August 16th, 2006
So, Monday and Tuesday was filled with news of various world leaders patting each other on the back as to who won in the latest Middle East Crisis, this Israel/Hezbollah Conflict.
“We are today before a strategic, historic victory, without exaggeration,” Hezbollah’s leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, said in a televised speech that was met with celebratory gunfire in the Shia suburbs of Beirut.
“We emerged from the battle with our heads high, and our enemy is the one who is defeated.”
In an impassioned address to the Knesset, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said “the IDF warriors always had the upper hand,” and promised to hunt down Hezbollah’s leaders. [“Israel, Hezbollah claim victory” (globalandmail.com)]
“Hezbollah attacked Israel, Hezbollah started the crisis, and Hezbollah suffered a defeat in this crisis,” Bush said. [“U.S. ‘freedom agenda; big winner in Lebanon War, Bush says” (Canada.com)]
Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad claimed Hezbollah had emerged the winner in Lebanon and called the battles with Israel “God’s promise”. [“Iran president hails Hezbollah victory” (Ireland Online)
The President of Syria said today that the map of the Middle East had been redrawn by Hezbollah’s “victory” in its five-week war with Israel.
In a rare public speech, Bashir al-Assad said that the once invincible Israeli army had been humiliated and that the Jewish state would do well to seek peace and hand back occupied Arab land - or risk more defeats if it tried to pursue “terrorist policies” in the future.[“Syria declares victory in Lebanon conflict” (TimesOnline.co.uk)]
Probably the silliest thing to come out of Israel’s mini-war with Hezbollah in Lebanon is the posturing over who “won.”
Nobody won.[“No ‘winner’ in the conflict, but Palestinians are losers” (PensacolaNewsJournal.com)
This morning NPR was interviewing a family of Israelis returning to their homes for the first time since last Friday after it had been hit by a Hezbollah rocket. The father/husband/man of the house said what I think none of the news, military and government analysts get — except maybe The Pensacola News Journal — when asked about who he thought won the war, he basically said, “No one wins wars, there are only losers and losers.”
In the end, I wonder if governments and world leaders and terrorists and ideological fanatic folks and such stopped to ask those of us who are just trying to get through our lives every day if we would be interested in going to war and killing and destroying, I wonder how many of us would really be interested in the whole idea.
The king of Zor, he called for war
And the king of Zam, he answered.
They fashioned their weapons one upon one
Ton upon ton, they called for war at the rise of the sun.
Out went the call to one and to all
That echoed and rolled like the thunder.
Trumpets and drums, roar upon roar
More upon more.
Rolling the call of Come now to war.
Throughout the night they fashioned their might
With right on the side of the mighty.
They puzzled their minds plan upon plan
Man upon man
And at dying of dawn the great war began.
They met on the battlefield banner in hand.
They looked out across the vacant land.
And they counted the missing, one upon one,
None upon none.
The war it was over before it begun.
Two little kings playing a game.
They gave a war and nobody came.
And nobody came.
And nobody came.
And nobody came.
And nobody came.
[repeat and fade]
There is no pause:
The king of Zor, he called for war
And the king of Zam, he answered.
They fashioned their weapons one upon one
Ton upon ton, they called for war at the rise of the sun.
Out went the call to one and to all
That echoed and rolled like the thunder.
Trumpets and drums, roar upon roar
More upon more.
Rolling the call of Come now to war.
Throughout the night they fashioned their might
With right on the side of the mighty.
They puzzled their minds plan upon plan
Man upon man
And at dying of dawn the great war began.
They met on the battlefield banner in hand.
They looked out across the vacant land.
And they counted the missing, one upon one,
None upon none.
The war it was over before it begun.
Two little kings playing a game.
They gave a war and nobody came.
And nobody came.
And nobody came.
And nobody came.
And nobody came.
[”Zor and Zam”, The Monkees, 1968, The Birds, The Bees & The Monkees]
Tags: Israel, Lebanon, NPR, Hezbollah, The Monkees, Ehud Olmert, IDF, Hassan Nasrallah, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran, George W. Bush, Syria, Bashir al-Assad, Middle East, politics
July 28th, 2006
Secretary of State Condi Rice’s prediction of a “New Middle East” may have been dead on, but I don’t think what’s happening over there now is what the White House and Israel had in mind. As a result of the US’s refusal to publically support any call for any sort of cease-fire between Israel and Hezbollah and in fact, the US’s apparently brazen and seemingly hypocritical encouragement of Israel to bomb the hell out of a weaker country on the very verge of the kind of democracy the US supposedly promotes, the U.S. and Israel may have finally done what no one has been able to accomplish in the Middle East in ages — Unite the Middle East.
Well, unite most of the Middle East against Israel and the U.S. anyway. It seems like organizations and countries and religious groups who would normally never consider cooperating are rushing to Lebanon’s aid and Hezbollah’s defense.
(emphasis mine)
At the onset of the Lebanese crisis, Arab governments, starting with Saudi Arabia, slammed Hezbollah for recklessly provoking a war, providing what the United States and Israel took as a wink and a nod to continue the fight.
Now, with hundreds of Lebanese dead and Hezbollah holding out against the vaunted Israeli military for more than two weeks, the tide of public opinion across the Arab world is surging behind the organization, transforming the Shiite group’s leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, into a folk hero and forcing a change in official statements.
The Saudi royal family and King Abdullah II of Jordan, who were initially more worried about the rising power of Shiite Iran, Hezbollah’s main sponsor, are scrambling to distance themselves from Washington.
An outpouring of newspaper columns, cartoons, blogs and public poetry readings have showered praise on Hezbollah while attacking the United States and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice for trumpeting American plans for a “new Middle East” that they say has led only to violence and repression.
Even Al Qaeda, run by violent Sunni Muslim extremists normally hostile to all Shiites, has gotten into the act, with its deputy leader, Ayman al-Zawahri, releasing a taped message saying that through its fighting in Iraq, his organization was also trying to liberate Palestine.
Mouin Rabbani, a senior Middle East analyst in Amman, Jordan, with the International Crisis Group, said, “The Arab-Israeli conflict remains the most potent issue in this part of the world.”
Distinctive changes in tone are audible throughout the Sunni world. This week, President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt emphasized his attempts to arrange a cease-fire to protect all sects in Lebanon, while the Jordanian king announced that his country was dispatching medical teams “for the victims of Israeli aggression.” Both countries have peace treaties with Israel.
The Saudi royal court has issued a dire warning that its 2002 peace plan — offering Israel full recognition by all Arab states in exchange for returning to the borders that predated the 1967 Arab-Israeli war — could well perish.
“If the peace option is rejected due to the Israeli arrogance,” it said, “then only the war option remains, and no one knows the repercussions befalling the region, including wars and conflict that will spare no one, including those whose military power is now tempting them to play with fire.”
The Saudis were putting the West on notice that they would not exert pressure on anyone in the Arab world until Washington did something to halt the destruction of Lebanon, Saudi commentators said.
American officials say that while the Arab leaders need to take a harder line publicly for domestic political reasons, what matters more is what they tell the United States in private, which the Americans still see as a wink and a nod.
There are evident concerns among Arab governments that a victory for Hezbollah — and it has already achieved something of a victory by holding out this long — would further nourish the Islamist tide engulfing the region and challenge their authority. Hence their first priority is to cool simmering public opinion.
But perhaps not since President Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt made his emotional outpourings about Arab unity in the 1960’s, before the Arab defeat in the 1967 war, has the public been so electrified by a confrontation with Israel, played out repeatedly on satellite television stations with horrific images from Lebanon of wounded children and distraught women fleeing their homes. [“Tide of Arab Opinion Turns to Support for Hezzbolla”(The New York Times)]
Hat Tip: Brilliant at Breakfast
Tags: Israel, Lebanon, Hezbollah, Egypt, Arab governments, Middle East, Saudi Arabia, Sunnis, President Hosni Mubarak, Iran, al-Qaeda, al-Zawahiri, Palestine, Condi Rice, Shiiti, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, King Abdullah II of Jordan
