering humanitarians when Hizbullah infiltrated suicide bombers across the border in order to kill Israeli children?
To those who truly wish for a just and peaceful international order, that kind of world just became much more remote with the shameful capitulation to the tactics of terror that the United States, the United Nations, and the rest of the international community agreed to in this cease fire resolution. It will come back to haunt all who worked for expediency over substance, all the while pretending that a “solution” to Hizbullah’s murderous designs on the Jewish state could be “negotiated” – as if the terrorists cared one whit about anything except their own survival as well as the killing of more Jews which is now guaranteed thanks to both the incompetence of Israeli leadership and the world’s timidity in the face of outright savagery.
The conduct of France in this affair has been one dizzying change of direction after another. Evidently, the French believed that if they kept churning their legs fast enough on the treadmill of international diplomacy, they would eventually get someplace. Beginning with a near agreement with the Americans on the need for a strong international force with a robust mandate to check and disarm Hizbullah, the French ended up groveling before the Sheiks of Araby by accepting their formulation of using an expanded United Nations force that has proven to be about as effective at stopping Hizbullah from attacking Israel as any United Nations force of its kind – which is to say it has failed utterly and completely.
In fact, I’m sure Hizbullah was overjoyed to hear that UNIFIL outposts would be augmented. It means they now have that many more locations to place their rocket launchers, safe and secure in the knowledge that no one will do anything to stop them from placing their Vergeltungswaffe next to locations that proudly fly the UN flag. (Funny thing about that flag. There don’t seem to be too many people willing to die for it although there is no lack of goons, thugs, and terrorists willing to use it for their own nefarious purposes. In that respect, it is something of an anti-flag.)
In this new Middle East, an emboldened Iran will be able to continue to thumb its nose at the international community as they go about the task of building their very own “Final Solution to the Jewish Question.” No need to bother with gas chambers and death camps this time around. Those crude instruments of mass extinction have been made obsolete both by science and the willful blindness of a world community that actually believes that if they pretend hard enough, ignore the extinguishing rhetoric emanating from Tehran, and blame Bush and the “Neo-Cons” in a loud enough voice, that the horror will either go away or only haunt them in their dreams and not be realized in the flesh.
Maybe they’ll be proven correct. Maybe Ahmadinejad is a rational actor and only wants to live in peace. Maybe all of his talk about the return of the 12th Imam is for domestic consumption. Maybe he really didn’t say that he’d “wipe Israel off the map” or that he didn’t really suggest transplanting the state of Israel onto European soil.
Maybe. Or maybe he means everything he says to the very core of his being in which case maybe someone should stop him before he carries out his threats.
But in order to stop Ahmadinejad, someone somewhere is going to have to stand up to his aggression. Israel tried and was slapped down for their effort. And since everyone knows that the only reason America would do anything to try and stop the Persians is to steal their oil, that leaves the fate of Israel and probably the world in the hands of those who preach “collective security” but in practice, carry out “collective surrender.”
Much has been made in conservative circles recently about events occurring now being reminiscent of events in the 1930’s and that mirror Hitler’s march to war. It is always problematic to try and graft one historical period onto another to glean “lessons from history” so that we don’t make the same mistakes again. I believe that kind of thinking dangerously simplistic and overwrought. Iran isn’t Nazi Germany. And America is not Great Britain or France. We see these parallels largely because of the nauseating anti-Semitism raising its ugly head not just in the Middle East but in Europe and America as well. That and the seeming paralysis of the world when confronted with the evil designs of evil men makes the simile an easy reach, almost a writer’s shorthand to explain it all in two paragraphs or less.
The differences between then and now are profound and obvious – so much so that I am not going to list them. But I would agree that the lessons from that time of world turmoil should never be forgotten regardless of whether there are historical connections to be made between the two epochs. Nations like Iran will not be deterred by diplomatic give and take. They will not be “contained” in any meaningful way by sanctions (especially the kind of sanctions being discussed at the UN Security Council).
They must be defeated. And by allowing their proxy Hizbullah to literally get away with terrorist murder, the UN has made the monumental mistake of legitimizing Hizbullah tactics while punishing Israel for exercising its right of self defense.
If there is a worse signal the world body has ever sent in its entire, miserable existence, I can’t think of one.
9:34 am
[...] Update: Rick Moran has another post about the cease fire deal that is pessimistic to say the least: Welcome to the new Middle East, a place where purposefully ordering the launching of thousands upon thousands of lethal rockets into towns and villages with the sole and exclusive goal of killing as many civilians as possible makes one a hero to the overwhelming majority of its people rather than a monster to be stoned in the street on sight. It is also a tactic that has been green lighted by the United Nations in that they have given these gleeful, murderous, rocketeers the opportunity to start their bombardment all over again just as soon as the international community loses interest and moves on to the next outrage that the world body also will be unable to do anything to stop. [...]
9:57 am
Rick wrote:
‘And America is not Great Britain or France.’
And America of 2006 is not America of 1945.
10:59 am
Another “mission accomplished” for George W. Bush.
12:17 pm
10 days and counting to August 22.
1:07 pm
TAQIYYAH, Rick; TAQIYYAH! A truce or ceasefire, or better yet, a “hudna”, concluded with Muslims, and especially Shias, isn’t worth the ink and paper it’s written on!
It’s just another term, for a long slow surrender, or suicide!
Sad fact is, that this time, we were complicit in it!
2:12 pm
Heaven help the U.S. for offering not a helping hand but a Judas kiss to its friend, Israel. “And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people; all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the pople of the earth be gathered together against her…It shall be in that day that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.” Zechariah 12:3,9
3:24 pm
[...] Update: Barnett and Moran are neck and neck in a race to the bottom of the depths of despair. Goldstein was in contention early on, but his last update holds out hope that Nasrallah will foolishly ignore the ceasefire, thereby giving the IDF the opportunity to wipe out the remaining jihadis in the field. I do think the fighting will continue for a few days after the ceasefire deadline, but both sides will simply point to the resolution and blame the other: Nasrallah will claim that Israel is continuing offensive operations, which justifies continued hostilities, and Israel will claim that Hezbollah is continuing hostilities, which justifies continued operations. Kofi Annan will express grave concern in due course, and by the end of next week the supreme soviet will have persuaded Olmert to be the bigger man and start withdrawing. Israel can be reasoned with, you see; terrorists can’t, Which is why pressure is brought to bear on the former and not the latter. Barbarism has its advantages. [...]
11:20 pm
[...] Rick Moran, in his post Welcome to the New Middle East, makes a number of great points, the following being one example: Welcome to the new Middle East, a place where purposefully ordering the launching of thousands upon thousands of lethal rockets into towns and villages with the sole and exclusive goal of killing as many civilians as possible makes one a hero to the overwhelming majority of its people rather than a monster to be stoned in the street on sight. It is also a tactic that has been green lighted by the United Nations in that they have given these gleeful, murderous, rocketeers the opportunity to start their bombardment all over again just as soon as the international community loses interest and moves on to the next outrage that the world body also will be unable to do anything to stop. [...]
11:46 pm
I think that if the “Loyal? Opposition” had been more loyal and less Bush deranged, the President would have had a much stronger hand. If we had a fair or even-handed “real”press, as opposed to the Dan Rather types who seem to hate him, the President would have a much stronger negotiating stance. If we had allies that wern’t so jealous and untrustworthy and sometimes cowardly, then maybe the President wouldn’t have to always practically fight all on his own. He could have some backup. The man has had unimaginable burdens and pressures and dishonabole intentions directed towards him while in this job, and has always remained steady and honorable. His decisions have sometimes enraged me, but I’ve always trusted his smarts, his fotitude and his heart. He is the best friend Israel can have, and shame on them if they can’t see it.
3:51 am
Wishful Thinking?
Just maybe: Olmert might have some insight into the mentality of Nasrallah when agreeing to the “Ceasefire” or is this just wishful thinging on my part?
Nasrallah speech on TV yesterday: “We will not give up our “right” to fight as long as Israeli Troops are in Lebanon”
Wording in UN Resolution: “Israel is expected to cease OFFENSIVE operations”
How can there be a ceasefire if Israel is allowed to stay in Lebanon until the wonderful, brave, unbioused and proven “keepers of the peace” return “en force” and Nasrallah continues his “resistance”? Is this some sort of sneaky, around the corner open window for Israel and Olmert has seen the possibilities? Or is it just wishful thinking from a very worried Israeli Citizen!
4:40 am
Well done, Rick..though unlike you, I do see certain parallels between now and the late 1930’s. Give William L. Shirer or Sir Winston a quick reread, if you like.
I would beg to differ with you slightly on one point…it was not the `sheiks of Araby’ the frogs went grovelling to, but Iran.
The French Foreign Minister Phillipe Dosty-Blasy met with the Iranian foreign minister in Beirut and received his marching orders…after which he praised Iran as a great nation and a stabilizing force for peace in the region!
Iran , of course is the real winner in this conflict.
I think that the Bush Administration would have continued to back Israel had Olmert displayed the slightest glimmer of competance or decisiveness…the US simply couldn’t delay things any longer. Not after a month. So, as you intimate,this game will be played out again, probably for muc hmore lethal stakes.
This is a defeat for the west, and the only silver lining I see is that Olmert will be gone from power soon after the war ends, Based on what I’m hearing from Israel.
AFter the near defeat in the Yom Kippur War, the Labor party essentially resigned leadership (and rightfully so) and Likud took over.
The party in question may not be the same, but I think Israel will end up with more decisive leadership. Basd onwhat I see coming inthe near future, they’re going to need it.
5:40 am
Non-War News
It’s a ceasefire, right? The IDF will withdraw in a 1-2 weeks.The IDF already ...