The American Spectator

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Finally, Israel is very much alone in this endeavor. At home, their appeasement factions are crying for a return to the status quo of three months ago. The Lebanese government will not help for two reasons. First, it is not a truly free government. To a large extent, Syria still controls that country. Second, the Lebanese army, what little of it is not sympathetic to Hezbollah, has no stomach for a fight. The Arab states, though fearful of the Iranian menace, have internal problems of their own. The Europeans have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo in the region for as long as they can, for both economic reasons and to pander to their own radical Islamic populations, and wish to see the fighting stop before there is an Israeli victory. Russia and China see the situation in the Middle East as to their advantage as long there is no decisive end to radical Islamic terrorism in the region. A low level terrorist conflict is viewed as a means of pinning down the United States while Russia and China, in particular, go about their own activities. Access to oil is a consideration for the U.S., as it is with most industrialized nations.

p>This has been a long way of agreeing with Mr. Babbin, for which I apologize. He is absolutely correct to say that the Israelis have got to turn off their television sets, ignore everyone else, including the U.S., and move forward with the objective of clearing Hezbollah out of Lebanon, even if takes leveling every building from the border to Beirut. Otherwise, they will have lost and sacrificed lives and international good will for nothing. Non-combatants must be protected as much as possible, but this is war not the police dealing with a lone barricaded subject. People who do not leave the area are liable to get killed. And if the Lebanese government is unwilling or unable to provide for the safe removal of non-combatants, then they have as little reason to exist as the group holding non-combatants as shields. br> -- Michael Tobias br> Ft. Lauderdale, Florida /p> p> HIGH ON THE HOG br> Re: David Hogberg's They Haven't Changed : /p> p>Just to let David Hogberg know, yes I am sitting out the election this year because I feel we have been duped, double crossed, ignored, and taken for fools. I thought the conservatives won the election in both the Congress and the executive but I was wrong. It was all about saying one thing to get elected, as usual, and then doing just the opposite. What ever happened to fiscal responsibility, a comprehensive energy policy that really means something other than finger waving, and border security. No thanks, I've had it. I can hardly hold my head up in the watering hole when my Democrat drinking companions chide about the failures of the U.S. President and Congress. br> -- Tom Bullock

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