Now that Reutergate has caught our attention, it's informative to look at certain other questionable aspects of Reuters policy.
For example, Reuters is famous for refusing to use the word "terrorist" in its copy or headlines.
Two years ago, Reuters made an amazing admission about this practice. I missed it at the time, but now it takes on greater significance. I had always thought that the failure of Reuters to use the "t" word was based on some abstract principle of "innocent till proven guilty," combined with an incomprehensible bias in favor of those in the Mideast with grievances against the West.
But it turns out I was wrong. Reuters's motivations are not even that lofty. They could best be described under the general rubric "CYA."
Oh, but let me present it in Reuters's own words--that is, the words of Reuter's managing editor David A. Schlesinger. Back in September of 2004 when CanWest, the owners of a large Canadian newspaper chain, decided to substitute "terrorists" for "militants" in Reuters's mealy-mouthed articles, Schlesinger said CanWest would be required to remove the Reuters label from such demonizing pieces:
"Our editorial policy is that we don't use emotive words when labeling someone," said David A. Schlesinger, Reuters' global managing editor. "Any paper can change copy and do whatever they want. But if a paper wants to change our copy that way, we would be more comfortable if they remove the byline."
Mr. Schlesinger said he was concerned that changes like those made at CanWest could lead to "confusion" about what Reuters is reporting and possibly endanger its reporters in volatile areas or situations.
"My goal is to protect our reporters and protect our editorial integrity," he said.
So, it's Eason Jordan all over again. The words "editorial integrity" used to mean telling the truth; at least I thought so. But truth? Fahgetabout it, says Reuters. What does matter, instead? Press access: Reuters's ability to bring you all the news that's not fit to print.
How has it come to this? Oh, believe me, I understand the need for journalists to live to write another day. But if telling the truth is too dangerous, then it's time to get out and tell it from another place.
Because you've outlived your usefulness as journalists if you compromise that much. You've become the tools of terrorists--and I doubt even Mr. Schlesinger had that particular goal in mind when he chose his profession.
Tuesday, August 08, 2006
Monday, August 07, 2006
Israel and Lebanon: let's play dominoes
To some, the war in Lebanon and Israel may look like just another skirmish in that long-running "cycle-of-violence" film. To others--and I count myself among them--something quite different is going on. And it's a different "something" than has been going on until now in that region, and that "something" is the growing power and reach of Iran.
Those who support Israel have always seen the Mideast wars as fights for Israel's existence against those ranged to destroy it. But Israel always prevailed. Its enemies seemed unable to fight effectively, or to be in disarray, despite periodic help from powers such as the once-mighty USSR. Those who prefer to think Israel culpable--and even evil--still saw it as powerful compared to its enemies. In fact, that's one of the reasons those people supported those enemies--in sympathy for what was perceived as their weakness and downtroddenness. It certainly couldn't have been their glorious devotion to human rights.
At the beginning of this war many people (including myself) wrote of the Lebanese people as being held hostage by Hezbollah, as having been reluctantly dragged into this fight against their will. But, although that is certainly true for many Lebanese, it's become more apparent that there are a vast number of Hezbollah supporters in that country.
What else has become apparent? The extent to which the Lebanese government has been coopted by Hezbollah, and by its masters Syria and especially Iran.
Take a look at Alexandra's an excellent post on the subject. Iran is behind a great deal of the turmoil in Iraq, via al Sadr; it is behind Hezbollah. And Iran has declared itself boldly: it is dedicated to the destruction of the great and little Satans, the US and Israel.
So here's another domino theory for you, updated: Iran is bent on hegemony, and Lebanon is a pawn in the game. Take a stand here, and it might help stop Iran. Give in, and more than Lebanon may be lost. Think Czechslovakia in World War II.
The situation is further complicated by the fact that we are now in an atomic age. Previous tyrants never had access to destructive means of this magnitude. But now they do. This particular marriage of tyranny, religious megalomania, and nuclear physics has never been consummated before. But get ready: that horrific menage a trois is about to take its vows.
At the moment, Israel is fighting for its life. Some care about that, some don't. Some would cheer if the entire country were wiped off the face of the earth. But make no mistake. The words of Eric Hoffer, written in 1968, resonate with eerie prescience:
I have a premonition that will not leave me; as it goes with Israel, so will it go with all of us. Should Israel perish, the holocaust will be upon us.
Is this another siege of Vienna, one of those pivot points in history? If so, let's fervently hope it pivots in the right direction.
And the first step towards that goal is recognition that this is not a minor skirmish. Israel is fighting for its life, but not only for its life. It's fighting for the West and the Enlightenment against formidable and implacable forces of darkness and religious tyranny.
Language like that is easy to mock in our postmodern world. So very apocalyptic, so over-the-top, so un-PC! But ignore and minimize this situation at your peril. Some day, the bell may toll for thee.
[ADDENDUM: Siniora, a man without a country.]
Those who support Israel have always seen the Mideast wars as fights for Israel's existence against those ranged to destroy it. But Israel always prevailed. Its enemies seemed unable to fight effectively, or to be in disarray, despite periodic help from powers such as the once-mighty USSR. Those who prefer to think Israel culpable--and even evil--still saw it as powerful compared to its enemies. In fact, that's one of the reasons those people supported those enemies--in sympathy for what was perceived as their weakness and downtroddenness. It certainly couldn't have been their glorious devotion to human rights.
At the beginning of this war many people (including myself) wrote of the Lebanese people as being held hostage by Hezbollah, as having been reluctantly dragged into this fight against their will. But, although that is certainly true for many Lebanese, it's become more apparent that there are a vast number of Hezbollah supporters in that country.
What else has become apparent? The extent to which the Lebanese government has been coopted by Hezbollah, and by its masters Syria and especially Iran.
Take a look at Alexandra's an excellent post on the subject. Iran is behind a great deal of the turmoil in Iraq, via al Sadr; it is behind Hezbollah. And Iran has declared itself boldly: it is dedicated to the destruction of the great and little Satans, the US and Israel.
So here's another domino theory for you, updated: Iran is bent on hegemony, and Lebanon is a pawn in the game. Take a stand here, and it might help stop Iran. Give in, and more than Lebanon may be lost. Think Czechslovakia in World War II.
The situation is further complicated by the fact that we are now in an atomic age. Previous tyrants never had access to destructive means of this magnitude. But now they do. This particular marriage of tyranny, religious megalomania, and nuclear physics has never been consummated before. But get ready: that horrific menage a trois is about to take its vows.
At the moment, Israel is fighting for its life. Some care about that, some don't. Some would cheer if the entire country were wiped off the face of the earth. But make no mistake. The words of Eric Hoffer, written in 1968, resonate with eerie prescience:
I have a premonition that will not leave me; as it goes with Israel, so will it go with all of us. Should Israel perish, the holocaust will be upon us.
Is this another siege of Vienna, one of those pivot points in history? If so, let's fervently hope it pivots in the right direction.
And the first step towards that goal is recognition that this is not a minor skirmish. Israel is fighting for its life, but not only for its life. It's fighting for the West and the Enlightenment against formidable and implacable forces of darkness and religious tyranny.
Language like that is easy to mock in our postmodern world. So very apocalyptic, so over-the-top, so un-PC! But ignore and minimize this situation at your peril. Some day, the bell may toll for thee.
[ADDENDUM: Siniora, a man without a country.]
Reuters rides again
The plot thickens.
[ADDENDUM: Could it be that Reuters is finally concerned about its own dwindling reputation, if not the state of the Western World? Perhaps.
Reuters also said today it had put in place a tighter editing procedure for images of the Middle East conflict to ensure that no photograph from the region would be transmitted to subscribers without review by the most senior editor on the Reuters Global Pictures Desk, according to a Reuters spokeswoman.
Now if only they could do the same for their editorial policy, and their headlines.]
[ADDENDUM: Could it be that Reuters is finally concerned about its own dwindling reputation, if not the state of the Western World? Perhaps.
Reuters also said today it had put in place a tighter editing procedure for images of the Middle East conflict to ensure that no photograph from the region would be transmitted to subscribers without review by the most senior editor on the Reuters Global Pictures Desk, according to a Reuters spokeswoman.
Now if only they could do the same for their editorial policy, and their headlines.]
Sunday, August 06, 2006
Reutergate: the blogosphere fact-checks your ass; what do you fact-check?
Kate of Small Dead Animals has given the story the perfect name: Reutergate.
Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs (he of "Rathergate" and the superimposed forged memos fame) has caught Reuters red-handed in allowing a Photoshopped image of the war in Lebanon to pass muster. Once again, the blogosphere is living up to its unofficial motto: "we fact-check your ass."
Reuters--unlike Rather--has admitted the fraud and removed the photo. And perhaps the most interesting factoid about the entire story is the identity of the photographer, one Adnan Hajj, who was also the Reuters photographer at Qana.
The original "gate"--Watergate--was huge news at the time. But as the years have rolled by, and nearly every scandal has been given the "gate" appellation, most of them have been of little or no consequence.
Reutergate should be important, but not just because of this particular incident--which, in isolation, would not matter a whole lot. Its importance lies in the fact that it's part of a larger pattern in which once-respected news agencies and newspapers have become compromised. Not only do they regularly violate the cardinal rule of journalism--fact-checking and photo-checking: in short, truth--but they have become the willing or unwilling, ignorant or knowledgeable, tools of the enemy (see this).
Second Draft is a website devoted to explaining how the media has disseminated the lies of "Pallywood" around the globe, creating a fictional reality that has influenced perceptions about the Middle East, especially in Europe, where the most famous Pallywood oeuvre, "Caught in the Crossfire" (otherwise known as "the death of Mohamed al Durah"), was widely publicized and fueled anti-Israel sentiment. It's since become clear that in Qana the press coverage of the aftermath was at least partly a Pallywood production, as well.
I wonder how much coverage this incident will get outside of the blogosphere. And the blogs, unfortunately, are preaching mainly to the choir. Just now, for instance, I Googled "reuters photoshop lebanon," and all that came up in the way of news stories was an article in the Jerusalem Post, and a short one at that.
It remains to be seen if the MSM will even see this as a wakeup call to vet their stringers better, or whether it will end with the suspension of Adnan Hajj. But it's about much more than Hajj; the truth is that this photo wasn't even a good example of Photoshopping. As many observers have pointed out, it was crude and obvious and should have been caught--if anyone had been looking.
The same, of course, was true of the Dan Rather memos. Anyone familiar with the difference between a typewriter and a word processor could--and should--have seen the forgery. But one had to have been looking. And the press has stopped looking.
So it's not just about stringers, although that's part of it. Whether or not it's also about bias (and I happen to believe it is), at the very least it's about standards. The MSM needs to raise them, and to fact-check and photocheck and proofread itself in a new way. It needs to realize that it is now one of the major fronts in the war in which we are currently engaged, and that it's being co-opted by forces that are not only the enemy, but are the enemy of a free press as well.
Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs (he of "Rathergate" and the superimposed forged memos fame) has caught Reuters red-handed in allowing a Photoshopped image of the war in Lebanon to pass muster. Once again, the blogosphere is living up to its unofficial motto: "we fact-check your ass."
Reuters--unlike Rather--has admitted the fraud and removed the photo. And perhaps the most interesting factoid about the entire story is the identity of the photographer, one Adnan Hajj, who was also the Reuters photographer at Qana.
The original "gate"--Watergate--was huge news at the time. But as the years have rolled by, and nearly every scandal has been given the "gate" appellation, most of them have been of little or no consequence.
Reutergate should be important, but not just because of this particular incident--which, in isolation, would not matter a whole lot. Its importance lies in the fact that it's part of a larger pattern in which once-respected news agencies and newspapers have become compromised. Not only do they regularly violate the cardinal rule of journalism--fact-checking and photo-checking: in short, truth--but they have become the willing or unwilling, ignorant or knowledgeable, tools of the enemy (see this).
Second Draft is a website devoted to explaining how the media has disseminated the lies of "Pallywood" around the globe, creating a fictional reality that has influenced perceptions about the Middle East, especially in Europe, where the most famous Pallywood oeuvre, "Caught in the Crossfire" (otherwise known as "the death of Mohamed al Durah"), was widely publicized and fueled anti-Israel sentiment. It's since become clear that in Qana the press coverage of the aftermath was at least partly a Pallywood production, as well.
I wonder how much coverage this incident will get outside of the blogosphere. And the blogs, unfortunately, are preaching mainly to the choir. Just now, for instance, I Googled "reuters photoshop lebanon," and all that came up in the way of news stories was an article in the Jerusalem Post, and a short one at that.
It remains to be seen if the MSM will even see this as a wakeup call to vet their stringers better, or whether it will end with the suspension of Adnan Hajj. But it's about much more than Hajj; the truth is that this photo wasn't even a good example of Photoshopping. As many observers have pointed out, it was crude and obvious and should have been caught--if anyone had been looking.
The same, of course, was true of the Dan Rather memos. Anyone familiar with the difference between a typewriter and a word processor could--and should--have seen the forgery. But one had to have been looking. And the press has stopped looking.
So it's not just about stringers, although that's part of it. Whether or not it's also about bias (and I happen to believe it is), at the very least it's about standards. The MSM needs to raise them, and to fact-check and photocheck and proofread itself in a new way. It needs to realize that it is now one of the major fronts in the war in which we are currently engaged, and that it's being co-opted by forces that are not only the enemy, but are the enemy of a free press as well.
Saturday, August 05, 2006
Understanding the 30s: a new Serenity Prayer
Victor Davis Hanson has written a compelling piece on the current moral malaise in the West and its pernicious effects. It's a topic many of us have been hammering home lately, although Hanson--as usual--says it especially well.
Hanson makes a point I've thought about many times recently, which is that previously it seemed difficult to understand how so many people of the 1930s could be blind to what was happening in Germany--what it meant, what it would lead to, and why it was so important to stop Hitler before his power had grown.
How could they have not seen, not known? Ah, we would have been so much smarter than they were, if faced with the same circumstances!
But lately, along with Hanson, I'm having no difficulty imagining the mindset of the 30s, and how it must have felt to watch, as Churchill put it, The Gathering Storm.
And I keep thinking of the poet William Butler Yeats's masterpiece "The Second Coming" (written in 1919 after World War I), which presciently foretold the events of the 30s, as Yeats himself acknowledged. I've quoted it before, I'm quoting it now, and I probably will quote it again, with emphasis on two especially important and famous lines:
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Perhaps those two lines expresses a common truth of human nature, one that comes to the fore when a terrible danger is building: those doing the threatening are passionate and intense, and the majority of those reacting are confused and in denial. For who among us wants to face a truth so harsh, to look true evil in the eye and understand that to fight it will require great suffering on the part of innocent people?
But evildoers (in Bush's famous and much-maligned phrase) don't care about the anguish of innocents--although they pretend to, if it suits their propaganda purposes. Whereas the enemies of evil do care, and very much.
That's part of what gives many of those who would combat evil their lack of conviction: the need, at times, to fight fire with fire, to kill to prevent worse killing from happening, is something that is very difficult for compassionate people to accept.
It's almost as though we need a new version of the Serenity Prayer:
God grant us the serenity to change those things that can be changed with talk and diplomacy, the courage to fight for those things that require it, and the wisdom to know the difference.
Hanson makes a point I've thought about many times recently, which is that previously it seemed difficult to understand how so many people of the 1930s could be blind to what was happening in Germany--what it meant, what it would lead to, and why it was so important to stop Hitler before his power had grown.
How could they have not seen, not known? Ah, we would have been so much smarter than they were, if faced with the same circumstances!
But lately, along with Hanson, I'm having no difficulty imagining the mindset of the 30s, and how it must have felt to watch, as Churchill put it, The Gathering Storm.
And I keep thinking of the poet William Butler Yeats's masterpiece "The Second Coming" (written in 1919 after World War I), which presciently foretold the events of the 30s, as Yeats himself acknowledged. I've quoted it before, I'm quoting it now, and I probably will quote it again, with emphasis on two especially important and famous lines:
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Perhaps those two lines expresses a common truth of human nature, one that comes to the fore when a terrible danger is building: those doing the threatening are passionate and intense, and the majority of those reacting are confused and in denial. For who among us wants to face a truth so harsh, to look true evil in the eye and understand that to fight it will require great suffering on the part of innocent people?
But evildoers (in Bush's famous and much-maligned phrase) don't care about the anguish of innocents--although they pretend to, if it suits their propaganda purposes. Whereas the enemies of evil do care, and very much.
That's part of what gives many of those who would combat evil their lack of conviction: the need, at times, to fight fire with fire, to kill to prevent worse killing from happening, is something that is very difficult for compassionate people to accept.
It's almost as though we need a new version of the Serenity Prayer:
God grant us the serenity to change those things that can be changed with talk and diplomacy, the courage to fight for those things that require it, and the wisdom to know the difference.
It bears repeating: Eric Hoffer on Israel
It was written in 1968, and perhaps you are familiar with it: Eric Hoffer's piece on what he referred to as the "peculiar" position of Israel.
Hoffer's essay is not only still astoundingly pertinent today, but it's also notable for its brevity and clarity. So I thought it wouldn't be a bad idea to present it here in its entirety, as food for thought.
ISRAEL'S PECULIAR POSITION
By Eric Hoffer (LA Times 5/26/68)
The Jews are a peculiar people: Things permitted to other nations are forbidden to the Jews.
Other nations drive out thousands, even millions of people, and there is no refugee problem. Russia did it. Poland and Czechoslovakia did it. Turkey threw out a million Greeks, and Algeria a million Frenchmen. Indonesia threw out heaven knows how many Chinese--and no one says a word about refugees.
But in the case of Israel, the displaced Arabs have become eternal refugees. Everyone insists that Israel must take back every single Arab. Arnold Toynbee calls the displacement of the Arabs an atrocity greater than any committed by the Nazis. Other nations when victorious on the battlefield dictate peace terms. But when Israel is victorious it must sue for peace. Everyone expects the Jews to be the only real Christians in this world.
Other nations when they are defeated survive and recover, but should Israel be defeated it would be destroyed. Had Nasser triumphed last June, he would have wiped Israel off the map, and no one would have lifted a finger to save the Jews. No commitment to the Jews by any government, including our own, is worth the paper it is written on. There is a cry of outrage all over the world when people die in Vietnam or when two Negroes are executed in Rhodesia. But when Hitler slaughtered Jews no one remonstrated with him.
The Swedes, who are ready to break off diplomatic relations with America because of what we do in Vietnam, did not let out a peep when Hitler was slaughtering Jews. They sent Hitler choice iron ore and ball bearings, and serviced his troop trains to Norway.
The Jews are alone in the world. If Israel survives, it will be solely because of Jewish efforts and Jewish resources.
Yet at this moment Israel is our only reliable and unconditional ally. We can rely more on Israel than Israel can rely on us. And one has only to imagine what would have happened last summer had the Arabs and their Russian backers won the war to realize how vital the survival of Israel is to America and the West in general. I have a premonition that will not leave me; as it goes with Israel, so will it go with all of us. Should Israel perish, the holocaust will be upon us.
[Via Pajamas Media.]
[ADDENDUM: Change "the Arabs and their Russian backers" in Hoffer's essay to "the Arabs and Iranians and their (fill in the blanks) backers."]
Hoffer's essay is not only still astoundingly pertinent today, but it's also notable for its brevity and clarity. So I thought it wouldn't be a bad idea to present it here in its entirety, as food for thought.
ISRAEL'S PECULIAR POSITION
By Eric Hoffer (LA Times 5/26/68)
The Jews are a peculiar people: Things permitted to other nations are forbidden to the Jews.
Other nations drive out thousands, even millions of people, and there is no refugee problem. Russia did it. Poland and Czechoslovakia did it. Turkey threw out a million Greeks, and Algeria a million Frenchmen. Indonesia threw out heaven knows how many Chinese--and no one says a word about refugees.
But in the case of Israel, the displaced Arabs have become eternal refugees. Everyone insists that Israel must take back every single Arab. Arnold Toynbee calls the displacement of the Arabs an atrocity greater than any committed by the Nazis. Other nations when victorious on the battlefield dictate peace terms. But when Israel is victorious it must sue for peace. Everyone expects the Jews to be the only real Christians in this world.
Other nations when they are defeated survive and recover, but should Israel be defeated it would be destroyed. Had Nasser triumphed last June, he would have wiped Israel off the map, and no one would have lifted a finger to save the Jews. No commitment to the Jews by any government, including our own, is worth the paper it is written on. There is a cry of outrage all over the world when people die in Vietnam or when two Negroes are executed in Rhodesia. But when Hitler slaughtered Jews no one remonstrated with him.
The Swedes, who are ready to break off diplomatic relations with America because of what we do in Vietnam, did not let out a peep when Hitler was slaughtering Jews. They sent Hitler choice iron ore and ball bearings, and serviced his troop trains to Norway.
The Jews are alone in the world. If Israel survives, it will be solely because of Jewish efforts and Jewish resources.
Yet at this moment Israel is our only reliable and unconditional ally. We can rely more on Israel than Israel can rely on us. And one has only to imagine what would have happened last summer had the Arabs and their Russian backers won the war to realize how vital the survival of Israel is to America and the West in general. I have a premonition that will not leave me; as it goes with Israel, so will it go with all of us. Should Israel perish, the holocaust will be upon us.
[Via Pajamas Media.]
[ADDENDUM: Change "the Arabs and their Russian backers" in Hoffer's essay to "the Arabs and Iranians and their (fill in the blanks) backers."]
Friday, August 04, 2006
Israel: Athens or Sparta or Masada
Here's an astounding article (via Belmont Club) about three of the four founders of the Israeli peace movement (called "Four Mothers") that was largely responsible for the shift in Israeli attitudes leading to the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon in 2000.
Revisiting the views of these women now, six years later, provides a sort of "where are they now?" of the mind.
In the 1990's, they had lost children fighting the war in Lebanon. They felt that the war was being waged to little or no good, and became devoted to a withdrawal of forces from the country and to the cause of peace. These women not only gave peace a chance, they believed in it with a fervent zeal, they lived it and fought for it (metaphorically speaking), and thought they won it.
But read what they have to say now. It's not only a story about the process of how minds and opinions change (one of the themes of this blog), it's one of the best examples I've found of the fact that Israelis see the current war as a fight for their very survival--a grim necessity offering no alternatives.
One of the women, the eloquent Zohara Antebi, says of her previous commitment:
So if you are saying now that I was wrong when I believed that it would be possible to ensure far fewer casualties and far more quiet after leaving Lebanon, you're right. I was wrong. I'm afraid of those who are incapable of saying 'I was wrong' in the first person. I lived on the border, in Malkiya, and I saw the small tobacco plots of the farmers in southern Lebanon, and I believed that prosperity on both sides of the border would ensure quiet. That Nasrallah would aspire for his people to have a good life. In that I was wrong. I was definitely wrong.
And she says of the present war, and how it followed that previous withdrawal she helped engineer:
And leaving Lebanon then was not a military move. It was a civilian move. It was meant to enable us to be Athens, not Sparta. And precisely because of that there is now no choice. Now we have to change the diskette. This time we are fighting for our home. This time we are fighting so that we will have lives here.
Not all the women regret that initial withdrawal from Lebanon in 2000, nor connect it inexorably to the present war. But all are united in believing that the present war is absolutely necessary. As one of them, Orna Shimoni, says, it's an "existential war," fought for their very lives. The enemy has made it clear that the goal is to eliminate Israel. And Shimoni, who has always been affiliated with the left, and who abhors killing with all her being, is now angry at her former comrades in the left in Israel. Since she sees this war as a fight for Israel's very life, and the consequence of losing would be the slaughter of the Israelis, she sees the left as aiding and abetting that slaughter.
The article is eloquent about the intensity of the suffering the deaths of Israeli soldiers cause the Israeli people. Israel is a small country with universal conscription, and Jews are famously known--as many Arab commenters so succinctly put it--to "love life." The Jewish mother is legendary in her protective maternal instincts, so much so that in the US she's always good for a laugh in that regard--but just imagine those instincts coupled with the constant threat of losing so many young adult children in war.
The earliest wars in Israel, however, were very clearly for survival, and the mothers of the soldiers who fought in those wars were--if not actually Spartan--part of the tough and pioneering group who founded that country. The mothers of today's soldiers and the soldiers of the previous decade came of age in a different Israeli climate-- one that, if not exactly secure, was at least more secure, or perceived as such. As Antebi puts it, it was more Athenian and less Spartan.
The Lebanese occupation was ultimately perceived by that generation as unnecessary and even counterproductive and wrong, and the deaths as simply not worth it--much like the Vietnamese War came to be perceived here in the late 60s and early 70s, and much as the Afghan-Soviet War came to be perceived by the Russians. Thus, the 2000 pullout from Lebanon was widely supported throughout Israel.
But the events of recent years have taken away the dream of Oslo and the Camp David era. It's no longer about the Palestinians, either; not this war. This war is about Iran and its plan to dominate the Arab world, a plan that does not include the existence of Israel. And this is true whatever Israel does or does not do, whatever steps it takes or does not take--short of the entire country reenacting the legend of Masada and committing mass suicide.
[ADDENDUM: Listen to this podcast, an interview with Caroline Glick, available through Politics Central at Pajamas Media. Her contention is that Israel must win this war not only for its own sake, but to save the country of Lebanon from becoming a wholly-owned subsidiary of Iran.]
Revisiting the views of these women now, six years later, provides a sort of "where are they now?" of the mind.
In the 1990's, they had lost children fighting the war in Lebanon. They felt that the war was being waged to little or no good, and became devoted to a withdrawal of forces from the country and to the cause of peace. These women not only gave peace a chance, they believed in it with a fervent zeal, they lived it and fought for it (metaphorically speaking), and thought they won it.
But read what they have to say now. It's not only a story about the process of how minds and opinions change (one of the themes of this blog), it's one of the best examples I've found of the fact that Israelis see the current war as a fight for their very survival--a grim necessity offering no alternatives.
One of the women, the eloquent Zohara Antebi, says of her previous commitment:
So if you are saying now that I was wrong when I believed that it would be possible to ensure far fewer casualties and far more quiet after leaving Lebanon, you're right. I was wrong. I'm afraid of those who are incapable of saying 'I was wrong' in the first person. I lived on the border, in Malkiya, and I saw the small tobacco plots of the farmers in southern Lebanon, and I believed that prosperity on both sides of the border would ensure quiet. That Nasrallah would aspire for his people to have a good life. In that I was wrong. I was definitely wrong.
And she says of the present war, and how it followed that previous withdrawal she helped engineer:
And leaving Lebanon then was not a military move. It was a civilian move. It was meant to enable us to be Athens, not Sparta. And precisely because of that there is now no choice. Now we have to change the diskette. This time we are fighting for our home. This time we are fighting so that we will have lives here.
Not all the women regret that initial withdrawal from Lebanon in 2000, nor connect it inexorably to the present war. But all are united in believing that the present war is absolutely necessary. As one of them, Orna Shimoni, says, it's an "existential war," fought for their very lives. The enemy has made it clear that the goal is to eliminate Israel. And Shimoni, who has always been affiliated with the left, and who abhors killing with all her being, is now angry at her former comrades in the left in Israel. Since she sees this war as a fight for Israel's very life, and the consequence of losing would be the slaughter of the Israelis, she sees the left as aiding and abetting that slaughter.
The article is eloquent about the intensity of the suffering the deaths of Israeli soldiers cause the Israeli people. Israel is a small country with universal conscription, and Jews are famously known--as many Arab commenters so succinctly put it--to "love life." The Jewish mother is legendary in her protective maternal instincts, so much so that in the US she's always good for a laugh in that regard--but just imagine those instincts coupled with the constant threat of losing so many young adult children in war.
The earliest wars in Israel, however, were very clearly for survival, and the mothers of the soldiers who fought in those wars were--if not actually Spartan--part of the tough and pioneering group who founded that country. The mothers of today's soldiers and the soldiers of the previous decade came of age in a different Israeli climate-- one that, if not exactly secure, was at least more secure, or perceived as such. As Antebi puts it, it was more Athenian and less Spartan.
The Lebanese occupation was ultimately perceived by that generation as unnecessary and even counterproductive and wrong, and the deaths as simply not worth it--much like the Vietnamese War came to be perceived here in the late 60s and early 70s, and much as the Afghan-Soviet War came to be perceived by the Russians. Thus, the 2000 pullout from Lebanon was widely supported throughout Israel.
But the events of recent years have taken away the dream of Oslo and the Camp David era. It's no longer about the Palestinians, either; not this war. This war is about Iran and its plan to dominate the Arab world, a plan that does not include the existence of Israel. And this is true whatever Israel does or does not do, whatever steps it takes or does not take--short of the entire country reenacting the legend of Masada and committing mass suicide.
[ADDENDUM: Listen to this podcast, an interview with Caroline Glick, available through Politics Central at Pajamas Media. Her contention is that Israel must win this war not only for its own sake, but to save the country of Lebanon from becoming a wholly-owned subsidiary of Iran.]
Kind to the cruel: how Khomeini's life was spared
[NOTE: I'm aware that the following information comes from Wikipedia, a somewhat suspect source at times. I can't independently correborate or refute the information, and I'm wondering whether anyone else can find another more reliable source that can shed light on its truth or falsehood.]
Recently I happened to come across this little tidbit from history. Read it and weep:
In 1963, [Khomeini] publicly denounced the government of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. He was thereby imprisoned for 8 months, and upon his release in 1964, he made a similar denunciation of the United States. It is well known that General Hassan Pakravan saved Ayatollah Khomeini’s life in 1963. Khomeini was condemned to death but General Hassan Pakravan felt that his execution would anger the common people of Iran. He knew that the most influential portion of the population was not its elite. He presented his argument to the shah. Once he had convinced the shah to allow him to find a way out, he called on Ayatollah Mohammad-Kazem Shariatmadari, one of the senior religious leaders of Iran, and asked for his help. [Ayatollah Shariatmadari] suggested that Khomeini be made an ayatollah. So, they made a religious decree which was taken by General Pakravan and Seyyed Jalal Tehrani to the Shah. After the Iranian Revolution, Pakravan was among the first of the Shah's officials to be executed.
Another illustration of the old adage that no good deed goes unpunished, as well as a demonstration of the wisdom of the ancient saying:
Those who are kind to the cruel will end up being cruel to the kind.
Recently I happened to come across this little tidbit from history. Read it and weep:
In 1963, [Khomeini] publicly denounced the government of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. He was thereby imprisoned for 8 months, and upon his release in 1964, he made a similar denunciation of the United States. It is well known that General Hassan Pakravan saved Ayatollah Khomeini’s life in 1963. Khomeini was condemned to death but General Hassan Pakravan felt that his execution would anger the common people of Iran. He knew that the most influential portion of the population was not its elite. He presented his argument to the shah. Once he had convinced the shah to allow him to find a way out, he called on Ayatollah Mohammad-Kazem Shariatmadari, one of the senior religious leaders of Iran, and asked for his help. [Ayatollah Shariatmadari] suggested that Khomeini be made an ayatollah. So, they made a religious decree which was taken by General Pakravan and Seyyed Jalal Tehrani to the Shah. After the Iranian Revolution, Pakravan was among the first of the Shah's officials to be executed.
Another illustration of the old adage that no good deed goes unpunished, as well as a demonstration of the wisdom of the ancient saying:
Those who are kind to the cruel will end up being cruel to the kind.
Thursday, August 03, 2006
That's Entertainment: the seamless web of war and propaganda and media
I've been thinking and writing about the war in Lebanon lately almost to the exclusion of other topics. In this I'm not alone; much of the media and the blogosphere is focused on the conflict, and rightly so.
And much of this discussion and thought isn't just about the war itself--strategy and battles and goals--but on the coverage of the action.
At first this fact puzzled me a bit, including my own emphasis on the media coverage--after all, isn't the conflict and what's behind it far more important than how the MSM chooses to frame it? The answer is yes, it should be--but the latter isn't just an unimportant side issue, either. It is absolutely essential to the war itself and can be instrumental in determining its outcome.
Morale, will, the perception of how essential it is to win a certain war and the justness of the cause--all have been part of war since time immemorial. Leaders have always had to inspire their armies; and now, in democracies, they have to inspire their people as well.
Before the advent of the 24-hour news cycle, and certainly prior to the 60s, the media used to be both less ubiquitous and more supportive of government efforts. During the Vietnam War, the media found its power as an antiwar force and a gadfly (see this for my views on the matter).
And since then, the media has never looked back. The irony is that the war in Vietnam probably was far more tangential to our interests than the present wars in Iraq or Lebanon, which are vital. But the media, like a junkie on a high, keeps going back for a fix of action and sensation and visual effect and almost kneejerk criticism of the US and Israel, without realizing the destructive potential of its own actions.
And those elements--the pursuit of sensation and effect--have become, I believe, at least as potent a motivator for the media's actions as any possible political bias of journalists. Perhaps even more.
On this point, Betsy Newmark cites an article by Noah Pollak that appeared today in National Review, "Video Made the Terrorist Star." In the piece, Pollak comments on the decline of "serious journalism," which was embedded in context and history and facts, and the ascendance of journalism as entertainment, designed to entertain and stimulate, looking for interesting "stories" and personal dramas.
Pollak doesn't even see journalists as especially biased, but rather as ignorant of the consequences of their actions, and intent on telling telegenic stories. And in doing so they have become, as he points out, codependent enablers of terrorists themselves.
In a far less important arena, I've noticed the same thing in coverage of sports events such as the Olympics. Over the years, fewer and fewer minutes were spent just showing us the unadorned action, and more and more time was devoted to fancy features about the personal lives of the athletes, usually highlighting tearjerker soap-opera type details designed to make it seem all the more "up close and personal." Pretty soon the sport became almost tangential to the story.
Well, it doesn't matter much with the Olympics, does it? I liked them better the old way, but who cares, really?
But war is different, and it matters, terribly. Because the truth is that the stupidity and short-sightedness of the media has worked to change the face of war. When, as Pollak puts it, "Hezbollah does not have a military strategy; it has a media strategy that so far has been chillingly effective," we understand that his words are true: Hezbollah doesn't need a military strategy. Military strategy has become increasingly irrelevant in today's modern, limited wars, every sensational detail of which is beamed around the globe at lightening speed.
Of course, if Israel ever decided to pursue a goal of all-out, total, war, the issue might become irrelevant. Israel could utterly destroy Hezbollah and Lebanon and even Iran if it so desired. But that has not happened so far, and Hezbollah and Lebanon and Iran are well aware--despite their demonizing of Israel as Satanic--that it's unlikely to happen.
So the media, pursuing its own selfish ends, has become the handmaiden of terrorists. And, in its shortsighted pursuit of sensation and "stories," the media could well be a participant in sowing the seeds of its own destruction, since the protection of a free press is not exactly the goal of Islamic jihadis.
Ironic, indeed.
And much of this discussion and thought isn't just about the war itself--strategy and battles and goals--but on the coverage of the action.
At first this fact puzzled me a bit, including my own emphasis on the media coverage--after all, isn't the conflict and what's behind it far more important than how the MSM chooses to frame it? The answer is yes, it should be--but the latter isn't just an unimportant side issue, either. It is absolutely essential to the war itself and can be instrumental in determining its outcome.
Morale, will, the perception of how essential it is to win a certain war and the justness of the cause--all have been part of war since time immemorial. Leaders have always had to inspire their armies; and now, in democracies, they have to inspire their people as well.
Before the advent of the 24-hour news cycle, and certainly prior to the 60s, the media used to be both less ubiquitous and more supportive of government efforts. During the Vietnam War, the media found its power as an antiwar force and a gadfly (see this for my views on the matter).
And since then, the media has never looked back. The irony is that the war in Vietnam probably was far more tangential to our interests than the present wars in Iraq or Lebanon, which are vital. But the media, like a junkie on a high, keeps going back for a fix of action and sensation and visual effect and almost kneejerk criticism of the US and Israel, without realizing the destructive potential of its own actions.
And those elements--the pursuit of sensation and effect--have become, I believe, at least as potent a motivator for the media's actions as any possible political bias of journalists. Perhaps even more.
On this point, Betsy Newmark cites an article by Noah Pollak that appeared today in National Review, "Video Made the Terrorist Star." In the piece, Pollak comments on the decline of "serious journalism," which was embedded in context and history and facts, and the ascendance of journalism as entertainment, designed to entertain and stimulate, looking for interesting "stories" and personal dramas.
Pollak doesn't even see journalists as especially biased, but rather as ignorant of the consequences of their actions, and intent on telling telegenic stories. And in doing so they have become, as he points out, codependent enablers of terrorists themselves.
In a far less important arena, I've noticed the same thing in coverage of sports events such as the Olympics. Over the years, fewer and fewer minutes were spent just showing us the unadorned action, and more and more time was devoted to fancy features about the personal lives of the athletes, usually highlighting tearjerker soap-opera type details designed to make it seem all the more "up close and personal." Pretty soon the sport became almost tangential to the story.
Well, it doesn't matter much with the Olympics, does it? I liked them better the old way, but who cares, really?
But war is different, and it matters, terribly. Because the truth is that the stupidity and short-sightedness of the media has worked to change the face of war. When, as Pollak puts it, "Hezbollah does not have a military strategy; it has a media strategy that so far has been chillingly effective," we understand that his words are true: Hezbollah doesn't need a military strategy. Military strategy has become increasingly irrelevant in today's modern, limited wars, every sensational detail of which is beamed around the globe at lightening speed.
Of course, if Israel ever decided to pursue a goal of all-out, total, war, the issue might become irrelevant. Israel could utterly destroy Hezbollah and Lebanon and even Iran if it so desired. But that has not happened so far, and Hezbollah and Lebanon and Iran are well aware--despite their demonizing of Israel as Satanic--that it's unlikely to happen.
So the media, pursuing its own selfish ends, has become the handmaiden of terrorists. And, in its shortsighted pursuit of sensation and "stories," the media could well be a participant in sowing the seeds of its own destruction, since the protection of a free press is not exactly the goal of Islamic jihadis.
Ironic, indeed.
The definition of joy, Palestinian-style
It's hard to comment adequately on a tale that resembles something from the Onion.
This story says a great deal, however, about how the thirst for destruction that's become commonplace in Palestinian society has joined the homicidal and suicidal impulses so closely that the two have become almost as one.
And, in line with that fact, I want to call your attention to an extraordinary article by Richard Landes.
Landes begins with an exploration of the cult of death in Arab Moslem society, ties it into the current war in Lebanon and in particular Qana, and describes the role the unwitting Western press plays in promoting that cult.
His essay is so rich with thought that, once again, I suggest you read the whole thing.
One particularly striking example he gives of the press's ineptitude (or malevolence--take your pick) is the following truncated quote by journalist William Orme of the New York Times.
Israelis cite as one egregious example [of Arab hated of Jews] a televised sermon that defended the killing of the two soldiers. “Whether Likud or Labor, Jews are Jews,” proclaimed Sheik Ahmad Abu Halabaya in a live broadcast from a Gaza City mosque the day after the killings.
It sounds fairly innocuous: "Jews are Jews." Who could object to that? What's all the fuss about?
Here are the Sheik's actual words--and those that followed them--in his televised "sermon" (and it ain't no Sermon on the Mount, let me tell you):
The Jews are the Jews. Whether Labor or Likud the Jews are Jews. They do not have any moderates or any advocates of peace. They are all liars. They must be butchered and must be killed… The Jews are like a spring as long as you step on it with your foot it doesn’t move. But if you lift your foot from the spring, it hurts you and punishes you… It is forbidden to have mercy in your hearts for the Jews in any place and in any land. Make war on them any place that you find yourself. Any place that you meet them, kill them.
This utterly egregious example of misuse of the truncated quote can't possibly be the result of ignorance or incompetence. So what is it? Stupidity or malevolence? Take your pick.
This story says a great deal, however, about how the thirst for destruction that's become commonplace in Palestinian society has joined the homicidal and suicidal impulses so closely that the two have become almost as one.
And, in line with that fact, I want to call your attention to an extraordinary article by Richard Landes.
Landes begins with an exploration of the cult of death in Arab Moslem society, ties it into the current war in Lebanon and in particular Qana, and describes the role the unwitting Western press plays in promoting that cult.
His essay is so rich with thought that, once again, I suggest you read the whole thing.
One particularly striking example he gives of the press's ineptitude (or malevolence--take your pick) is the following truncated quote by journalist William Orme of the New York Times.
Israelis cite as one egregious example [of Arab hated of Jews] a televised sermon that defended the killing of the two soldiers. “Whether Likud or Labor, Jews are Jews,” proclaimed Sheik Ahmad Abu Halabaya in a live broadcast from a Gaza City mosque the day after the killings.
It sounds fairly innocuous: "Jews are Jews." Who could object to that? What's all the fuss about?
Here are the Sheik's actual words--and those that followed them--in his televised "sermon" (and it ain't no Sermon on the Mount, let me tell you):
The Jews are the Jews. Whether Labor or Likud the Jews are Jews. They do not have any moderates or any advocates of peace. They are all liars. They must be butchered and must be killed… The Jews are like a spring as long as you step on it with your foot it doesn’t move. But if you lift your foot from the spring, it hurts you and punishes you… It is forbidden to have mercy in your hearts for the Jews in any place and in any land. Make war on them any place that you find yourself. Any place that you meet them, kill them.
This utterly egregious example of misuse of the truncated quote can't possibly be the result of ignorance or incompetence. So what is it? Stupidity or malevolence? Take your pick.
Wednesday, August 02, 2006
Neo is hot
I can attest to the truth of this. It's one of the hottest days I can ever remember in these parts.
Back of my neck gettin dirty and gritty. Although, actually, I've got one of these.
Back of my neck gettin dirty and gritty. Although, actually, I've got one of these.
Bush's blood pressure: the man has ice water in his veins
In keeping with the modern taste for intimate disclosure, the White House has released the results of President Bush's most recent physical.
First, the bad news: he's shrunk a quarter of an inch. Haven't we all? And gained five pounds, although he still has very little body fat, especially for a man his age (sixty, prime of life!).
The rest of the statistics are astounding, especially for a man under the sort of stress a post-9/11 war president endures. Blood pressure? 106/68, a level usually achieved only by young children, and by yogis who've attained nirvana. Pulse? 46 beats per minute, the sort of thing usually only found in elite athletes. His cholesterol is a very respectable 174, although I'm puzzled by the article's emphasis on the fact that he's lowered his cholesterol: down from 178 last year. Big deal; well within the range of test variation.
Because he had a precancerous lesion removed, doctors reminded him to wear sunscreen. If he's like most of the men I know, he'll promptly and totally ignore that advice.
Meanwhile, another leader isn't doing quite as well.
First, the bad news: he's shrunk a quarter of an inch. Haven't we all? And gained five pounds, although he still has very little body fat, especially for a man his age (sixty, prime of life!).
The rest of the statistics are astounding, especially for a man under the sort of stress a post-9/11 war president endures. Blood pressure? 106/68, a level usually achieved only by young children, and by yogis who've attained nirvana. Pulse? 46 beats per minute, the sort of thing usually only found in elite athletes. His cholesterol is a very respectable 174, although I'm puzzled by the article's emphasis on the fact that he's lowered his cholesterol: down from 178 last year. Big deal; well within the range of test variation.
Because he had a precancerous lesion removed, doctors reminded him to wear sunscreen. If he's like most of the men I know, he'll promptly and totally ignore that advice.
Meanwhile, another leader isn't doing quite as well.
Tuesday, August 01, 2006
The sleep of reason--and moral agency--produces monsters
Here we have Goya's famous etching"The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters."
It came to mind while I was reading Melanie Phillips, who is presently writing some of the finest analysis of the British (and, by extrapolation, general Western European) reaction to the war in Lebanon that I've read.
Phillips makes sobering reading. It does appear that, among a certain rather large segment in Europe, reason has indeed gone to sleep and monsters are afoot. The West, the birthplace of the Enlightenment and its dedication to reason, seems to have lost the ability to do so.
Read most especially and particularly this; (and also this, and this, if you have more time).
Phillips writes with an air of astonishment as well as outrage, the astonishment of the child who points out the obvious fact that the emperor has no clothes, and yet no one will listen. Her "J'accuse" will no doubt be rejected by those she's criticizing in the press, the intelligentsia, and the Left.
Ms. Phillips writes that the West is in the grip of "a profound moral breakdown." Some of this is fed by the lies and distortions of the BBC, which provides most of the information for the British populace; the BBC seems to have abandoned not only it's vaunted objectivity but reason itself.
The consequences are dreadful, because, as Phillips points out, this isn't about Israel anymore. This is about a genocidal intent on the part of Iran and certain Arab states to obliterate Israel, and to establish an all-encompassing caliphate. If the Jews have always been the canary in the mine (and I believe they have), we're all in dire trouble. One of the troubles is that so few in Europe seem to recognize their own potentially suicidal defense of their enemies and their refusal to recognize their friends.
I could quote at great length from Phillips's piece, but I'll try to be as brief as possible and give you the essence of it. Please ponder this:
But the moral crisis in Britain extends far wider and deeper than the wretched BBC and other media. The surreally distorted response by so many to Israel’s attempt to destroy the would-be purveyors of genocide raises the question of whether Britain will ever again support a just war — because it no longer knows what a just war is, and no longer has the intellectual capacity to know. This is in large measure because moral agency has disappeared altogether from the analysis. Intention, the essence of moral actions, is now tossed aside as of no significance. All that matters are the consequences of an action. This is in accordance with the prevailing amoral consensus which has negated moral agency altogether in order to remove the burden of personal responsibility. What someone intends to do is therefore held to be of no account. All that matters is the consequences of their action.
So the fact that Israel is at war solely to prevent the deaths of innocents is dismissed. All that matters is that the consequences of its actions are that Lebanese civilians are dying. The fact that the Israelis do not intend them to die is irrelevant. Those deaths are deemed to be the equivalent of the deaths caused by Hezbollah. The fact that Hezbollah deliberately sets out to murder innocent Israelis is irrelevant. Thus the only thing that matters is which side has more dead people. The fact that there are more dead Lebanese than dead Israelis settles the matter. The Israelis are in the wrong, are behaving disproportionately, are committing war crimes, are the villains of the piece. The fact that they are actually the victims of unprovoked genocidal aggression is deemed irrelevant. Thus the moral bankruptcy of Britain’s post-modern cultural desert...
Such prejudice [towards Israel] is not only despicable. It is also nationally suicidal. For such is the hatred of Israel that — fantastically — a world war is under way in which the designated victims don’t even realise it is happening.
If Iran succeeds in developing nuclear weapons and wipes out Israel--thus coming a long way to finishing the job Hitler began--will Western Europe mourn, or rejoice? I begin to wonder. Phillips does offer some hope, however--evidence that the middle-class "man in the street" gets the situation better than the intellectuals--and despite the efforts of the press to shape opinion otherwise.
_-_Sleep_of_Reason.jpg#/media/File:Goya_-_Caprichos_(43)_-_Sleep_of_Reason.jpg){kind=link}
It came to mind while I was reading Melanie Phillips, who is presently writing some of the finest analysis of the British (and, by extrapolation, general Western European) reaction to the war in Lebanon that I've read.
Phillips makes sobering reading. It does appear that, among a certain rather large segment in Europe, reason has indeed gone to sleep and monsters are afoot. The West, the birthplace of the Enlightenment and its dedication to reason, seems to have lost the ability to do so.
Read most especially and particularly this; (and also this, and this, if you have more time).
Phillips writes with an air of astonishment as well as outrage, the astonishment of the child who points out the obvious fact that the emperor has no clothes, and yet no one will listen. Her "J'accuse" will no doubt be rejected by those she's criticizing in the press, the intelligentsia, and the Left.
Ms. Phillips writes that the West is in the grip of "a profound moral breakdown." Some of this is fed by the lies and distortions of the BBC, which provides most of the information for the British populace; the BBC seems to have abandoned not only it's vaunted objectivity but reason itself.
The consequences are dreadful, because, as Phillips points out, this isn't about Israel anymore. This is about a genocidal intent on the part of Iran and certain Arab states to obliterate Israel, and to establish an all-encompassing caliphate. If the Jews have always been the canary in the mine (and I believe they have), we're all in dire trouble. One of the troubles is that so few in Europe seem to recognize their own potentially suicidal defense of their enemies and their refusal to recognize their friends.
I could quote at great length from Phillips's piece, but I'll try to be as brief as possible and give you the essence of it. Please ponder this:
But the moral crisis in Britain extends far wider and deeper than the wretched BBC and other media. The surreally distorted response by so many to Israel’s attempt to destroy the would-be purveyors of genocide raises the question of whether Britain will ever again support a just war — because it no longer knows what a just war is, and no longer has the intellectual capacity to know. This is in large measure because moral agency has disappeared altogether from the analysis. Intention, the essence of moral actions, is now tossed aside as of no significance. All that matters are the consequences of an action. This is in accordance with the prevailing amoral consensus which has negated moral agency altogether in order to remove the burden of personal responsibility. What someone intends to do is therefore held to be of no account. All that matters is the consequences of their action.
So the fact that Israel is at war solely to prevent the deaths of innocents is dismissed. All that matters is that the consequences of its actions are that Lebanese civilians are dying. The fact that the Israelis do not intend them to die is irrelevant. Those deaths are deemed to be the equivalent of the deaths caused by Hezbollah. The fact that Hezbollah deliberately sets out to murder innocent Israelis is irrelevant. Thus the only thing that matters is which side has more dead people. The fact that there are more dead Lebanese than dead Israelis settles the matter. The Israelis are in the wrong, are behaving disproportionately, are committing war crimes, are the villains of the piece. The fact that they are actually the victims of unprovoked genocidal aggression is deemed irrelevant. Thus the moral bankruptcy of Britain’s post-modern cultural desert...
Such prejudice [towards Israel] is not only despicable. It is also nationally suicidal. For such is the hatred of Israel that — fantastically — a world war is under way in which the designated victims don’t even realise it is happening.
If Iran succeeds in developing nuclear weapons and wipes out Israel--thus coming a long way to finishing the job Hitler began--will Western Europe mourn, or rejoice? I begin to wonder. Phillips does offer some hope, however--evidence that the middle-class "man in the street" gets the situation better than the intellectuals--and despite the efforts of the press to shape opinion otherwise.
"You and what army?" redux
I was going to write a midlength post on the absurdity of the UN's call to Ahmadinejad to suspend Iran's nuclear program or face sanctions. The resolution was considered "mandatory" and "binding," words that are essentially meaningless in the context of the UN and Iran. Or perhaps the UN and anything.
Well, Tammy Bruce called this one. Not that it was so difficult to call. But she did it with special flair and verve.
And Ahmadinejad finessed me--and the UN. He already has responded by rejecting the UN resolution. Surprise, surprise!
"Binding," indeed! The UN has no power except by the consent of its member nations, and the threat of sanctions. And the latter is almost amusing after the Oil for Food scandal in Iraq.
Another irony: putting teeth into the UN's ability to halt the nuclear programs of rogue and tyrannical states is actually one of the things the buildup to the war in Iraq was meant to accomplish. But in the rush to tear down that effort, the UN itself lost whatever legitimacy it might have gained through that avenue.
Well, Tammy Bruce called this one. Not that it was so difficult to call. But she did it with special flair and verve.
And Ahmadinejad finessed me--and the UN. He already has responded by rejecting the UN resolution. Surprise, surprise!
"Binding," indeed! The UN has no power except by the consent of its member nations, and the threat of sanctions. And the latter is almost amusing after the Oil for Food scandal in Iraq.
Another irony: putting teeth into the UN's ability to halt the nuclear programs of rogue and tyrannical states is actually one of the things the buildup to the war in Iraq was meant to accomplish. But in the rush to tear down that effort, the UN itself lost whatever legitimacy it might have gained through that avenue.
Monday, July 31, 2006
Women and children first: the propaganda of compassion, at Qana and elsewhere
The casualties at Qana are horrific. The visuals are heartrending, and the details sorrowful--especially the predominance of women and children among the dead.
We are biologically predisposed to want to protect children--to love them, to smile when we see them. Only monsters kill children, correct?
Although the phrase "women and children first" comes from maritime tradition, the same impulse has meant, historically, that societies were generally dedicated to protecting that especially vulnerable and vital portion of their population from the enemy.
This doesn't mean that in war women and children were not killed, of course, despite those efforts at protection. In particular, the aeriel bombardments of World War II made children fair game if they happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, although they were not specifically targets (except for purposeful Nazi killings of Jewish children during the Holocaust). Some countries, such as England, sent many of their children off to the countryside during the war, because it was mainly cities that were bombed.
And World War II ended with the terrible atomic conflagration of Hiroshima, which killed indiscriminately; a description of the plight of the victims was immortalized in John Hersey's classic. Hersey's Hiroshima, published after World War II ended, represented the first attempt of which I'm aware to take a close look at the enemy war dead, and to view them with compassion and even a sense of shame for what an honorable nation, the United States, felt it necessary to do in time of war.
I've discussed the pros and cons of dropping the atomic bombs on Japan here; I'm not going to rehash the topic at this point. I'm bringing it up now, however, to illustrate the fact that World War II involved such widespread and horrific carnage--both military and civilian--that, once it was over, there was a natural desire to write about the devastation in the humane (and probably vain) hope that people would somehow found a way to avoid such things in the future.
Here's what I wrote about Hersey's work in my earlier post:
Hersey's book purposely gives his reportage on Hiroshima no context at all, the better to appreciate the appalling human cost. He simply describes, and the reader identifies with the victims. There is no way to read his book and not feel a deep and visceral revulsion towards what happened there.
Although the scale is nothing whatsoever like Hiroshima, the casualties at Qana are dreadful, and we instinctively recoil from them. They are also the sort of the thing that makes good programming for the voracious jaws of the 24-hour-a-day cable news cycle. And as for context--well, too much context would muddy the waters and appear to justify the bombing of children.
But too little context serves the propaganda purposes of the group least interested in stopping the deaths of children such as these, and that is Hezbollah.
In Qana, Israel was targeting a location that had been used repeatedly for rocket firing at Israel's own civilians. Israel forces had warned the population to leave prior to the bombing. The people who died obviously did not heed those warnings. Whether this was because they didn't get the word to leave, or couldn't leave because they didn't have the resources, or voluntarily chose not to leave, or whether Hezbollah kept them from leaving, we simply do not know.
Israel had no information that this particular structure was filled with women and children when it was targeted. But filled it was. And, as Richard Fernandez of Belmont Club writes, "... all the leaflets in the world can be dropped and the death of civilians still be a near-inevitability."
The new calculus of asymmetrical warfare, of which Hezbollah is master, is that the sacrifice of women and children is a good strategic move; putting weaponry among its own women and children is the result of a conscious and wily decision on its part.
This is a sort of looking-glass inversion of the old rule "women and children first." And it tends to work, because current asymmetrical warfare is fought less on the traditional battlefield and more on the battlefield of public opinion.
Hezbollah knows that there's nothing like dead women and children to turn public opinion against those doing the killing. And there's nothing like the Western news to fail to adequately provide and evaluate the all-important context for that killing.
Hezbollah could not--and would not--operate this way if it didn't rely on both the compassion of the West and its news cycle. Without these things, Hezbollah's actions would be suicidal. But with these things, Hezbollah's actions are effective.
So, what's the solution? What should Israel--or any other country faced with such a dilemma--do when an enemy such as Hezbollah turns the tables on the compassionate West, and takes advantage of the compassion to get a twofer: launching rockets from civilian enclaves in Lebanon to directly target Israeli civilians, and then scoring a propaganda coup with the cooperation of the Western media when Israel retaliates and kills the Lebanese civilians?
And then imagine a similar question being asked when a nation such as Iran goes nuclear. The people of Iran will then be in the position of the women and children of Qana, first in line for retaliation if the mad mullahs decide to attack.
We are biologically predisposed to want to protect children--to love them, to smile when we see them. Only monsters kill children, correct?
Although the phrase "women and children first" comes from maritime tradition, the same impulse has meant, historically, that societies were generally dedicated to protecting that especially vulnerable and vital portion of their population from the enemy.
This doesn't mean that in war women and children were not killed, of course, despite those efforts at protection. In particular, the aeriel bombardments of World War II made children fair game if they happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, although they were not specifically targets (except for purposeful Nazi killings of Jewish children during the Holocaust). Some countries, such as England, sent many of their children off to the countryside during the war, because it was mainly cities that were bombed.
And World War II ended with the terrible atomic conflagration of Hiroshima, which killed indiscriminately; a description of the plight of the victims was immortalized in John Hersey's classic. Hersey's Hiroshima, published after World War II ended, represented the first attempt of which I'm aware to take a close look at the enemy war dead, and to view them with compassion and even a sense of shame for what an honorable nation, the United States, felt it necessary to do in time of war.
I've discussed the pros and cons of dropping the atomic bombs on Japan here; I'm not going to rehash the topic at this point. I'm bringing it up now, however, to illustrate the fact that World War II involved such widespread and horrific carnage--both military and civilian--that, once it was over, there was a natural desire to write about the devastation in the humane (and probably vain) hope that people would somehow found a way to avoid such things in the future.
Here's what I wrote about Hersey's work in my earlier post:
Hersey's book purposely gives his reportage on Hiroshima no context at all, the better to appreciate the appalling human cost. He simply describes, and the reader identifies with the victims. There is no way to read his book and not feel a deep and visceral revulsion towards what happened there.
Although the scale is nothing whatsoever like Hiroshima, the casualties at Qana are dreadful, and we instinctively recoil from them. They are also the sort of the thing that makes good programming for the voracious jaws of the 24-hour-a-day cable news cycle. And as for context--well, too much context would muddy the waters and appear to justify the bombing of children.
But too little context serves the propaganda purposes of the group least interested in stopping the deaths of children such as these, and that is Hezbollah.
In Qana, Israel was targeting a location that had been used repeatedly for rocket firing at Israel's own civilians. Israel forces had warned the population to leave prior to the bombing. The people who died obviously did not heed those warnings. Whether this was because they didn't get the word to leave, or couldn't leave because they didn't have the resources, or voluntarily chose not to leave, or whether Hezbollah kept them from leaving, we simply do not know.
Israel had no information that this particular structure was filled with women and children when it was targeted. But filled it was. And, as Richard Fernandez of Belmont Club writes, "... all the leaflets in the world can be dropped and the death of civilians still be a near-inevitability."
The new calculus of asymmetrical warfare, of which Hezbollah is master, is that the sacrifice of women and children is a good strategic move; putting weaponry among its own women and children is the result of a conscious and wily decision on its part.
This is a sort of looking-glass inversion of the old rule "women and children first." And it tends to work, because current asymmetrical warfare is fought less on the traditional battlefield and more on the battlefield of public opinion.
Hezbollah knows that there's nothing like dead women and children to turn public opinion against those doing the killing. And there's nothing like the Western news to fail to adequately provide and evaluate the all-important context for that killing.
Hezbollah could not--and would not--operate this way if it didn't rely on both the compassion of the West and its news cycle. Without these things, Hezbollah's actions would be suicidal. But with these things, Hezbollah's actions are effective.
So, what's the solution? What should Israel--or any other country faced with such a dilemma--do when an enemy such as Hezbollah turns the tables on the compassionate West, and takes advantage of the compassion to get a twofer: launching rockets from civilian enclaves in Lebanon to directly target Israeli civilians, and then scoring a propaganda coup with the cooperation of the Western media when Israel retaliates and kills the Lebanese civilians?
And then imagine a similar question being asked when a nation such as Iran goes nuclear. The people of Iran will then be in the position of the women and children of Qana, first in line for retaliation if the mad mullahs decide to attack.
Saturday, July 29, 2006
And what does Ariel Sharon have to say about it all?
No, the title of this post isn't some sort of joke. And, of course, Ariel Sharon has nothing whatsoever to say--nor (barring some extraordinary miracle) will he ever be saying anything again.
But in one of my many efforts at organizing my papers and tidying up in general, I recently found a stack of unread New Yorkers. I skimmed their "Contents" sections and threw them all out (actually, took them to the dump to recycle, like the environmentally concerned person that I am).
But in one of them, the January 23 and 30, 2006 issue, I found and read "The Samurai of Zionism," a piece by Ari Shavit based on a series of interviews with Ariel Sharon over the last couple of years. Towards the end, Shavit quotes Sharon as having come to the following conclusions, which I reproduce here as food for thought in this particular crisis:
The conflict isn't between us and the Palestinians. The conflict is between us and the Arab world. And the problem at the heart of the conflict is that the Arab world does not recognize the Jews' inherent right to have a Jewish state in the land where the Jewish people began. This is the main problem. This also applies to Egypt, with which we have a cold peace. It also applies to Jordan, with which we have a very close strategic relationship, but this is a relationship between governments, not between peoples. The problem is not 1967. The problem is the profound nonrecognition by the Arab world of Israel's birthright. The problem will not be solved by an agreement. It will not be solved by a speech. Anyone who promises that it's possible to end the conflict within a year or two year or three is mistaken. Anyone who promises peace now is blind to the way things are. Even after the disengagement, we will not be able to rest on our laurels. We will not be able to sit under our fig tree and our vine....
The greatest danger is in signing some document and believing that as a result we will have peace. This is not going to happen...Instead, we have to build a process that will enable us to ascertain that indeed a change is taking place in the Arab world. It is necessary to teach all the teachers that Israel is a legitimate entity. And it is necessary to replace all the Palestinian textbooks. And this is beyond the elementary demand for the cessation of terror and the cessation of incitement and the implementation of reforms in the security organizations and the implementation of govermental reforms. It is necessary not to omit a single one of these steps. Under no circumstances should there be concessions. A situation must not develop in which Israel retreats and is chased by terror. Once you accept that, it will never end. Terror will keep chasing us.
Sobering words. I'm not sure he's correct about everything--I still tend to believe that the population of Jordan, for example, is not set on the elimination of Israel.
But many of his points are spot on. And right now it's more difficult than ever to see how the vision of the final paragraph could ever be implemented. And the phrase "a situation must not develop in which Israel retreats and is chased by terror" seem remarkably apropos to the current conflict.
I am reminded of an article I read back in my liberal Democrat days, during the early years of the 90s. I've searched for this article before, because I'd love to look at it again. I think it appeared in this very same periodical--the New Yorker--but I simply don't know, and at this point I despair of ever finding it.
But nevertheless I remember the subject matter. The article appeared after Oslo, back when the peace process seemed to be going well and when many people, including myself, were hopeful that things were going in the right direction. The author had visited the areas under the control of the PLO and especially the schools, and what he (she?) found there was chilling beyond belief. The article described the teaching of a hatred so deep and so naked, a hatred involving not just Israelis but Jews in general, that my blood ran cold.
For days afterwards I had trouble shaking the conviction that, whatever we might think about the hope for progress that Oslo represented, when the generation that was being steeped and marinated in such hatred came of age in about ten years or less, something terrible would be happening, no matter what Israel tried to do, no matter how many concessions it made towards peace.
And events have certainly "progressed" that way. And not with just the Palestinians and even the Arab world, but the non-Arab government of Iran. We have in the Iranian leaders and Hezbollah, of course, an enemy that not only hates Israel and Jews, but that isn't shy about saying so. And that enemy is playing to one of the oldest and deepest hatreds in the world--Jew-hatred--finding a harmonic resonance with all those who profess it, and using them for their own nefarious ends.
But in one of my many efforts at organizing my papers and tidying up in general, I recently found a stack of unread New Yorkers. I skimmed their "Contents" sections and threw them all out (actually, took them to the dump to recycle, like the environmentally concerned person that I am).
But in one of them, the January 23 and 30, 2006 issue, I found and read "The Samurai of Zionism," a piece by Ari Shavit based on a series of interviews with Ariel Sharon over the last couple of years. Towards the end, Shavit quotes Sharon as having come to the following conclusions, which I reproduce here as food for thought in this particular crisis:
The conflict isn't between us and the Palestinians. The conflict is between us and the Arab world. And the problem at the heart of the conflict is that the Arab world does not recognize the Jews' inherent right to have a Jewish state in the land where the Jewish people began. This is the main problem. This also applies to Egypt, with which we have a cold peace. It also applies to Jordan, with which we have a very close strategic relationship, but this is a relationship between governments, not between peoples. The problem is not 1967. The problem is the profound nonrecognition by the Arab world of Israel's birthright. The problem will not be solved by an agreement. It will not be solved by a speech. Anyone who promises that it's possible to end the conflict within a year or two year or three is mistaken. Anyone who promises peace now is blind to the way things are. Even after the disengagement, we will not be able to rest on our laurels. We will not be able to sit under our fig tree and our vine....
The greatest danger is in signing some document and believing that as a result we will have peace. This is not going to happen...Instead, we have to build a process that will enable us to ascertain that indeed a change is taking place in the Arab world. It is necessary to teach all the teachers that Israel is a legitimate entity. And it is necessary to replace all the Palestinian textbooks. And this is beyond the elementary demand for the cessation of terror and the cessation of incitement and the implementation of reforms in the security organizations and the implementation of govermental reforms. It is necessary not to omit a single one of these steps. Under no circumstances should there be concessions. A situation must not develop in which Israel retreats and is chased by terror. Once you accept that, it will never end. Terror will keep chasing us.
Sobering words. I'm not sure he's correct about everything--I still tend to believe that the population of Jordan, for example, is not set on the elimination of Israel.
But many of his points are spot on. And right now it's more difficult than ever to see how the vision of the final paragraph could ever be implemented. And the phrase "a situation must not develop in which Israel retreats and is chased by terror" seem remarkably apropos to the current conflict.
I am reminded of an article I read back in my liberal Democrat days, during the early years of the 90s. I've searched for this article before, because I'd love to look at it again. I think it appeared in this very same periodical--the New Yorker--but I simply don't know, and at this point I despair of ever finding it.
But nevertheless I remember the subject matter. The article appeared after Oslo, back when the peace process seemed to be going well and when many people, including myself, were hopeful that things were going in the right direction. The author had visited the areas under the control of the PLO and especially the schools, and what he (she?) found there was chilling beyond belief. The article described the teaching of a hatred so deep and so naked, a hatred involving not just Israelis but Jews in general, that my blood ran cold.
For days afterwards I had trouble shaking the conviction that, whatever we might think about the hope for progress that Oslo represented, when the generation that was being steeped and marinated in such hatred came of age in about ten years or less, something terrible would be happening, no matter what Israel tried to do, no matter how many concessions it made towards peace.
And events have certainly "progressed" that way. And not with just the Palestinians and even the Arab world, but the non-Arab government of Iran. We have in the Iranian leaders and Hezbollah, of course, an enemy that not only hates Israel and Jews, but that isn't shy about saying so. And that enemy is playing to one of the oldest and deepest hatreds in the world--Jew-hatred--finding a harmonic resonance with all those who profess it, and using them for their own nefarious ends.
Friday, July 28, 2006
A surprise but not a surprise: shooting in Seattle
A man opened fire at the Jewish Federation building in Seattle today, killing one woman and wounding four others. He identified himself as an "American Moslem," and said he was upset about "what was going on in Israel."
I assume he meant what was going on in Lebanon at the hands of Israel; I sincerely doubt that Katusha rockets raining on Haifa are his main concern.
The shooter was, according to the head of the FBI's counterterrorism efforts in Seattle, an individual acting alone, with "nothing to indicate it's terrorism related."
I'm not sure why an individual acting out a political grudge and declaring himself clearly in such fashion wouldn't be considered a terrorist, unless terrorism is, by definition, an organized group endeavor.
It's no wonder that this happened. It's a wonder it hasn't happened more often. And in fact, Hezbollah itself has been connected to the worst incidents of attacks on Jewish institutions outside of the Middle East, the most flagrant being the 1994 bombing of the Jewish Community Center in Buenos Aires, which killed 100 people and wounded twice that many.
It's been my understanding that, in the wake of 9/11, many synagogues in this country have quietly beefed up security. It only makes sense. Perhaps the Jewish Federation of Seattle, which is mainly a fund-raising organization, hadn't seen the need to do so up till this point. My guess is that that will change.
I assume he meant what was going on in Lebanon at the hands of Israel; I sincerely doubt that Katusha rockets raining on Haifa are his main concern.
The shooter was, according to the head of the FBI's counterterrorism efforts in Seattle, an individual acting alone, with "nothing to indicate it's terrorism related."
I'm not sure why an individual acting out a political grudge and declaring himself clearly in such fashion wouldn't be considered a terrorist, unless terrorism is, by definition, an organized group endeavor.
It's no wonder that this happened. It's a wonder it hasn't happened more often. And in fact, Hezbollah itself has been connected to the worst incidents of attacks on Jewish institutions outside of the Middle East, the most flagrant being the 1994 bombing of the Jewish Community Center in Buenos Aires, which killed 100 people and wounded twice that many.
It's been my understanding that, in the wake of 9/11, many synagogues in this country have quietly beefed up security. It only makes sense. Perhaps the Jewish Federation of Seattle, which is mainly a fund-raising organization, hadn't seen the need to do so up till this point. My guess is that that will change.
Katushas and other VSBMs as emerging terrorist weapons
This quotation has always made great sense to me:
With reasonable men I will reason; with humane men I will plead; but to tyrants I will give no quarter...
The quote came to mind once again when I was reading Daniel Henninger's opinion piece in today's Wall Street Journal.
The column is about Katusha and other very short-range ballistic missiles, or VSBMs. Ever since the current Lebanese war began, it's been clear that these missiles are a force that Hezbollah has exploited, and I wanted to learn more about them.
According to Henninger, these missiles are emerging as an ideal weapon for terrorists at borders, and there is presently no defense against them. Ordinarily, some sort of state apparatus is required to operate VSBMs, but there are certainly enough rouge states these days, or state-allied terror forces such as Hezbollah, to qualify.
VSBMs are not governed by any existing export-control regime. Since terrorists not only don't care if they kill civilians, but in fact desire to kill civilians, VSBMs don't have to be "smart" to be effective. Theoretically, they could be fitted with chemical or biological agents as well, although there's no indication that's happening at present in Lebanon.
Unless Hezbollah decides to take up residence in Juarez, it doesn't seem as though VSBMs pose any direct threat to the US. But they certainly pose an indirect one, through the vulnerability of allies such as Israel or South Korea. Previously, the threat was not considered great enough to warrant implementing a defense system against them (Israel, according to Henninger, nixed plans "to deploy Northrop Grumman's THEL system, whose lasers routinely have shot down Katyushas at the Army's White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico"). Now that this vacuum in defense has been exploited by Hezbollah, look for that to change.
And what of the quote that began this post? Henninger writes:
As Robert Kaplan pointed out in the Journal last week in his review of "Terrorists, Insurgents and Militias," the biggest strategic problem today isn't past notions of big-power miscalculation but new rogue regimes whose ideology means they "cannot be gratified through negotiations."
That's the sad truth that many cannot and do not want to hear. We are now in the situation of dealing with a number of unreasonable and inhumane regimes that are truly tyrannical--Iran being the leading one at the moment. Such regimes do not enter into negotiations in good faith. Reason and pleading are not going to work. Although it's not altogether clear how to "give no quarter," it is clear that, once such regimes are armed with the nuclear weapons they seek and crave, the consequences will be far worse.
With reasonable men I will reason; with humane men I will plead; but to tyrants I will give no quarter...
The quote came to mind once again when I was reading Daniel Henninger's opinion piece in today's Wall Street Journal.
The column is about Katusha and other very short-range ballistic missiles, or VSBMs. Ever since the current Lebanese war began, it's been clear that these missiles are a force that Hezbollah has exploited, and I wanted to learn more about them.
According to Henninger, these missiles are emerging as an ideal weapon for terrorists at borders, and there is presently no defense against them. Ordinarily, some sort of state apparatus is required to operate VSBMs, but there are certainly enough rouge states these days, or state-allied terror forces such as Hezbollah, to qualify.
VSBMs are not governed by any existing export-control regime. Since terrorists not only don't care if they kill civilians, but in fact desire to kill civilians, VSBMs don't have to be "smart" to be effective. Theoretically, they could be fitted with chemical or biological agents as well, although there's no indication that's happening at present in Lebanon.
Unless Hezbollah decides to take up residence in Juarez, it doesn't seem as though VSBMs pose any direct threat to the US. But they certainly pose an indirect one, through the vulnerability of allies such as Israel or South Korea. Previously, the threat was not considered great enough to warrant implementing a defense system against them (Israel, according to Henninger, nixed plans "to deploy Northrop Grumman's THEL system, whose lasers routinely have shot down Katyushas at the Army's White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico"). Now that this vacuum in defense has been exploited by Hezbollah, look for that to change.
And what of the quote that began this post? Henninger writes:
As Robert Kaplan pointed out in the Journal last week in his review of "Terrorists, Insurgents and Militias," the biggest strategic problem today isn't past notions of big-power miscalculation but new rogue regimes whose ideology means they "cannot be gratified through negotiations."
That's the sad truth that many cannot and do not want to hear. We are now in the situation of dealing with a number of unreasonable and inhumane regimes that are truly tyrannical--Iran being the leading one at the moment. Such regimes do not enter into negotiations in good faith. Reason and pleading are not going to work. Although it's not altogether clear how to "give no quarter," it is clear that, once such regimes are armed with the nuclear weapons they seek and crave, the consequences will be far worse.
Thursday, July 27, 2006
Disarming Hezbollah: either way, the punishment is war
The war in Lebanon has dominated the news, the blogosphere, and the thoughts of so many people, including myself.
The mind casts about for a solution. Indeed, there must be a solution right?
Some blame the usual targets, Israel and the US. The UN has come in for criticism as well, and rightly so. The government and people of Lebanon, who have failed to root out Hezbollah and in fact have often lauded it, bear some responsibility.
But there is little doubt in the minds of most thinking people that the lion's share of the blame falls squarely on the shoulders of the black-clad puppeteers behind the action, Iran, and their henchmen and disciples, Hezbollah, as well as their Syrian middlemen. The penetration of Hezbollah into so much of Lebanon has been a slow but steady one, and by now the entwinement is so thick and tangled that it's hard to see how it can be undone without terrible destruction of innocent people, and the destabilization of the country. Some of this has already happened.
But the mind searches for solutions, because the possible outcomes are so dreadful to contemplate. This morning, while casting about for the views of others, I came across this piece by Michael Totten.
The peripatetic Totten was in Lebanon fairly recently, a long sojourn in which he reported on what he saw there. What's his solution? Unfortunately, he doesn't have one. What he offers is a certain perspective, and it's not a comforting one.
Here's Totten on the topic of disarming Hezbollah, describing what he saw in Lebanon a few months ago, when neither he nor anyone foresaw the exact course of events to follow:
Many Lebanese Christians, Sunnis, and Druze were getting so impatient with the impasse over Hezbollah’s weapons they threatened to reconstitute their own armed militias that were disbanded after the war. Peaceful and diplomatic negotiation over Hezbollah’s role in a sovereign rather than schismatic Lebanon was not going to last very much longer. Once the rest of Lebanon armed itself against Hezbollah, a balance of terror would reign that could explode into war without any warning. That was the danger. That was the nightmare. That’s why Hezbollah had not been disarmed...
Totten saw the peace in Lebanon at the time as an uneasy and temporary one. Despite whatever polls might have said about Lebanese support for Hezbollah, he saw the people as more frightened of its power than approving. Of course, we have no way of knowing how representative Totten's informants were, or whether his impressions were skewed by seeing a small sample of the Lebanese people. But still, he was there, and did his best to learn what was really going on.
Now, Totten says that in the heat of this war the Lebanese are angry at the Israelis. Temporarily:
No one is running off to join Hezbollah, but tensions are being smoothed over for now while everyone feels they are under attack by the same enemy. Most Lebanese who had warm feelings for Israel -- and there were more of these than you can possibly imagine -- no longer do.
This will not last.
Totten makes a prediction about what will happen after. His "after" assumes (as I think it is correct to assume) that this particular episode, the hot war with Israel, will not end with the eradication of Hezbollah in Lebanon. He writes:
My sources and friends in Beirut tell me most Lebanese are going easy on Hezbollah as much as they can while the bombs are still falling. But a terrible reckoning awaits them once this is over.
Some Lebanese can’t wait even that long....
My friend Carine says the atomosphere reeks of impending sectarian conflict like never before. Another Lebanese blogger quotes a radical Christian war criminal from the bad old days who says the civil war will resume a month after Israel cools its guns: "Christians, Sunnis and Druze will fight the 'fucker Shia', with arms from the US and France."
For those who want Hezbollah out of Lebanon, this may sound like a solution. Totten addresses this idea:
Israeli partisans may think this is terrific. The Lebanese may take care of Hezbollah at last! But democratic Lebanon cannot win a war against Hezbollah, not even after Hezbollah is weakened by IAF raids. Hezbollah is the most effective Arab fighting force in the world, and the Lebanese army is the weakest and most divided....
To Totten, Lebanon has been essentially powerless from the start. It had one of two choices: war or accommodation. Since the war against Hezbollah was unwinnable by the weak and divided Lebanon, it chose the latter.
But there's no accomodation possible with a force such as Hezbollah. Know your enemy; accomodation only buys them time, I'm afraid.
And, in the end, Totten also seems to be saying this. He has great compassion for the dilemma the Lebanese people faced, and still face:
Israel and Lebanon (especially Lebanon) will continue to burn as long as Hezbollah exists as a terror miltia freed from the leash of the state. The punishment for taking on Hezbollah is war. The punishment for not taking on Hezbollah is war. Lebanese were doomed to suffer war no matter what. Their liberal democratic project could not withstand the threat from within and the assaults from the east, and it could not stave off another assault from the south. War, as it turned out, was inevitable even if the actual shape of it wasn’t.
The quote that struck me most forcibly was this, which bears repeating:
The punishment for taking on Hezbollah is war. The punishment for not taking on Hezbollah is war.
It immediately brought to mind a statement by Winston Churchill, he of the silver tongue, when speaking about a similar accomodation sought by the militarily weak British and French prior to WWII:
Britain and France had to choose between war and dishonor. They chose dishonor. They will have war.
And please, spare yourself the trouble of informing me that the situation isn't quite analogous. I know it's not. But the similarity is this: sometimes what seems like a choice is no choice at all. When dealing with certain enemies bent on destruction and conquest, how can one avoid battle? Sooner or later, the conflagration will erupt. And is it better in the end for it to erupt sooner rather than later, when the enemy is stronger and more deeply entrenched?
The punishment for taking on Hitler was war. The punishment for not taking on Hitler was war. World War.
In the middle of all of this, into my head popped some lines by the ancient Persian (Persia=Iran) poet Omar Khayyam. Somehow they seem apropos to the feeling of futility and confusion, of powerful forces working in mysterious ways that can't be foreseen.
Omar, a fatalist, didn't believe very much in the ability of human beings to control their own destiny. He wrote, so long ago, that:
We are no other than a moving row
Of Magic Shadow-shapes that come and go
Round with the Sun-illumined Lantern held
In Midnight by the Master of the Show;
But helpless Pieces of the Game He plays
Upon this Chequer-board of Nights and Days;
Hither and thither moves, and checks, and slays,
And one by one back in the Closet lays.
I'm not ready to subscribe to the level of fatalism of Omar Khayyam. But it does seem right now that the people of Lebanon are "but helpless pieces" in a game being played--if not by the Master of the Show, then by the puppet masters of Iran.
And this verse of Khayyam's, with its strangely prescient geography ("Naishapur," Omar's birthplace, is a city in what is now Iran; and "Babylon" is the ancient word for Iraq), seems apropos as well:
Whether at Naishapur or Babylon,
Whether the Cup with sweet or bitter run,
The Wine of Life keeps oozing drop by drop,
The Leaves of Life keep falling one by one.
The mind casts about for a solution. Indeed, there must be a solution right?
Some blame the usual targets, Israel and the US. The UN has come in for criticism as well, and rightly so. The government and people of Lebanon, who have failed to root out Hezbollah and in fact have often lauded it, bear some responsibility.
But there is little doubt in the minds of most thinking people that the lion's share of the blame falls squarely on the shoulders of the black-clad puppeteers behind the action, Iran, and their henchmen and disciples, Hezbollah, as well as their Syrian middlemen. The penetration of Hezbollah into so much of Lebanon has been a slow but steady one, and by now the entwinement is so thick and tangled that it's hard to see how it can be undone without terrible destruction of innocent people, and the destabilization of the country. Some of this has already happened.
But the mind searches for solutions, because the possible outcomes are so dreadful to contemplate. This morning, while casting about for the views of others, I came across this piece by Michael Totten.
The peripatetic Totten was in Lebanon fairly recently, a long sojourn in which he reported on what he saw there. What's his solution? Unfortunately, he doesn't have one. What he offers is a certain perspective, and it's not a comforting one.
Here's Totten on the topic of disarming Hezbollah, describing what he saw in Lebanon a few months ago, when neither he nor anyone foresaw the exact course of events to follow:
Many Lebanese Christians, Sunnis, and Druze were getting so impatient with the impasse over Hezbollah’s weapons they threatened to reconstitute their own armed militias that were disbanded after the war. Peaceful and diplomatic negotiation over Hezbollah’s role in a sovereign rather than schismatic Lebanon was not going to last very much longer. Once the rest of Lebanon armed itself against Hezbollah, a balance of terror would reign that could explode into war without any warning. That was the danger. That was the nightmare. That’s why Hezbollah had not been disarmed...
Totten saw the peace in Lebanon at the time as an uneasy and temporary one. Despite whatever polls might have said about Lebanese support for Hezbollah, he saw the people as more frightened of its power than approving. Of course, we have no way of knowing how representative Totten's informants were, or whether his impressions were skewed by seeing a small sample of the Lebanese people. But still, he was there, and did his best to learn what was really going on.
Now, Totten says that in the heat of this war the Lebanese are angry at the Israelis. Temporarily:
No one is running off to join Hezbollah, but tensions are being smoothed over for now while everyone feels they are under attack by the same enemy. Most Lebanese who had warm feelings for Israel -- and there were more of these than you can possibly imagine -- no longer do.
This will not last.
Totten makes a prediction about what will happen after. His "after" assumes (as I think it is correct to assume) that this particular episode, the hot war with Israel, will not end with the eradication of Hezbollah in Lebanon. He writes:
My sources and friends in Beirut tell me most Lebanese are going easy on Hezbollah as much as they can while the bombs are still falling. But a terrible reckoning awaits them once this is over.
Some Lebanese can’t wait even that long....
My friend Carine says the atomosphere reeks of impending sectarian conflict like never before. Another Lebanese blogger quotes a radical Christian war criminal from the bad old days who says the civil war will resume a month after Israel cools its guns: "Christians, Sunnis and Druze will fight the 'fucker Shia', with arms from the US and France."
For those who want Hezbollah out of Lebanon, this may sound like a solution. Totten addresses this idea:
Israeli partisans may think this is terrific. The Lebanese may take care of Hezbollah at last! But democratic Lebanon cannot win a war against Hezbollah, not even after Hezbollah is weakened by IAF raids. Hezbollah is the most effective Arab fighting force in the world, and the Lebanese army is the weakest and most divided....
To Totten, Lebanon has been essentially powerless from the start. It had one of two choices: war or accommodation. Since the war against Hezbollah was unwinnable by the weak and divided Lebanon, it chose the latter.
But there's no accomodation possible with a force such as Hezbollah. Know your enemy; accomodation only buys them time, I'm afraid.
And, in the end, Totten also seems to be saying this. He has great compassion for the dilemma the Lebanese people faced, and still face:
Israel and Lebanon (especially Lebanon) will continue to burn as long as Hezbollah exists as a terror miltia freed from the leash of the state. The punishment for taking on Hezbollah is war. The punishment for not taking on Hezbollah is war. Lebanese were doomed to suffer war no matter what. Their liberal democratic project could not withstand the threat from within and the assaults from the east, and it could not stave off another assault from the south. War, as it turned out, was inevitable even if the actual shape of it wasn’t.
The quote that struck me most forcibly was this, which bears repeating:
The punishment for taking on Hezbollah is war. The punishment for not taking on Hezbollah is war.
It immediately brought to mind a statement by Winston Churchill, he of the silver tongue, when speaking about a similar accomodation sought by the militarily weak British and French prior to WWII:
Britain and France had to choose between war and dishonor. They chose dishonor. They will have war.
And please, spare yourself the trouble of informing me that the situation isn't quite analogous. I know it's not. But the similarity is this: sometimes what seems like a choice is no choice at all. When dealing with certain enemies bent on destruction and conquest, how can one avoid battle? Sooner or later, the conflagration will erupt. And is it better in the end for it to erupt sooner rather than later, when the enemy is stronger and more deeply entrenched?
The punishment for taking on Hitler was war. The punishment for not taking on Hitler was war. World War.
In the middle of all of this, into my head popped some lines by the ancient Persian (Persia=Iran) poet Omar Khayyam. Somehow they seem apropos to the feeling of futility and confusion, of powerful forces working in mysterious ways that can't be foreseen.
Omar, a fatalist, didn't believe very much in the ability of human beings to control their own destiny. He wrote, so long ago, that:
We are no other than a moving row
Of Magic Shadow-shapes that come and go
Round with the Sun-illumined Lantern held
In Midnight by the Master of the Show;
But helpless Pieces of the Game He plays
Upon this Chequer-board of Nights and Days;
Hither and thither moves, and checks, and slays,
And one by one back in the Closet lays.
I'm not ready to subscribe to the level of fatalism of Omar Khayyam. But it does seem right now that the people of Lebanon are "but helpless pieces" in a game being played--if not by the Master of the Show, then by the puppet masters of Iran.
And this verse of Khayyam's, with its strangely prescient geography ("Naishapur," Omar's birthplace, is a city in what is now Iran; and "Babylon" is the ancient word for Iraq), seems apropos as well:
Whether at Naishapur or Babylon,
Whether the Cup with sweet or bitter run,
The Wine of Life keeps oozing drop by drop,
The Leaves of Life keep falling one by one.
Wednesday, July 26, 2006
The plot thickens, but does the fog of war thin?
Today seems to be an all UN, all the time day.
Take a listen to an interview with retired Canadian Major General Lewis Mackenzie, here. Quote: "there's an information war going on." Indeed there is, and I'm afraid Hezbollah, with the cooperation of the UN, is winning.
Other quotes: the UN observer said that "Hezbollah fighters were all over his position."
And, if this is true, why (as Canadian PM Harper asks) had the position not been evacuated by the UN weeks ago?
And then, take a look at this. I'm not sure about the provenance of the video, or who "Alan Peters" actually is, but things seem to be getting curiouser and curiouser.
Take a listen to an interview with retired Canadian Major General Lewis Mackenzie, here. Quote: "there's an information war going on." Indeed there is, and I'm afraid Hezbollah, with the cooperation of the UN, is winning.
Other quotes: the UN observer said that "Hezbollah fighters were all over his position."
And, if this is true, why (as Canadian PM Harper asks) had the position not been evacuated by the UN weeks ago?
And then, take a look at this. I'm not sure about the provenance of the video, or who "Alan Peters" actually is, but things seem to be getting curiouser and curiouser.
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