Vicious Rants of an Angry Yellow Man

It is now over three weeks since the battle in Lebanon started. There is still no ending in sight. Even if the U.N. gets a resolution at the end of this week, it will be weeks before an U.N. force can be assembled to do the job of keeping peace. In the meanwhile, Israel is increasing her ground attack with the intention of destroying as much of Hezbollah's force before the truce come. I think Israel can achieve some of her military objective, but as I said before, whatever the outcome, it will not make Israel safer based on her actions in this conflict.

The bombing at Qana was a disaster. This was almost a repeat of what happened 10 years ago. This is exactly the type of situation that Israel was guaranteed to get into when she refused to have a cease fire shortly after retaliating against Hezbollah. As precise this type of bombing is supposed to be, mistakes are unavoidable. The bombing of Qana should have been avoided, however. When a decision is to bomb a target, one must consider the risk and benefit ratio of the attack. Israel claimed that Hezbollah was firing rockets from the target area. So the benefit, if the intelligence is correct, would be to wipe out couple of rocket launchers. The risk is that there are great civilian casualties in a very symbolic site from 10 years ago. If I am in charge of deciding where to bomb, I would not take Qana unless I see lots of enemies and weapons sitting in an open field. Israel says she regrets the incidence and will investigate how the mistake occured. This is of course what she always say when an unintended target is hit. Some ambulances and an U.N. building were hit the week before. There is still no explanation how such mistakes occured. If an ambulance with a large red cross and a building occupied by the U.N. for years can be mistakenly blown up, why would anyone think that air strikes are precise?

Even the U.S. were upset by the bombing at Qana and tried to pull Israel back by coercing Israel into stop bombing for 48 hours. Israel did not comply with the wishes of the U.S. Pundits have continue to make the point that Hezbollah is responsible for the civilian deaths by hiding among the populace. Mort Zuckerman said that if someone robs a bank and hold hostages, then if anyone dies in the stand off, the robber is responsible for murder according to our laws. Pat Buchanan responded by saying that in that case, he doesn't think the police will bomb the bank to catch the robbers. If Israel is really the good guy, then act like a good guy. I don't expect the Israelis to turn the other cheek, I couldn't do it if I am in their shoes. Eye for an eye is fair. But gouging the eyes of 10 innocents to revenge one eye is excessive even to me. Can you imagine what the Arabs think about that? If you are a Lebanese child and your home is lost and you are a refugee today, do you grow up hating Hezbollah, who started this, or do you hate Israel who bombed out your house? This Lebanese child maybe tommorrow's terrorist.