As usual in any crisis, the Middle East rumor, prevarication and excuses mill has been working overtime. A canard circulated by supposedly respectable people claims that the Hezbollah kidnapping of Israeli soldiers was "legitimate" because the Israeli patrol had entered Lebanese territory. So let us be absolutely clear about this:
 

Certainly Hizbollah's attack broke the United Nations rules in southern Lebanon--a "violent breach" of the Blue Line, it was called by Geir Pedersen, the senior UN official in the country--and was bound to unleash the air force, tanks and gunboats of Israel on to this frail, dangerous country.
 

The source of the above quote is none other than Robert Fisk, who is not suspected of any Zionist sympathies. Even Fisk understands that the Hezbollah, who are allowed by the Lebanese to represent them, committed a clear act of aggression.

A second excuse that has been circulating is that the Hezbollah and Israel are morally equivalent, because the Israelis hold Lebanese prisoners for "no reason," as hostages to be traded. The prisoner whom the Hezbollah want to retrieve apparently is Samir Kuntar. Kuntar has been jailed in Israel since a 1979 attack in the northern town of Nahariyah, in which he entered an apartment and murdered three family members and an Israeli police officer. There is no moral equivalence between imprisoning the murderous Kuntar and kidnapping soldiers or civilians who are going about their business.

A third excuse that has been circulating is that the Hezbollah attacked a "legitimate" target - soldiers. This is very confused and confusing. If the Hezbollah are allowed to attack soldiers, then Israel is at war with Lebanon, and Israel is allowed to retaliate against any and all targets that it considers to be strategic. In any case, the kidnapping was accompanied by a rocket attack on Israel. Rocket attacks are aimed at civilians and are not "legitimate."

Less controversial but more confusing fog surrounds the nature of the missiles or rockets in use by Hezbollah. An Israeli "Saar-5" missile cruiser was hit by an Iranian Fajr missile. It is not clear if these missiles were fired by Iranian crews operating in Lebanon, or by Hezbollah trained in the operation of these missles. It is not clear (to me anyhow) if the reference is to the sophisticated naval missiles developed by Iran, or to a truck mounted Katyusha like rocket, also called "Fajr." Both have been supplied to the Hezbullah by Iran The nature of the rockets that hit Haifa today, killing nine people is also in doubt. These are not Katyousha rockets. They are variously identified as "Shaheen" or "Shihab" missiles, but those have a range of up to 1,500 kilometers and clearly are not what struck Haifa. Israeli sources claim that fragments of the rockets indicate that they are of Syrian manufacture.

Much of the Arab world is still of the opinion that this "incident" will end like all the others, in an exchange of prisoners. In Asharq Al Awsa, Abdul Rahman Al-Rashed writes:
 

It is likely that after the military operations, Israel will release a thousand Palestinian and Lebanese prisoners in return for the release of its three soldiers. All parties will then announce their victories. I hope that then you will look carefully at the situation and whether it was a victory bearing in mind the number of victims, the suffering, the politics and the damages.
 

If that happens, then of course it will be a victory for the Hizbollah and Iran. President Ahmadinejad is determined to wipe out Zionism and Israel, and he will fight Israel to the last Lebanese, so it would be pure profit. Likewise Hassan Nasrallah will claim a victory. Nobody else will get any victory. However, Israel has upped the ante. Defense Minister Peretz and PM Olmert have both declared that Israel will not stop until the Hezbollah is disarmed and the Lebanese army is deployed along the border with Israel.

The Jihadist forces backed by Iran have clearly hijacked the Palestinian issue and many other issues in the Middle East, as David Brooks notes in the New York Times. They have also hijacked the Lebanese government. Therefore there is no way forward for peace or for Lebanese freedom or any other desirable goal as long as the Hezbollah and the Hamas remain in control of the destinies of Lebanon and Palestine, allowing Iran and Syria to dictate the agenda.

However, it is not clear at all that continued Israeli military pressure can defeat the Hezbollah. Israel has already killed over a hundred people in Lebanon. Many, according to IDF, were civilians who lived next to specially built rocket storage facilities in Lebanese villages. Even so, pressure to stop the offensive is bound to mount. It would only take one disaster, such as occurred at Sabra and Shatilla or Cana, to force Israel to stop. On the other hand, Hezbollah has threatened rocket attacks on the Israeli refineries and petrochemical complex in Haifa, which could cause a disaster in Israel. Failure in trying to eliminate Hezbollah would be even worse than living with them.

So what would be done, in the event the casualties mount? Call off the assault and let the Hezbollah win, or continue no matter what, as the allies did in WW II.

It seems that US Secretary of State Rice is clear as mud on this issue. On the one hand:
 

We have said to Prime Minister Olmert and to other Israelis that we are deeply concerned about the effect on innocent civilians, and would hope that Israel would be mindful of, and restrained in, its operations so that the innocent civilians do not suffer -- innocent civilian casualties, civilian infrastructure -- and so that the Lebanese government, which is a good and democratic and, in fact, young democratic government, is not undermined by those actions. But that has been the message to the Israelis, just as we've been saying publicly, and I think as the President said yesterday.
 

On the other hand, Rice says:
 

I can tell you that -- of course, we want violence to end. But I can tell you right now if violence ends on the basis of somehow Hezbollah or Hamas continuing to hold in their hands the capabilities anytime they wish to start launching rockets again into Israel, if violence ends on the basis of no change in the underlying political support for Resolution 1559 or for the work that President Abbas is doing, if violence ends on the basis of Syria and Iran being able to turn on the key again anytime, we will have achieved very, very little, indeed, and we will be right back here, perhaps in a worse circumstance because the terrorists will assume that nobody is willing to take on what has been a very clear assault now on the progress that is being made by moderate forces in the Middle East.
 

Personally I do not see any progress made by moderate forces in the Middle East. Anything that was achieved in the peace process, in dialogue between peoples, anything that the Palestinians achieved in the way of responsible self-government, and all the achievements of the Cedar Revolution in Lebanon are in ruins, along with considerable portions of Beirut, parts of Nahariyah and other Israeli cities. The antics of the Hamas and the Hezbollah and the Israeli reaction, necessarily polarized both sides. The rise of the Hezbollah and the Hamas so far showed that democracy can be the road to disaster and chaos rather than the promised road to peace and progress.

I am aware that I am repeating myself, but the best course for everyone concerned is to push for an immediate cease fire, return of Israeli soldiers and disarmament of Hezbollah in accordance with U.N. Security Council Resolutions 1559 and 1680. Indeed, that is what Israel Defense Minister Peretz called for in his speech today, and it is also what Lebanese P.M. Fuad Seniora called for in his speech yesterday. Why then, isn't it happening?