Right Wing Nut House

ATTENTION LIZARDOIDS! TUNE IN TO THE RICK MORAN SHOW THIS MORNING BETWEEN 7:00 AM AND 9:00 AM CENTRAL TIME FOR AN EXAMINATION OF THE ISSUES SURROUNDING FAKED AND STAGED PHOTOS BY THE WIRE SERVICES. CLICK ON THE “LISTEN LIVE” BUTTON IN THE LEFT SIDEBAR TO HEAR THE BROADCAST.

Well, it took a while but I made it through the top 30 or so lefty blogs looking for reactions to the Reuters scam.

After disinfecting the keyboard, I got to work. It appears that out of the top lefty blogs, only 4 had anything to say about the Reuters story. And then there’s Billmon. Our friend didn’t write about the Reuters story. But he did use a photo of a woman that DFR at Drinking from Home has proven to be part of staged propaganda.

TBogg, in his usual incoherent and childish manner (is there a more immature intellect on the web?) essentially points out that yes, it’s bad that Reuters did this but RETHUGLICANS DO IT TOO…NYEAH, NYEAH, NYEAH. (One can almost see TBoy sticking his tongue out in a most defiant manner).

How very grown up of you. Maybe next year, your mama will let you go to the playground all by yourself as long as you look both ways before crossing the street…

Ahab blogging at Roger Ailes site also takes the juvenile road by using the Reuters scam to savage Powerline for not posting a complete answer by Rep. John Dingell to the question of whether or not he was “against Hizbullah.” Dingell answered “no” and then tried to prove he was neutral (meaning of course, he was not against Hizbullah) but which the lefty blogs erupted because the guys didn’t include Dingell’s long winded explanation regarding his agnosticism about a terrorist group.

I know, I know…But you have to think like a liberal to understand the “nuance” involved.

At any rate, Ahab only mentions the Reuters story in passing - as if we get this kind of thing all the time so what’s the big deal? I guess I’m just not sophisticated enough to be blase about a wire service with thousands of clients printing fake pictures in order to advance the public relations cause of a terrorist group.

Brad at Sadly, No! takes exactly the right attitude - for a Hizbullah toady. He condemns the offending photo as “unethical” and then adds the Hiz Spin:

Now, while I think it’s unethical for Reuters to photoshop any picture it runs, I have to ask… is there really that much of a difference between the two that justifies the wingnutosphere’s scream fest? I mean, to me it looks like the photographer mostly darkened the smoke in the picture so it’d look better in black-and-white. I can’t believe this is the best the wingnutosphere can come up with nowadays.

Moral blindness personified. It isn’t a question about whether there is little difference between the two pictures, the fact is that the doctored photo was done to elicit a greater emotional response from the reader. This is the essence of propaganda which makes ‘ole Brad a truly useful idiot of Hizbullah. Even when presented with incontrovertible evidence he’s being taken for a fool, he goes right on acting and thinking foolishly.

The only lefty who seems to get it a little bit is Taylor Marsh who, not surprisingly, is more centrist than leftist on some issues. Ms. Marsh makes a valid point about why this kind of thing happens in the first place:

As if we needed more corporate media disrespect, we’ve now got Reuters’ propaganda. They’ve now admitted to actually doctoring a picture to show more smoke and disaster in Lebanon than was happening in a certain snapshot. It’s bad enough in Beirut, so we surely don’t need to push this envelope, not to mention heighten mistrust of the media. There are not that many corporate outlets willing to risk their people in war zones as it is.

Indeed, the reason Hizbullah is able to get away with this kind of crap is because the mainstream press, for a variety of reasons - some good, some bad - are not covering this war with their own people. The extensive use of stringers has been forced on media outlets due to the danger, the lack of personnel, and the limitations imposed by the warring parties. We see the same thing in Iraq, only magnified considerably because the danger is so much greater thanks to the lawlessness in Baghdad as well as hatred of westerners in general.

This brings us to Billmon of Whiskey Bar and his use of the old woman photo who seems to turn up whenever Reuters needs a “grieving old woman standing in front of her ruined house” picture.

She appears to be the same woman seen in two different pictures, mourning the loss of two different homes, on two different dates.

It is very hard to say for sure, but it appears to me that the picture in Billmon’s post is of an entirely different neighborhood as well. At the very least, this woman has been moved around in order to get great background shots of the devastation. We know this because when Hizbullah takes the press out for a Devastation Photo Op, they rope them off and only show them images that the terrorists want presented to the world.

WORLD PRESS PENNED UP BY HIZBULLAH AT QANA

But Billmon should not be criticized too harshly. After all, he was unaware of the Hizbullah propaganda shenanigans and only used the photo to elicit a gut wrenching, emotional response from the reader. In other words, even if the photo wasn’t staged, he was doing Hizbullah’s work for them.

He also has a picture of Mr. “Green Helmet” whose traveling mortician show magically moves from Lebanese town to Lebanese town. “Green Helmet” was in both Qana and Tyre and just coincidentally happened to bring out dead children in both cities, parading them shamelessly before the penned up reporters down what the EU Referendum blog calls “Stretcher Alley.” Read the jaw dropping piece by EU Ref accompanied by photo evidence that at the very least raises enormously troubling questions about the way that wire services are getting their photos and writing their stories.

And for my lefty friends out there, let me make it absolutely clear that by examining the aftermath of what happened at Qana and Tyre in no way diminishes the fact that civilians lost their lives as a result of a bomb dropped by the IAF. That fact is not in dispute here. I think it a baldfaced lie to say that Israel deliberately targets civilians but I am not arguing that the IAF’s actions leave them blameless. They have freely admitted to making a mistake in Qana, apologized for it, and even changed their targeting regime to help prevent it ever happening again.

What does concern me is that you have become the unwitting propaganda pawns of Hizbullah when you ignore what Reuters has admitted doing; they have pulled every single one of Mr. Hajj’s photos from their archives because he has apparently been doctoring photos for weeks. The implications are staggering. It is now impossible to trust any “news” coming from Reuters. Anyone who does is a fool. And my gut feeling is that these revelations will not be confined to Reuters. It would not surprise me in the slightest if in the coming days we see similar stories about photos from AP, UPI, AFP and other wire service outfits.

And what about stringers being used by the big newspapers like the New York Times and WaPo? Can we really trust these outlets to vet their stringers and make sure that they are as unbiased as possible in this conflict? Can we be assured that the stringer’s BS detector is good enough to tell the difference between propaganda and news?

This story is a foreshock. The earthquake that may follow could rock the media establishment like no other event in our lifetimes. Am I exaggerating? I wonder what they’re talking about at AP today? Do you think they’re nervous over at UPI? Has someone been tasked at AFP with looking at old photos with a more critical eye?

These and other mainstream outlets live or die by selling the appearance of unbiased truth. By exposing Reuters as a propaganda arm of Hizbullah, the blogs have shown that the media emperors have little clothing left covering their behinds. And that’s the kind of perception that directly affects the bottom line.

UPDATE

Jeff Jarvis gets it. In spades:

It seems more likely an act of agenda that fits into the current argument about proportionalism in the Hizbullah-Israel war. One side of the argument is, of course, that Israel’s security was violated by Hizbullah, and it has a right to defend itself and to assure that these attacks will stop by disarming or disabling Hizbullah. The other side of the argument we hear now is that Israel’s response is disproportionate, an argument I find puzzling in war, where the disproportion is in winning or losing (I have blogged on this here and here and here). If the effort is not to make war look worse but to make one side in it look disproporationate, then I suppose it makes sense to make the smoke bigger and blacker. It makes sense if that is your agenda.

It doesn’t make sense if what you’re trying to do is report the news.

And in addition to the usual jaw dropping variety of links in her round-up, Malkin adds this:

If Reuters had half a brain, it would post all of Hajj’s photos on a separate site and welcome continued blogger analysis that uncovered this debacle in the first place. Withdrawing the photos to cover their tracks is a dumb idea.

If they are interested in the truth, they will harness the power of the Internet’s distributed intelligence network–not cut it off.

Thee’s never a half a brain around when you need one…

UPDATE II 8/8

I got a very interesting email from a professional photo-journalist who disabused me of some notions about working in a war zone:

Actually, if you were a journalist with experience in a war zone, or a disaster
site, you’d understand that this is common enough practice. They cordon off a
“secured” area to keep the group safe for their tour. Once the tour is over,
you can go where you want. This is done everywhere, not only by Hezbollah. For
example, on disaster sites, down in NOLA, and at Ground Zero. It’s a common
practice to keep reporters and photogs from stepping into a hole or worse,
during the tour.

Point taken. However, I doubt if you were at NoLA or Ground Zero, they would threaten your life if you aimed your camera at the wrong target.

This is also an excellent point:

Also, you and others keep harping on pictures that seem out of place by date.
The old woman for example. It is not uncommon for a number of things to happen.
First, the photog takes a series of pictures of an event. The one of the woman
could average up to 100. (Fast exposure, multi-series with a digital camera
etc) Easy. And, they could very well show many different backgrounds. I’ve
taken pictures like this many times.

I’ve looked at the pictures you site, and it is just not possible to tell if it
is the same background or not. Not enough info to make that judgement. A point
you struggle with as well. With no real definitive answer.

Agreed. My primary beef with the old woman is that the captions cited by DFH are on two different dates. Perhaps the second one was a result of your editor needing something dramatic. Fine. But the caption from the later date makes it seem as if the Israelis had just destroyed her home the previous night.

Not exactly honest journalism, in my opinion.

Thanks to “Camera A” for the fascinating background info.

The IDF may be winning the battle in southern Lebanon to carve out a buffer zone that will eventually keep Hizbullah terrorists from attacking Israeli cities and towns, but they are badly losing the atrocity war.

This “atrocity gap” gets larger daily and threatens the mainstream media’s one sided coverage of the conflict. In fact, some analysts say that it is probable that the lopsided advantage that Hizbullah is showing in the atrocity area could lead to a disastrous state of affairs for the mainstream media. They would be forced to report something like the truth; that Hizbullah revels in targeting and killing innocent civilians while Israel doesn’t. These analysts point to the fact that it is getting harder and harder for the MSM to be sanguine and “neutral” in the face of Hizbullah’s ever growing number of rockets launched aimed at killing civilians while still ginning up enough outrage at the accidental killing of civilians by the IDF.

The Israeli problem is obvious. By nature of the fact that the Israeli atrocities happen by accident, unlike Hizbullah there is no overall plan for the IDF to kill civilians. Many analysts scoff at the excuse that the Israeli Air Force, if they put their mind to it, could really go to town and kill tens of thousands of Lebanese civilians given the superiority of their weaponry and enormous destructive power of their bombs. Lack of atrocity planning by the Israelis is no excuse they say.

The terrorists made a huge stride forward in their atrocity scorecard today:

A woman and two men were killed and at least 189 people were wounded on Sunday evening when a massive barrage of rockets struck at least six sites in a crowded residential area of Haifa.

Two people who were critically wounded died of their wounds shortly after. Several others were listed in serious condition. All of the wounded were evacuated to local hospitals within some 30 minutes.

One building sustained a direct hit and collapsed, trapping dozens of people inside. Emergency workers labored to extract the victims.

The incident was defined a high-casualty event. This was the first time such a definition was applied to an attack on Israel since rockets started landing in Israel almost four weeks ago.

One Hizbullah terrorist speaking on condition of anonymity complained that Hizbullah may be winning the atrocity war as far as “murderous intent” and “cold blooded heartlessness” but that the terrorists were actually losing the all-important “atrocity perceptions” battle.

“What’s the use of deliberately slaughtering innocent Israelis if you infidels in the media don’t give us proper credit for our barbarity?” the terrorist said. “Israel accidentally kills some civilians and the media calls it a ‘war crime. You want war crimes? Nobody can do war crimes like the Party of God,” he said.

Analysts are undecided whether it is more important that Israeli accidental atrocities are perceived as much worse than Hizbullah’s deliberate murder of the innocent or whether the sheer number of Hizbullah atrocities will eventually wear down the MSM and win the day for the terrorists.

These analysts say the outcome of the atrocity war will be one of the more interesting sidelights to the Israeli-Islamist conflict.

UPDATE

Luck of the Hiz:

A massive rocket barrage was fired Sunday afternoon at Kibbutz Kfar Giladi in the Kiryat Shmona area. Ten Israelis were killed in the attack and another two people died of their wounds at the Ziv Medical Center in Safed and the Rambam Medical Center in Haifa, to where they were evacuated in critical condition.

Fifteen people are still hospitalized at the Safed and Haifa hospitals, two of them in serious condition, three in moderate condition and six in light condition.

[snip]

Celebratory processions were held in Nablus following the lethal attack. Cars with photographs of Hassan Nasrallah drove past with Hizbullah flags.

The dead were all Israeli reservists evidently gathering in a parking lot waiting to be deployed.

The tragedy brings to mind the unlucky hit by a Scud missile on the American barracks at al-Khobar during the Gulf War. Twenty-eight Americans died and 93 were wounded when the one in a million hit by the crudely aimed Scud caused most of the casualties during that conflict.

To say that these men were a legitimate target would be correct. But they were not the target. Hizbullah could not possibly have had any inkling that the reservists were gathering in that parking lot nor did they themselves know where their missile would end up. Their target was Israeli civilians. The fact that it hit soldiers doesn’t negate the intent of the atrocity.

This is unbelievable.

A Reuters photograph of smoke rising from buildings in Beirut has been withdrawn after coming under attack by American web logs. The blogs accused Reuters of distorting the photograph to include more smoke and damage.

The photograph showed two very heavy plumes of black smoke billowing from buildings in Beirut after an Air Force attack on the Lebanese capital. Reuters has since withdrawn the photograph from its website, along a message admitting that the image was distorted, and an apology to editors.

DISTORTED! HOW ABOUT “FAKED?” HOW ABOUT “MANIPULATED?” HOW ABOUT “PROPAGANDIZED?”

It appears that someone emailed Charles Johnson at Little Green Footballs with some compelling evidence that a Reuters photograph showing smoke billowing from buildings in Beirut was heavily altered. After Charles posted the original story, the blogosphere went to work with a vengeance.

Several bloggers weighed in with their own evidence, including a photographer’s blog who determined that the photo indeed had been altered. From there, the blog frenzy continued with one blogger finding a probable match for the photo that was undoctored. Others weighed in that the photo really was an awful photoshop image, an obvious fake.

The rest is familiar. As more and more evidence piled up, it became obvious that Reuters had screwed the pooch. And the final bit of evidence that sealed the fate of this photo was the photographer in question, one Adnan Hajj, who just happened by Qana at the moment the “rescue worker” in the green helmet was holding aloft a dead child.

Coincidence or collusion between the photographer and Hizbullah?

It certainly raises some interesting questions about how the Qana story has been reported. First the drastically lower casualty figure of 28 instead of 56 and now we have Mr. Hajj and his travelling propaganda show revealed as a liar and perhaps even an agent of Hizbullah.

Read the entire story at LGF and see the genesis of a Blog Strike. It should probably go without saying that the lefty blogs sat this one out, never dreaming that the international media could be playing them for fools. And it should be interesting to see what they’ll be saying about this as the day wears on. Perhaps I’ll post reaction - if there is any.

Kudos to LGF, Charles, and all the bloggers who participated in this exercise in people power at its best.

As Hizbullah fighters fanatically try and hold their ground in the small villages and towns of southern Lebanon, all the while being slaughtered systematically by the IDF, the makings of Israel’s “defeat” is being spun unmercifully in some corners of the media and on the left.

To date, more than 50 members of the IDF have been killed in the 25 day war. And while information on the numbers of Hizbullah fighters killed in action has been sketchy to say the least, the IDF estimates put the number at 300 on August 1, almost certainly an inflated estimate but one at least more trustworthy than Hizbullah’s laughable figure of 43 given on the same day.

There is every reason to believe that the figure of 300 is closer to being accurate as of today given what’s been happening the last 72 hours in southern Lebanon. Wherever Hizbullah fighters have stood toe to toe with the IDF, they have died. The terrorists perform the best in small unit ambushes where they put the Israelis on the defensive. The IDF then must call in helicopters and fighters to pound Hiz positions in order to extract their men.

But in the last few days, the Israelis have attacked in much larger formations, overwhelming the pockets of Hizbullah fighters and causing them to either flee or be killed. The J-Post reports:

At least ten Hizbullah operatives were killed and three were captured overnight.

Meanwhile, it was released on Sunday that in the past 48 hours, special forces operated south of Tyre. The troops destroyed 3 rocket launchers, a bunker, three weapons warehouses, and three cars used to transport rockets.

Two reserve soldiers were killed in clashes with Hizbullah in southern Lebanon on Saturday. Army forces killed at least 50 Hizbullah guerillas over the weekend, the IDF said.

The raid at Baalbek and the most recent Special Forces op south of Tyre killed dozens more. And given the amount of ordinance expended by the IAF, one has to assume that many Hizbullah fighters have died as the result of bombings.

The point is very simple; Hizbullah fighters are dying in droves, their infrastructure is being smashed to pieces, they are being thrown out of positions in southern Lebanon they’ve occupied since Israel left in 2000, and conversely, they have failed to inflict significant casualties on the IAF although they do very well killing unarmed civilians by launching barrages of rockets indiscriminately into the towns and villages of northern Israel.

Would someone please explain how Hizbullah is “winning” anything except perhaps the race to have the most martyrs claim those 72 virgins in the afterlife?

Where the Hiz are successful, it is in the battle of perceptions. And in this conflict, the IDF is at a huge disadvantage in that the overwhelming majority of the world’s press is openly cheering for Hizbullah to give the Israelis a bloody nose. Tom Gross of the J-Post points to the piss poor job being done by the Israelis in the media war:

Hizbullah and the Palestinians know the value of propaganda. They often fight their media battles by the dirtiest possible means. An expose in these pages on Thursday by former Sunday Telegraph correspondent Tom Gross revealed that Hizbullah officers supervise CNN reports, that a CBS reporter admitted Hizbullah overseers determine what’s filmed, that repeated shots of several downed buildings lend Beirut the erroneous image of devastated WWII Dresden, that journalists are threatened, that Hizbullah holds their passports for ransom, that their analyses are skewed to curry favor, and so on.

Not only doesn’t Israel engage in significant preemptive damage control, it often seems resigned to lose by default. The axiomatic official Israeli attitude often seems to be that “the world hates us.”

It may indeed deny us a fair shake, but there’s a difference between giving up a priori and trying to do something about it. To forfeit without a fight is reckless neglect. It can only impact on Israel’s image, its standing abroad, and the pressure on international politicians to take unsympathetic positions, and thus directly on Israel’s future well-being.

The pathetic nature of Hizbullah’s “success” - the fact that they aren’t running away in terror or surrendering as other, less fanatical Arab armies have done in the past - says much more about those who are lionizing the terrorists than it does about whether they are “winning” the war in any real sense of the word. Because when the dust settles and hostilities end, Israel will have a buffer zone of one kind of another, Hizbullah will be prevented from re-occupying positions they held for nearly 6 years prior to the war, and given Israeli-American insistence, Nasrallah’s fanatics will be disarmed probably by having his militia folded into the Lebanese army.

And this is a Hizbullah “victory?”

Ah, but the Hiz are heroes in the Arab street you say! Nasrallah will be more powerful in Lebanese politics, you crow! As for the former, my aunt Mabel would be popular in the Arab street if she was the beneficiary of the dizzying spin being put on this conflict in the Arab and western press.

As for the latter, someone please give me the crystal ball making that prediction so that I can pick some stocks. No one knows what shape post war Lebanese politics will take., what the impact of Nasrallah’s bellicosity that started the war and now his intransigence that is prolonging it will have on his standing among the other factions. My guess is that the Future Party of Prime Minister Siniora, Saad Hariri and Walid Jumblatt will do a little anti-Nasrallah spinning of their own in the aftermath of this war. And how that will turn out is anyone’s guess.

The western press always seems able to find present or former State Department officials or analysts of one kind or another who will wail on cue about how badly the war has gone for Israel and how the conflict has “empowered” Hizbullah. These doomsayers have made their prognostications based not what has been happening on the battlefield but what they perceive to be Israel’s weakness in not vanquishing Hizbullah in 6 days - that being the standard set by the international punditariat for a clear Israeli victory. Anything more and either the IDF is losing its edge or they have met their match on the battlefield in Hizbullah. This is so clearly tommyrot. Just look at a map of Israeli positions today and see that they have trapped Hizbullah’s remaining fighters in a kill zone from the border to the Litani River. With roads and bridges impassable, those Hiz fighters are doomed unless they surrender.

Given the fact that Nasrallah has rejected out of hand the provisions in the cease fire resolution that will probably be passed Tuesday or Wednesday, Israel will have a free hand to continue to kill his fighters, bust up his remaining infrastructure, and weaken his organization where it counts - its ability to harm the Jewish state.

Will that matter to those who are busy spinning Israel’s inevitable defeat? Probably not. But then, I doubt the Israelis care very much just as long as they can prevent Hizbullah from harming their citizens whenever they feel like it.

Now that smells like victory…

UPDATE

Judith Klinghoffer has more evidence of a Hizbullah “victory.” Nasrallah begging for help in arranging a cease fire from the very same Arab states he dismissed so cavailerly just 3 weeks ago:

Get out of my way, he told Arab leaders at the start of the conflict. Now he changed his tune:

For your own sake, for the sake of your thrones, I say to you: Combine your humanity with your thrones, and act - even for a single day - to stop this aggression against Lebanon. From the first day, I said that I do not ask or call upon you to do anything. I still do not, but I want to protect you, our country, and our homeland. This is how those who want can help Lebanon.”

There are times when my pessimism about what is happening in the world gets the better of me and I sink into one of two states of consciousness; blissful ignorance as I just ignore what is really going on until my curiosity gets the better of me or a simmering anger that usually explodes in some towering rant against those who would lead us (the West) to disaster because of the deliberate self delusion or ignorance of a large and influential segment of our political class.

As for the latter, while emotionally satisfying on one level, there are many times that I wish I had not hit that “publish” button. This is an occupational hazard for any blogger who becomes a slave to content and feels it necessary at times to let loose an ill favored rhetorical barrage at whatever current object of scorn, or derision, or humor that wanders into my gunsights. I realize that is part of the appeal of this site to many of you but there really are times when such writing is ill advised. Better the reasoned riposte than a heaping of calumny directed toward the wayward, the clueless, or the downright dumb.

However, there is something to be said for the former. Existing in one’s own little cocoon of information and opinion is certainly comforting. Reading only people and ideas that you agree with is not only good for one’s blood pressure, but also allows for a smug, self satisfaction to settle over one’s writing. The idea of the Revealed Truth From Rick is reinforced by many of you who leave nice comments and verbally pat me on the back for my perspicacity.

All goes swimmingly until I happen to read what I’ve written after a few weeks time and realize the trap I’ve fallen into. That’s when you must force yourself once again to examine the issues and events of the day from every possible angle so that even in disagreement, you find nuggets of truth, shades of meaning that can alter your perceptions and give a sense of wholeness to your beliefs.

In the end, that’s what this blog is all about; my beliefs. And the sooner you find out that it is silly and dangerous to believe that you have a corner on what is right or what is true, the more intellectually satisfying your search for knowledge will become.

Aristotle wrote:

“The search for truth is in one way hard and in another way easy, for it is evident that no one can master it fully or miss it wholly. But each adds a little to our knowledge of nature, and from all the facts assembled there arises a certain grandeur.”

“All the facts assembled” means that you must humble yourself in order to achieve that “grandeur” by searching out contrary interpretations of the facts. It isn’t just a matter of buttressing your own opinions by finding flaws in another’s arguments. It sometimes comes down to actually trying to wear the shoes of those with whom you disagree, seeing the issue from their perspective. Only then can you truly embrace your own conceits with the confidence that you’ve done all that is required to satisfy those pesky muses who bedevil your unconscious, whispering in your ear that “thou art but mortal” and must work like the dickens to overcome your own arrogance.

But in the face of this kind of evil, this monstrous darkness that is descending over the west largely as a result of our own stupidity and reckless disregard for our own safety, I’m tempted to gather all the Juan Coles, the Billmons, the Kossacks, and the whole lot of morally timid, incredibly myopic liberals who cannot see the horrific danger we are in from the scourge if Islamic fundamentalism and send them packing to Iran so that they can glimpse our future. It is mindboggling. And for someone brought up in a western, liberal, democratic, (small “d”) tradition, really quite perplexing.

Is there nothing in the west worth defending? Are there no values, no artistic or cultural traditions worth standing up for? Is the warm and comfortable embrace of western freedoms to be given up so cavalierly, without a fight and in some cases, even willingly?

On Thursday, the President of Iran said for the umpteenth time that the State of Israel should be eliminated. Previous incarnations of this rhetoric has been the disputed phrase about wiping Israel “off the map” and variations on the theme that the Jewish state will disappear in fire and smoke. Ahmadinejad has also suggested that the Europeans carve out some of their own territory and uproot more than 6 million Jews in order to move them “back” to Europe (the overwhelming majority of Israelis having been born in their own land, given to them by the United Nations and fought for by their fathers and grandfathers).

And yet, despite the clearly stated goals of the Islamic regime in Iran now growing bolder and more open about its intent to use proxies like Hizbullah to carry the fight to all “infidels,” all we hear from most of the left is a combination of nauseating anti-Semitism and a curious moral indistinctness between the Israelis and Hizbullah.

Hizbullah launches hundreds of rockets into Israel with the expressed intent of killing as many non-combatants as possible and the reaction on the left is, after (perhaps) a desultory condemnation of these purely terror tactics, gleeful commentary on how Israel is losing the war. On the other hand, when Israel mistakenly targets a house in Qana, apologizes profusely, and actually alters their targeting regime to try and prevent further mistakes, the moral outrage is without limit. Juan Cole:

There had been some question about whether Hizbullah’s ability to hit Israel with rockets had been degraded, or whether it was just observing the 48 hour air cease fire. On Wednesday it cleared the mystery up. The indiscriminate firing of rockets on civilian targets wounded 21 persons and one hit the Palestinian West Bank. Among the rockets fired was a long-distance Khaybar II. Targeting civilians or unnecessarily endangering them is a war crime.

Please note Professor Cole’s pro-forma recognition that Hizbullah has committed an atrocity is disconnected, unemotional, and matter of fact. He doesn’t even directly accuse Hizbullah of a war crime despite the fact that Hizbullah has now launched thousands of rockets into northern Israel trying desperately to kill as many civilians as they can.

What kind of mind can make that disconnect? The kind that can write this about Qana:

Note how by calling it a “tragedy,” Blair takes the onus off Israel for launching a total war on the Lebanese infrastructure and population. A hurricane is a tragedy, Mr. Prime Minister. This is a war. It is a war launched by specific persons, including especially Ehud Olmert and Gen. Halutz. It isn’t something that can be put into the passive voice.

Even most of the Arab world agrees that Hizbullah “launched” this war, not Prime Minister Olmert. And Cole’s blindness, comforting as it might be for him, extends to his swallowing hook, line, and sinker, this kind of Arab propaganda:

The Israelis appear to be engaged in a concerted campaign of ethnic cleansing in the Shiite towns and villages of southern Lebanon, and are indiscriminately bombing all buildings in the area south of the Litani River. They have chased hundreds of thousands of residents out, and are destroying the property they left behind in a systematic way, rather as they destroy the houses belonging to the family members related to suicide bombers. In other words, the Israelis are engaged in collective punishment on a vast scale. They maintain that rocket launching sites are embedded in these villages. But since Hizbullah keeps firing large numbers of rockets, it does not actually appear to be the case that the Israelis are hitting the rocket launchers. They are demonstrably hitting civilian houses and apartment buildings in a methodical way.

“Ethnic cleansing?” “Collective punishment?” Cole and I share a passion for reading the Daily Star of Lebanon and the individuals making claims such as he is reprinting here are Hizbullah spokesmen. There is no talk from Prime Minister Siniora of “ethnic cleansing” nor of any “methodical” razing of buildings. Cole regurgitates Hizbullah propaganda without batting an eyelash.

And herein lies the cause of my pessimism. Cole is an intelligent man, a font of information on the Middle East and its history (if you can stomach his biases). But last May, he wrote this regarding any confrontation between the west and Iran:

So sit down and shut up, American Enterprise Institute, and Hudson Institute, and Washington Institute for Near East Policy, and American Heritage Foundation, and this institute and that institute, and cable “news”, and government “spokesmen”, and all the pundit-ferrets you pay millions to make business for the American military-industrial complex and Big Oil.

We don’t give a rat’s ass what Ahmadinejad thinks about European history or what pissant speech the little shit gives.

Despite his hatred for the Iranian regime, Cole believes that we should not take Ahmadinejad at his word. If the Iranian President says that Israel will be eliminated, it is rhetoric that we can safely ignore. And when Ahmadinejad uses proxies like Hizbullah to make war on Israel and the west, I suppose we should bury our heads in the ground and pretend we shouldn’t do anything about it because the entire rationale for looking at Iran as an enemy has to do with the military industrial complex in America and has nothing to do with our own survival.

Cole, of course, is not alone. Not by a long shot. And it is legitimate to ask if Cole and his ilk would do anything to defend themselves against this kind of threat. Time and time again over the last 27 years Islamic fundamentalists have attacked us, eliciting a “proportional” response - a bombing run or lobbing a few cruise missiles at targets of opportunity. All this has gotten us is more attacks.

And Israel, trying to play by the rules laid out by the international community for the last 60 years that prevent it from removing threats to its existence so that the sensibilities of those who refuse to recognize the Jewish state as a legitimate national entity won’t be ruffled, finds itself on the frontline of this most recent war against the west. And once again, an international community more in love with “process” than with actually solving Israel’s dilemma is calling for the Jewish state to halt before it feels the job is done. No wonder the United States wants to change the failed diplomatic framework of the past that did nothing to make Israel safe and only made western politicians look good to the homefolks.

The world is becoming too dangerous to play these kinds of games anymore. Hizbullah must be disarmed. Syria must be be held to account for their meddling in Lebanon which included the brazen assassination of the beloved Hariri. And Iran must be isolated from the community of nations until they rid themselves of those who seek to lead a wordlwide crusade whose goal is the subjugation or destruction of everything we in the west find worth living for.

It is getting very late in the day not to have the left on board for this fight. And perhaps it will take a liberal leader somewhere else to explain it to them. They seem to have turned a deaf ear to anything coming from the United States and especially George Bush.

But wherever the wake-up call comes from - and it will come - the only question is will it come too late so that the west can face this latest challenge to its existence reasonably united.

The alternative is simply unthinkable.

There are so many “plans” to stop the violence in the Israeli-Islamist War that I thought I’d lay them out in one post so that you can see how hard it is going to be to achieve a halt anytime soon.

The major players at the UN - France vs. Britain and the US - and the Middle East - US/Israel vs. Lebanon/Hizbullah - all have their own ideas on how to stop the war. And the differences are not insignificant, not by any means. Let’s look at the US-Israeli positions first.

US/ISRAEL

1. No “cease fire” (an important word choice) until an international force is “in place.”

2. International force would occupy a buffer zone between Israel and Lebanon (size to be determined)

3. International force must have rules of engagement that allow it to shoot back in order to keep Hizbullah from re-occupying the south.

4. Hizbullah must be disarmed - either by the Lebanese themselves or by the International force.

5. Immediate release of Israeli prisoners.

6. Lebanese Army will take over from the International force once they are trained and deployed.

7. Lebanese government will have sovereignty over all of Lebanon.

Now here’s the Lebanese government/Hizbullah formulation:

LEBANON/HIZBULLAH

1. Immediate cease fire along with an immediate withdrawal of IDF forces.

2. No international force - only an augment to the UNIFIL force already there.

3. No buffer zone and Hizbullah gets to re-occupy positions in the south.

4. Lebanese government will disarm Hizbullah following discussions carried out in the context of the National Dialogue.

5. Release of all Lebanese prisoners in Israeli jails in return for the two captured IDF soldiers.

6. Resolution of the Shebaa Farms issue with the UN turning over the tiny slice of land to Lebanon.

Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah (who is temporarily calling the negotiating shots) has made it clear that any international force not connected to UNIFIL will be considered invaders. And the Israelis have agreed to release 3 Lebanese prisoners in exchange for their two captured soldiers.

Now, what’s going on at the UN?

UNITED NATIONS

Roughly speaking, France has taken the Lebanese positions while Condi Rice has modified the American position marginally in order to come a little closer to what the French are asking:

Efforts are under way at the United Nations to set up a mechanism that would facilitate “direct or indirect” Israeli-Lebanese discussions, senior Israeli diplomatic officials said Thursday.

According to the officials, under this proposal “everything would be discussed: a cease-fire, the Shaba Farms issue, the prisoner exchange, and deployment of the multinational force.”

According to UN and American officials, an arrangement of this kind, which would include a pair of Security Council resolutions, is now within reach.

Here is the French proposal:

FRANCE

1. Immediate cease fire.

2. No discussion of other issues until the guns stop.

3. All “political issues” like the disarming of Hizbullah and deployment of the Lebanese army to be worked out before France or any international troops occupy the buffer zone.

4. Weak rules of engagement for the international force.

How close can Condi come to that position? Here’s what she and the Brits have come up with:

The solution to these divergent positions has come in the form of two resolutions. The first, to be voted on in the coming days, will establish a “cessation of hostilities” and articulate a political framework for the future.

Israeli officials said that this document would likely be similar to a statement issued by the G-8 soon after the crisis began last moth, and include a call to release the captive Israeli soldiers, for a cessation of hostilities, and for beefing up the Lebanese army.

The first resolution would be window dressing. It would call for “a cessation of hostilities” rather than a “cease fire.” In the cuckoo land of diplomacy, this makes everyone happy. It is immediate which pleases the French but it doesn’t use the words “cease fire” which pleases us and the Israelis.

We also want to append a call for sanctions against any nation that resupply’s Hizbullah. France is frowning on that because they want to engage the Syrians to help rein in Hizbullah. But as we’ve seen with sanctions elsewhere, there are ways around them so in the end, France will probably give in.

This resolution will be trumpeted by the media but will mean little. It is the second resolution that will have teeth (if any) and that will tell the tale as to whether or not any cease fire will mean a pause of a couple of weeks or a genuine solution:

The second resolution, which would follow after an as yet determined amount of time, would set the composition and mandate of a multinational force and the contours of a new buffer zone in southern Lebanon. It would also assert the authority of the Lebanese government and propose help to the Lebanese Army to gain control of its borders.

Israel’s position is that the IDF first needs to clear the buffer zone, one currently being carved out by the IDF, in order for the multinational force to move in. Israel wants this force to be “an international army,” not an observer force like UNIFIL, but rather one strong enough that it can impose its will.

The real sticking point here is what happens to the buffer zone in the meantime? France wants Israel to withdraw and the UNIFIL force occupy the buffer zone until the International force can be constituted. Israel and the US naturally are balking at that idea.

The solution may involve a token international “rapid response” force that could be flown in immediately and buttress UNIFIL’s efforts. Israel quite naturally is very wary of this and may put the kibosh on the entire idea - unless Washington insists:

There are two possibilities for solving this remaining problem. The IDF could maintain its position until the arrival of an international force, a position clearly favored by the Israeli government and opposed by Lebanon, among other countries. The other option is for the current UNIFIL mission to be beefed up. Its troops could then be integrated into whatever larger, more robust force arrives. Israel, considering UNIFIL to be weak, opposes this solution.

This remains a major point of contention between the American and French. As French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy told France-Inter radio on Thursday, “We are working well with the Americans, working night and day. We are advancing toward a common resolution, but we’re not yet there. There is still work to do.”

That actually sounds more hopeful than is realistic. After spilling all that blood (and having Washington stick its neck out in support of Israel’s offensive) it is doubtful that we will compromise when it comes to Israeli forces in the buffer zone leaving until a sizable force of International soldiers who can enforce their will by having “robust” rules of engagement is in place. This will probably be a sticking point that takes another 10 days to 2 weeks to resolve.

In the meantime, here’s my speculation.

The first resolution calling for a “cessation of hostilities” will pass easily. Israel will probably stop bombing outside the buffer zone in Lebanon (or perhaps stop bombing all together). This will put pressure on Nasrallah to make good on his promise to stop launching rockets into northern Israel. It will not stop the IDF from carrying out “mop-up” operations in whatever buffer zone they can carve out between now and the passage of that first resolution.

The Security Council will have a devil of a time coming to an agreement on the second resolution. In the end, Hizbullah will probably be kicked out of southern Lebanon but still get to keep their guns. The Lebanese government will be just as weak as it was before the conflict started but will perhaps have assistance from the international community in training its army (which I predict will include Hizbullah as an independent command thus making them part of the army rather than a militia that needs to be disarmed) and rebuilding its devastated infrastructure.

And then both sides will lick their wounds, re-arm, and get ready for the next go around.

This article originally appears in The American Thinker.

Stubborn or courageous? Calculating or clueless? Smart or dumb?

My, but historians will have a tough time trying to define George Bush. At least the honest historians will. And by honest, I mean those who will make an effort to glean the truth from the avalanche of contemporary reports portraying the 43rd President as (take your pick) 1) a captive of a neoconservative conspiracy; 2) a doltish, two dimensional clod who sees all the problems of the world in black and white; or 3) an unsophisticated lout in thrall to a religious fanaticism that sees conflict in the Middle East as proof that the End Times are upon us.

Indeed, it may be the President’s critics who are the simpletons. Blinded by their own hubris and in love with their fey conceits, most of the President’s detractors are in a snit because George Bush thinks there’s something of a war on and they don’t much like the way he’s fighting it.

First and foremost, he’s neglecting the nuance involved in warmaking. Silly George! He can’t go around lumping Hamas, Hizbullah, and al-Qaeda together as if there was anything similar about them. That just isn’t done. What those three fundamentalist Islamic terror groups could possibly have in common seems to escape those who insist that the world is a complicated place with many shades of gray. They believe that “good” and “evil” are meaningless terms that may in fact be neo-colonial racist constructs not descriptives aimed at morally differentiating between those who see slaughtering innocents as a path to heaven and those who seek to stop them.

And doesn’t our President know that their are gradations of evil? Hamas is not as evil as Hizbullah because they were, well, elected sort of. And Hizbullah builds day care centers and has seats in the Lebanese parliament. This makes them less evil than al-Qaeda who we’re not fighting the right way because we’re not getting to the root causes of what upsets them so. Better that we try and understand why they want to conquer the world and convert every living soul to Islam than seek them out and destroy them.

But what has the President’s critics howling with full throated cries of outrage is that dumb old George has gone and upset the Middle East apple cart. He’s standing firmly on the side of Israel rather than practicing the traditional American balancing act of tying ourselves into pretzel like contortions in order to please the Arab supporters of the Palestinians by decreeing a pox on both their houses.

In other words, Bush is getting raked over the coals by both domestic critics and the international community because during this go around with their terrorist tormentors, he is standing shoulder to shoulder with Israel and letting the devil take Hamas and Hizbullah. This has thrown the calculations of both the terrorists and their patrons in Syria and Iran into a cocked hat. Who would have thought that the United States would actually allow Israel a “green light” to so weaken Hamas and Hizbullah that their ability to harm the Jewish state would be seriously hampered? It’s unprecedented in the sorry annals of Middle East diplomacy.

And therein lies a clue to the President’s thinking. While the current war is a serious crisis still with the possibility of an escalation that could include other state actors in the conflict, what is happening in the Middle East is revolutionary and in the end, necessary. The diplomatic framework that has been employed dozens of times since the birth of the Jewish state in 1948 to keep the lid on the Palestinian/Israel question has been revealed to be obsolete.

Born in a bi-polar world where it was vitally necessary to prevent war from breaking out between Israel and its Arab neighbors lest the conflict escalate to a superpower showdown, the tried and true rigmarole that saw Arab defeat snatched from the jaws of a complete Israeli victory was an unsatisfying yet necessary adjunct to the diplomatic dance which saw the United States playing the part of “honest broker” to Palestinian aspirations.

What exactly did that achieve? Lasting peace? A safe and secure Israel? For nearly 60 years the world community has worked the same diplomatic levers and pulleys to no avail. Not when support for the murderous fedayeen in Hamas and Hizbullah as well as other terror groups like Islamic Jihad and the Muslim Brotherhood continues from sources all over the Arab world and threatens destruction of the Jewish state.

While the President’s naysayers in Europe and America are almost apoplectic with rage and calls for a cease fire resonate from the United Nations to the Hague, Bush remains stoic in his belief that Israel’s fight against Hizbullah actually has something to do with the War on Terror and thus deserves America’s full and unqualified support. Since many of the President’s critics don’t believe we’re at war in the first place, this lack of American “balance” in dealing with the terrorist aggressors of Hamas and Hizbullah is all the more shocking. It is chalked up to either Bush’s simple minded view of terrorism or his animus toward Muslims in general.

More conspiratorially, hints of the Vast Jewish Conspiracy haunt the thoughts of the borderline anti-Semites who dreamily wonder aloud if Israel has a “right to exist” in the first place. In the past, this kind of filth would have been confined to the poorly mimeographed rants of neo-Nazi mouthbreathers. Now, these thoughts appear on the slick website of the most popular and powerful liberal blog in the world.

Most on the left (and the paleo-right) seem content not to voice their hopes for the destruction of the Jewish state out loud and settle for accusing Bush of being a puppet of the Zionists. Of course, this is a free floating kind of critique in that a few short years ago, the roles of the United States and Israel were transposed in this relationship and it was Israel having its strings pulled by evil capitalists. One would hope that the some day, the inveterate Jew haters of the world would make up their minds and decide once and for all who is Sherri Lewis and who is Lambchop in this relationship.

It doesn’t seem to matter to our George. While expressing the proper amount of regret at civilian casualties, he firmly makes the point that the moral onus for the death of civilians lies heavily on the shoulders of those who use the innocents to shield their military activities and then employ their dead bodies in a macabre propaganda side show, not to mention glorying in the death of civilians they deliberately target themselves. This moral distinction, so brilliantly exposited by James Lewis on these pages last Sunday, is lost on those either too blinded by their hatred of the President (or the United States) or those whose moral cowardice in the face of such evil has made them unable to confront the consequences of their ambivalence.

Perhaps what makes the President’s opponents the most uncomfortable is this uncompromising stance against evil. While it certainly has biblical overtones, it seems to be based more on a faith in something beyond religious conviction - a steadfast belief in the goodness of man. Those whose cynicism towards humanity blinds them to people’s potential to do great and good things as well as savage and terrible things will not ever understand this aspect of the Bush presidency. It goes to Bush’s core beliefs in freedom and the natural rights of man - that all people everywhere are born into liberty.

This belief plays into Bush’s stubborn support of Israel in the face of opposition that perhaps would have cowed a lesser man. He sees Israel much as he sees America. Speaking at the American Jewish Committee’s Centennial Dinner last May, the President spoke of our similarities:

We have so much in common. We’re both young countries born of struggle and sacrifice. We’re both founded by immigrants escaping religious persecution. We have both established vibrant democracies built on the rule of law and open markets. We’re both founded on certain basic beliefs, that God watches over the affairs of men, and that freedom is the Almighty God’s gift to every man and woman on the face of this earth. These ties have made us natural allies, and these ties will never be broken.

Simple but not simple minded. And the unstated ties between Israel and the United States are perhaps the most binding. We are joined at the hip as the result of the unspeakable atrocity of the holocaust. There is only one nation on earth with the ability and yes, the moral authority to see that the Jewish people never suffer such a blow again. The world community has proved itself fickle in its support for a Jewish state. And while the nation of Israel is perfectly capable of defending itself, the steadfast support of the United States in its times of trial over the last 60 years has benefited both countries.

We are morally committed to the survival of the Jewish state, a commitment unlike any other we have made to any other country. Unlike his critics, the President understands this and sees Israel’s war against Hizbullah for what it is; a fight for the tiny state’s right to exist. The terrorists and their sponsors in Damascus and Tehran have made no secret of their desire to see Israel destroyed. One wonders why the President’s numerous critics both here and abroad pretend that such hatred doesn’t exist or that it can be reasoned with or bargained away.

Perhaps seeing the world the way George sees it might not be such a bad thing after all.

Alright, I’m being flip and disrespectful about this, but C’mon Mr. Talabani! We’ve had enough pie in the sky pronouncements from our own people. We don’t need it from someone ostensibly charged with the responsibility of working to improve the dire security situation of his people:

President Jalal Talabani said Wednesday that Iraqi forces will assume security duties for the whole country by the end of the year, taking over responsibility from U.S. and other foreign troops now policing all but one of the 18 provinces. The optimistic forecast came during a relative lull in the violence wracking Iraq. Police said nine people were slain Wednesday, a day after a wave of bombings and shootings killed more than 70.

Iraqi leaders had said previously that their goal was to be fully in control of security by the end of 2006, but Talabani’s statement was the most specific.

The president, a Kurd from northern Iraq, said the government is confident it will vanquish extremist groups, calling the recent surge in violence as “the last arrows in their pockets.”

“We are highly optimistic that we will terminate terrorism in this year,” he said.

Nearly a quarter million Iraqis have been displaced by the sectarian violence that rages on a daily basis. Death squads are running rampant in Baghdad and its environs killing more than 100 a day. You still have a Sunni insurgency with upwards of 20,000 hardened fighters setting off car bombs and IED’s. The loyalty of many of your police (not so much the army) is still suspect. And Mookie al-Sadr and his merry band of torturing thugs flips the bird at you and your government every single day.

On top of that, you have forces at work that are tearing the country apart with Kurdish separatism in the north a growing menace and Shia nationalism asserting itself in the south.

The Turks are mad as hornets at Kurdish terrorism and may invade in order to stop it while Iran and Syria laugh in the face of the United States and your government while supplying everyone who is raising a hand against you with arms.

Shall I go on?

Corruption, an inability to compromise, infrastructure problems, an intelligentsia and middle class fleeing for their lives (estimated 500,000 have left the country in the last 2 years), and an economy that is swirling down the proverbial toilet.

And you want to police all of this with what American commanders are telling us is perhaps as few as 6 or 7 brigades of competently trained soldiers?

Gimme whatever you’re smoking, Mr. President ’cause its better’n what I got ’shyear.

Seriously, this statement by the President doesn’t mean diddly. He has very little power, constitutionally speaking although he is a well respected man. He may just be reiterating the mantra chanted by other Iraqi politicians who need to get the Americans out of the country as soon as possible.

And don’t worry. We’re not going anywhere. In fact, in the next couple of weeks, we’re going to start wiping the smile off Mookie al-Sadr’s face - and there will be no one to save him this time. Ditto for the Badr Brigades in the south as well as the Sunni militias not associated with the insurgency who have sprung up in Baghdad in answer to the Shia militia’s death squads.

The kidnappers, the gangs, and other criminals will be a matter for the Iraqi forces to deal with. If Prime Minister Maliki is serious about cracking down - and in many ways his life depends on him being serious - what we are about to witness in the next fortnight is what we should have done two years ago but were prevented by the Ayatollah al-Sistani - kill al-Sadr and destroy his Iranian-loving militia.

My guess is that by the end of the year, the security situation will have improved noticeably but will be no where near what it should be. It will take a long time to rid Iraq of the devils that torment her. But given time and the skills of the United States military, it will be possible.

As long as her leaders don’t act like a bunch of Pollyannas in pigtails, that is…

I’LL HAVE THE LATEST ON THE ISRAELI-ISLAMIST WAR ON THE RICK MORAN SHOW, 7:00 AM - 9:00 AM CENTRAL ON WIDEAWAKES RADIO. ACCESS THE STREAM HERE.

This could be the best news of the war.

The IDF is carrying out some kind of ground operation with heavy air support in the Bekaa Valley, more than 60 miles north and east of the Litani River (almost 75 miles from the Israeli-Lebanon border). Troops are engaged in heavy fighting with Hizbullah’s best troops near - and get this - the ancient city of Baalbek.

Lebanese army and security officials said a major Israel Defense Forces operation was underway against suspected Hezbollah positions near Baalbek in eastern Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley late Tuesday. IDF troops thrust deep into the area, landing troops by helicopter in the Hezbollah heartland.

Lebanese security sources said IDF soldiers had landed by helicopter near Baalbek as aircraft launched several strikes in the region.

One Lebanese officer saying the Israel Air Force presence in the air above the ancient city was “unprecedented.”

Lebanese army and security officials said a major IDF operation was under way against suspected Hezbollah positions near Baalbek.

Baalbek just happens to be where the Syrians maintained their headquarters during the occupation of Lebanon. It is also the place where Iranian Revolutionary Guards were quartered during their announced stay in Lebanon during the 80’s.

The Lebanese have accused the Syrians of never entirely leaving Lebanon, maintaining an outpost in the Bekaa Valley and being given cover by Hizbullah. It is also thought that the Iranians never left Lebanon either, handling logistical support for the terrorists also in Bekaa.

Could the Israelis be going after the Syrian and Iranian personnel stationed in the Bekaa?

The bulk of Hizbullah’s best fighters are stationed in the Bekaa Valley, being too valuable to risk in any stand-up fight with the IDF. The small sized operations carried out by the IDF prior to today netted only several hundred of the estimated 3,000 of these crack troops. Most analysts believed that in order for the IDF to really hurt Hizbullah, some kind of Bekaa operation was an absolute necessity.

Is this a raid? Or are these troops the vanguard of a major thrust aimed at the heart of Hizbullah? And what about any stray Syrians or Iranians? What would be the consequences of the IDF busting up any kind of logistical and/or intel operations being carried out by the terrorist’s patrons?

The next 48 hours will be the most crucial in this war. They will probably answer the questions above as well as decide the question of how serious the Israelis are about winning through to a decisive victory.

UPDATE

At the moment, this strike appears to be a Special Forces operation aimed at a hospital in Baalbek:

Hezbollah’s chief spokesman, Hussein Rahal, told The Associated Press that Israeli troops landed near Dar al-Hikma Hospital and that fierce fighting continued to rage for more than one hour.

“A group of Israeli commandos was brought to the hospital by a helicopter. They entered the hospital and are trapped inside as our fighters opened fire on them and fierce fighting is still raging,” Rahal said.

Rahal said Hezbollah guerrillas were using automatic rifles and rocket-propelled grenades. He dismissed as “untrue” reports that the Israeli commandos managed to snatch some patients from the hospital and spirit them away in helicopters. He said Israel jets were attacking the surrounding guerrilla force with rockets.

The IDF snatching patients from a hospital? Could it be that those “patients” were none other than the two IDF soldiers kidnapped by Hizbullah on July 12?

Jumping to conclusions is an occupational hazard for a blogger. Patience in this case, will reveal all.

UPDATE II

YNet News is reporting additional strikes against Hemel as well as the bombing of several key border crossings between Syria and Lebanon:

Just hours after the conclusion of the meeting, witnesses reported that Israeli warplanes targeted the Hizbullah stronghold of Hermel deep inside Lebanon early Tuesday, despite Israel’s 48 hours suspension of air strikes. Warplanes fired at least five air-to-surface missiles on the town, witnesses said. Another strike targeted an area near the Syrian border.

The J-Post offers more details:

Earlier, fighter-bombers struck deep inside the country, hitting the Hizbullah stronghold of Hermel, some 120 km. north of the border in the Bekaa Valley, witnesses said. Planes also hit Hizbullah fighters battling with soldiers near the border, as the gunmen fired mortars into Israel.

About six hours later, jets returned to attack Hermel again, hitting a pickup truck loaded with cooking gas canisters, security officials said. The canisters exploded, sending flames shooting up from the vehicle for nearly an hour. The driver had pulled over and exited the vehicle before the attack, and was not hurt, they said.

Another strike at an area near the Syrian border, about 10 km. north of Hermel, targeted the Qaa-Homs road, one of four official crossing points between Lebanon and Syria. Lebanon’s official news agency reported IAF jets also hit early Tuesday near the Masnaa crossing into Syria, which was attacked several times in the last three days.

Tuesday’s air strikes meant that two of the four border crossings are now closed because of damage. Repeated air strikes have made the main Beirut-Damascus highway impassable.

Sure is a lot of air activity for a raid. The IDF has still only committed a fraction of its force of more than 10,000 crack troops along the border with Lebanon, no more than regiment-sized engagements.

Could they be preparing for a lightening quick thrust into Bekaa, bypassing Hez strong points in the south and racing north in an effort to engage the bulk of Nasrallah’s men in the Bekaa Valley?

More rank speculation from an amatuer to be sure. But the IDF clearly needs to do something spectacular in order to turn the tide of perceptions about this war from an Israeli defeat into a smashing victory.

UPDATE III 8/2

Bill Roggio reports that the IDF Special Forces captured several low-level Hizbullah officials - including one with an interesting name:

The commandos were extracted from the scene after a fierce gun battle which included air strikes and strafing runs on Hezbollah positions outside the hospital, The commandos did not leave empty handed, and “took a number of Hizbullah officials captive.” Haaretz reports 3 to 5 “junior Hezbollah militants” were captured, and several more were killed during the raid. “[Lebanese sources] identified the men as Hussein Nasrallah, Hussein al-Burji and Ahmed al-Ghotah and described them as low ranking members of the group,” according to Haaretz, and “The captured Hussein Nasrallah has the same name as a Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah.”

Coincidence?

Also, check out the excellent map at CTB showing exactly where in the Bekaa Israel hit. It appears the IAF is trying to choke off any Syrian attempt at resupplying their friends in Hizbullah. They could also be trying to forestall any attempt by Syria to assist Hizbullah if the IDF decides to make a major thrust into the Valley.

The Israeli Air Force has changed its story on how and why the ancient village of Qana was bombed, raising questions about a host of military/civilian issues that demand answers.:

It now appears that the military had no information on rockets launched from the site of the building, or the presence of Hezbollah men at the time.

The Israel Defense Forces had said after the deadly air-strike that many rockets had been launched from Qana. However, it changed its version on Monday.

The site was included in an IAF plan to strike at several buildings in proximity to a previous launching site. Similar strikes were carried out in the past. However, there were no rocket launches from Qana on the day of the strike.

To sum up; no Hizbullah rockets launched from the building or in the vicinity, none apparently even launched from Qana that day, it was not in retaliation for a rocket launch but rather part of a “plan” to strike the building, and that “mysterious” 8 hour gap could very well not even exist:

The IDF account and those of survivors present contradictory versions of the Qana deaths. The IDF said that there is an unexplained gap of about seven hours between the IAF strike and the first report that the building had collapsed. Residents’ accounts say only 10 minutes went by between the strike and the collapse.

The survivors say rescue teams arrived only in the morning, as night conditions made the rescue mission difficult. The Red Cross in Tyre received a call for help only in the morning, explaining their late arrival.

First and foremost, those who are blogging this story should step back for a while and wait for the IDF report on the tragedy which should be forthcoming in the next couple of days. This appears to be one of those stories where the bloggers got ahead of the curve of information so far that speculation took on a life of its own and ended up making some wish they had held their fire.

The immediacy and impact of blogs makes delving into stories like the Qana bombing a treacherous undertaking. It is one thing to relay media reports like those from Qana that suggested there was an 8 hour lag time in the building’s demolition as well as IAF statements that have now turned out to be false. But it is quite another to engage in the kind of rank speculation that posited the notion that the collapse of the building was due to the enemy bringing down the building on top of those civilians instead of an Israeli bomb.

This in no way should give Hizbullah a free pass for their shameful dog and pony show with the dead bodies of children found in the rubble. Nor does it excuse the AP, Reuters, and other news organizations who always seem to be there to act as Hizbullah’s private PR team.

And while there are still legitimate questions that need to be answered about several issues surrounding the bombing, what the IAF is admitting here does not reflect well on their targeting policies. Based on the best intelligence available to them, it nevertheless appears that the IAF made a tragic and perhaps avoidable mistake.

Given the professionalism and yes, the humanity of the IDF, I fully expect an investigation into the incident to include the decision making process that led to authorizing the mission to bomb the building.

Meanwhile, Hizbullah gets a free pass from most of the world for firing missiles at Israeli cities, probably praying to Allah before launch that the rockets hit a building and kill as many Israeli civilians as possible. The contrast between the two sides should be highlighted at every possible opportunity; when Israel hits a civilian target, it is a mistake, cause for mourning and a re-examination of military protocols. When Hizbullah hits a civilian target, it is a cause for celebration and probably rates a pat on the back to those who launched the rocket.

UPDATE

Confederate Yankee makes two excellent points:

1. That the building was used to store munitions.

2. Evidence for the almost immediate collapse comes via an “eyewitness” who may or may not be telling the truth.

He also links to The Left Coaster who thinks piles on Israel’s supporters for daring to speculate that Hizbullah could have engineered the entire incident. This from a moonbat who wrote this measured, thoughtful piece on the day of the tragedy at Qana:

God damn you Mr. President for what you, yes you have done to this country. You, your satanic Vice President and Secretary of Defense, and your inept Secretary of State have besmirched the integrity and dignity of this country for far too long. I fear that we will all now pay a price for it. With his green light and wink and a nod relationship with Israel, Bush has blood on his hands tonight just as much as the Israelis. …

Burn in hell Mr. Bush. Your foreign policy team is waiting for you there. No matter how quickly you try and weasel your way away from this and towards a face-saving call for a cease fire, this hangs around your neck, and there is nothing you can do to change that.

This is what passes for rational thought on the left.