Friday, July 21, 2006

Who Started the War in Lebanon

Ed Koch nails it:

It's long been said that when war comes, truth is the first casualty. War has come to Israel, Gaza and Lebanon. Let us remember the truth about how this war started.

In Gaza, Hamas terrorists dug a half-mile tunnel into Israel, killing two Israeli soldiers and taking one prisoner. The Israeli army responded by counter-attacking the Gaza Strip, which is now ruled by a Hamas government. Since its recent election to power, the Hamas government has not only refused to recognize the State of Israel, it has restated its goal of destroying Israel and replacing it with a single Islamic state running from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea. Hamas will not recognize any prior agreements made by Arafat with Israel. The Hamas regime has publicly endorsed the use of terror — the killing of Israeli civilians in Israel — to achieve its goals.

A second front was opened on Israel’s border with Lebanon on July 11th, with Hezbollah crossing Israel’s border killing eight Israeli soldiers and taking two soldiers prisoner. Hezbollah has rained more than 1,000 missiles down on Israel, inflicting 24 deaths and 300 casualties. Hezbollah is part of the Lebanese government having several cabinet ministers and 13 members of parliament. Hezbollah has been ceded by the Lebanese government the right to control southern Lebanon and its border with Israel. The leader of Hezbollah, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, has threatened before and during these latest hostilities the destruction of the State of Israel.

Despite all sniveling to the contrary, if Lebanon is stupid enough to join forces with Hezbollah they will deserve whatever they get.

Update: The "mainstream media" continues to tout the Hezbollah/Iranian/UN Party Line. Consider this headline of a Reuters "news" report: "Casualties mount in Israel war in Lebanon." No comment required on this.

Rami Khouri is editor of the Beirut based Daily Star newspaper. His bio is revealing regarding those who are US citizens for convenience but will never consider themselves to be Americans: "Rami George Khouri is a Palestinian-Jordanian and US citizen whose family resides in Beirut, Amman, and Nazareth."

Khouri wrote an article yesterday where he trots out the standard line of Arab as Victim. Read it closely to discover the mindset of the moderate Middle-Easterner. Here are the money quotes:

Protecting Israelis while leaving Arabs to a fate of humiliation, occupation, degradation and subservient acquiescence to Israeli-American dictates only guarantees that those Arabs will regroup, plan a resistance strategy, and come back one day to fight for their land, their humanity, their dignity and the prospect that their children can have a normal life one day.

Three Arab parties to date developed missiles of various sorts that can strike Israel from greater and greater distances. Iraq, Hamas and Hizbullah have all fired rockets and missiles at Israel, making the concept of buffer zones militarily obsolete and politically irrelevant. New buffer zones imposed by the international community to protect Israel, while leaving Arab grievances to rot, will only prompt a greater determination by the next generation of young Arab men and women to develop the means to fight back, some day, in some way that we cannot now predict.

Khouri, and those who agree with him, are either fools or worse. He fails to mention that Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran have sworn to "wipe Israel off the map." What's left to negotiate after a declaration of war by extermination? Here is a man impervious to reality who chooses to wallow in delusions. If the Arab world had simply accepted the UN resolutions that created Israel, there would be peace and prosperity in the region. The Arab people in the region by supporting Hezbollah, Hamas, the Moslem Brotherhood and the rest have made their decision. Now they have to deal with the consequences. Whining never changed reality.

Hat tip: Ralph "So long as western diplomacy concentrates on the protection of Israel and leaves Palestinian and Arab grievances unaddressed, there will be no peace" Luker at Cliopatria. I'm not quoting history professor Luker out of context. Surrendering to genocidal terrorists is his recommendation to Israel for "peace."

Crossposted at The Dougout

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