Abracadabrah<br><br><i> I create as I speak</i>: Measuring Olmert for a political shroud

Friday, August 11, 2006

Measuring Olmert for a political shroud

[ Is anyone but me now wondering what Olmert agreed to in advance to secure the robust support not only from the US, but from Britain's Tony Blair. Because it is hard to imagine why Blair of all people would lend such robust support to it without it being in realization of a goal he believes in so strongly,
such as the Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank. ]

Vital Perspective has the text of the UN resolution. So does the Corner, where there is some parsing of it if you scroll up and down.

John Podhoretz thinks Olmert is being measured for a political shroud. His nephew, an IDF soldier, thinks that Olmert's picture will be listed in the dictionary besides the word "coward".

Rich Lowry reports that his sources tell him there is intense anger in the US Administration right now against Israel:

Was just talking to a friend who was noting that there is intense anger toward Israel within the administration for botching the war. He thinks the attitude was, "What's the point of giving them more time when they do nothing with it?" He thinks it's the worst defeat for Israel since 1948. He also guesses that the reason that the French flipped against the first resolution wasn't so much the Lebanese reaction as the realization of how poorly Israel was faring militarily. His general rule when it comes to U.N. resolutions in the Middle East is that they either simply reflect the facts on the ground, or make the victor give away a little bit of his victory; they never let someone pull victory out of a hat from defeat. So Israel will utlimately get from this resoltuon what they won on the ground, which is to say not much.

I myself feel that the destruction Israel wrought on Lebanon is less morally defensible for serving so little purpose. Since that damage was not in service of some useful end, like destroying Hezbollah, or destroying Hezbollah more than it did, if there is no useful, strategic, moral point to it, than it is harder to see the point of it at all.