The fighting in Lebanon has been going on now for 17 days. Hundreds of bombs are still being dropped on Lebanon. The talks about cease fires continues. Today Toni Blair and George Bush met. There are no signs of the coflict ending though. Ending the conflict is just not a simple thing to do.

There are just too many unanswered questions about how a peacekeeping force shall be able to secure peace in the area. The plausibility of such a mission being a success is not convincing. It all depends on Isreals objectives.

They claim they want to disarm the Hezbollah in south Lebanon. This is the most credible and sensible objective. A U.N. peacekeeping force cannot achieve this, though. A NATO opperation similar to that in Kosovo is more likely to succeed, is politically very controversial and therefore very unlikely. If Israel will not stop until the Hezbollah are disarmed the fighting will have to continue much longer.

Israel may be persuing a much larger objective. When Condoleezza Rice met with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert she talked about “a new Middle East”. This hints at an Israeli objective beyond just disarming the Hezbollah. Syria and Iran are constant threats to Israel. The Bush Administration has also accused these countries of supporting terrorism. Regime change in these countries is very much in Israel’s interests and an escalation of fighting may open opportunities to attempt such a regime change.

Whatever Israel’s objectives are, they will continue their military operations until they are achieved. If of course public pressure or even diplomatic pressure from other states increases to a critical mass, Israel may be forced to end their offensive. This public pressure is increasing and the longer the conflict last, the greater the pressure will be. The pressure will have to be emense though before Israel agrees to a cease fire.

For Lebanon time has just about run out. Even if the fighting ends in the next few days, the damage has already been done. All diplomatic efforts will have come to late.

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Israel’s agressiveness in this conflict continues to kill innocent people. This is just the latest tradgedy of the war. If the numbers published on CNN and Fox News are accurate about 380 Lebanese civilians have been killed and only 11 Hezbollah fighters. That makes ca. 95% of all casualties civilian. On the other side about 19 Israeli civilians have been killed and 22 Israeli soldiers (ca. 46%).
This lack of respect for human life is astonishing.

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It is nothing new for a nation to defend itself. Every government has a commitment to proctect its citizens. The Hezbollah, The Hamas and other radical islamic groups in Lebanon and Palestine have of course threatened Israelis for a very long time. In fact Israel has been threatened by its neighbors since its beginnings. Israel’s “fight to survive” is well known.

It is very difficult to accept the current Israeli attacks on Lebanon as self defense. The reasons Israel gives for this attack are the abduction of two Israeli solders and missile attack on Israeli cities. Both have been done by the Hezbollah in southern Lebanon. Israeli attacks, though, have not been confined to destroying Hezbollah military targets. Delierate and massive destruction of the Lebanese infrastructure vital for all Lebanese citizens go way beyond fighting Hezbollah forces attacking Israel. The Hezbollah certainly recieve thier weapons and munition through this infrastructure, but destroying Hezbollah supply lines is in no relation to the suffering caused by the inability for all Lebanese to transport goods (such as food), electricity, water etc. Furthermore self defense cannot justify the indiscrimination of the bombings, which have caused the deaths of many Lebanese civilians hardly if at all connected to the Hezbollah.

Israel has transgressed acceptable actions of self defence. Israel hopes to achive more security for thier citizens this way. The chances that the Israeli attacks on Lebanon will provide more protection for Israel and its citizens are very small. The damage Lebanon and its citizens have sustained is emense. Hundreds innocent Lebanese have been killed.

No matter what reasons Israel gives for thier actions, they must be condemned.

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Today WOrldpinion goes online. Everyone has an opinion about what’s going on in the world. This is mine.

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