« Take Responsibility for Your Food Choices | Main | When no one trusts you, you've no one to trust »

July 18, 2006

The Lunatics Have Taken Over

Jim Lobe opines in the Asia Times that U.S. war hawks are smelling blood in the current Israeli-Palestinian explosion, and he makes a compelling case that is worth a careful read. Here's a taste:

Just nine days after September 11, Kristol and PNAC - whose charter members included Vice President Dick Cheney, Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld and half a dozen other senior Bush administration officials - released an open letter to Bush that called for the United States to retaliate not only against al-Qaeda and Afghanistan, but also against Israel's main regional foes, beginning with Iraqi president Saddam Hussein and Palestine Liberation Organization chairman Yasser Arafat.

In addition, the letter advised, "any war against terrorism must target Hezbollah. We believe that the administration should demand that Iran and Syria immediately cease all military, financial and political support for Hezbollah and its operations. Should Iran and Syria refuse to comply, the administration should consider appropriate measures of retaliation against these state sponsors of terrorism. …

[T]he current conflict represents a golden opportunity for the neo-conservatives to reassert their influence and reactivate their Israel-centered agenda against Hezbollah and its two state sponsors.

Not everyone views Hamas and Hezbollah as terrorists, despite their terrorist activity. Some see them as something much worse.

They are not terrorists. They carry out terrorist attacks, but they are not terrorists. They are something far more dangerous. They are a fully functioning political, social, religious, and military organizations that use terrorism tactics, but they are far more formidible than terrorist groups like Al Qaeda or the Basque Terrorist Organization. They do have the resources and the personnel to project force, sustain operations, and cannot be easily defeated. Unlike the Egyptian and Syrian armies in 1973, Hamas and Hezbollah will not easily fold and cannot be defeated in a seven day war. If that is the assumption among some Israeli military planners it is a crazy fantasy.

The worst part of this for me is not that North Korea, Iran, Israel, and God knows where else are run by a bunch of lunatics. It's that the United States, once a force for peace and stability, is run by a bunch a lunatics who want to go to war with all the other lunatics in the world. It just plain pisses me off. Particularly seeing as how there is about a zero percent chance that anyone can stop this runaway train at this point and I'm stuck on board.

TruthOut.org has some more commentary on the matter. And if you want a real heart breaker, go to Jeff Rense's conspiratorial website and have a look at the photo of the gifts Israeli children are sending to Lebanese children. Be sure to click through to see how well received those gifts have been.

Posted by Becky at July 18, 2006 09:43 AM