US Secretary of State Condi Rice has had her flying visit to the Middle East, and back to the relative calm of Rome for the hastily arranged international conference to try and set up some sort of international consensus. Basically as soon as she had left Jerusalem, the Israelis ramped up the bombing of Lebanon again.
A United Nations observer post got bombed today, four blue berets killed, and yesterday a Red Cross ambulance got hit by a missile in the south of the country - luckily with that, it was only injuries rather than any deaths, although there was an amputation involved. And there was a heartbreaking report, both in the Guardian and the New York Times on Sunday, about a minivan with a dozen family members getting hit with a missile - a mother dying in her son's arms. Another Israeli hater created...
The UN Secretary General went off at the Israelis for that attack earlier today, saying it may be that the UN post was deliberately targetted, to which the Israelis said preposterous and not to judge the situation before any investigation - although the UN posts probably haven't moved in like twenty years. Just throws me back to that Gaza beach incident about two weeks before that particular front restarted, when a shell hit the beach and killed a family of seven - in that case, the Israelis didn't admit responsibility for any incoming shell...
Just the footage from Lebanon is stunning in it's destruction - Rumsfeld's Shock and Awe tour of Baghdad in 2003, doesn't even come close. South Beirut is like a major earthquake zone, rubble piling on rubble, and south Lebanon's road system has been torn to shreds - huge craters in the roads, cars that have been attacked or crashed either in the craters on at the sides of the roads.
Was reading a report in one of the papers tonight that said the death toll in Lebanon isn't anywhere near where it is likely to be, what with the reports from hospitals and morgues on the ground, the fact that a lot of bodies are probably in cars by the roadside or under buildings, and the oncoming crisis that is the no food, water and sanitation situation brought on by both the war and blockade.
And no doubt the Americans will disown Iraqi democracy shortly as they did with the Palestinians - the Iraqi PM is touring Britain and America at the moment, and is saying an immediate ceasefire is needed, rather than the 'durable' ceasefire tweedledum and tweedledee seem to be wanting. Tony Blair had an interesting press conference earlier in the week, where not wishing an immediate ceasefire was, by common sense I would think, equated with allowing more civilians to come under fire and probably die.
That microphone conversation that Blair and Bush had at the G-8, probably turned on and then leaked to the media by their host, Vladimir Putin, Blair was doing his earnest trying to help thing, and got slapped down by Bush saying Condi will get there, eventually, while taking bites of a bread roll. And Tony spluttering for about a minute after that - very funny, if it wasn't so tragically pathetic.
And one of the Democrat senators in Washington, Schumer I think, is saying why are we allowing the Iraqi PM to address Congress when he isn't trashing Hizbullah. Yes, you can have democracy, but only if you are lapdog-like to the power of Washington - regime change in Baghdad again perhaps?
Oh, and with 100 people a day dying in Iraq the last month, and more casualties there than in the Hizbullah war since that started, Bush and the Pentagon are reallocating troops from the provinces to Baghdad, civil war central. That will puncture the Administration a bit more before the mid-terms.
Part of the reason I have been a bit slack in my blogging lately, is reading reports from Iraq and Lebanon, and, to be honest, the way some of those reports are written, it is a bit intimidating to even think of ever writing again. Especially the report from the roadside on the weekend (NYT and Guardian), and a Washington Post series on the screw ups in Iraq in 2003/04.
I could only dream of writing as well. But, getting back on the horse of regular writing, I will just slog away in my little corner of internetland and try, try, try.
Paul
A United Nations observer post got bombed today, four blue berets killed, and yesterday a Red Cross ambulance got hit by a missile in the south of the country - luckily with that, it was only injuries rather than any deaths, although there was an amputation involved. And there was a heartbreaking report, both in the Guardian and the New York Times on Sunday, about a minivan with a dozen family members getting hit with a missile - a mother dying in her son's arms. Another Israeli hater created...
The UN Secretary General went off at the Israelis for that attack earlier today, saying it may be that the UN post was deliberately targetted, to which the Israelis said preposterous and not to judge the situation before any investigation - although the UN posts probably haven't moved in like twenty years. Just throws me back to that Gaza beach incident about two weeks before that particular front restarted, when a shell hit the beach and killed a family of seven - in that case, the Israelis didn't admit responsibility for any incoming shell...
Just the footage from Lebanon is stunning in it's destruction - Rumsfeld's Shock and Awe tour of Baghdad in 2003, doesn't even come close. South Beirut is like a major earthquake zone, rubble piling on rubble, and south Lebanon's road system has been torn to shreds - huge craters in the roads, cars that have been attacked or crashed either in the craters on at the sides of the roads.
Was reading a report in one of the papers tonight that said the death toll in Lebanon isn't anywhere near where it is likely to be, what with the reports from hospitals and morgues on the ground, the fact that a lot of bodies are probably in cars by the roadside or under buildings, and the oncoming crisis that is the no food, water and sanitation situation brought on by both the war and blockade.
And no doubt the Americans will disown Iraqi democracy shortly as they did with the Palestinians - the Iraqi PM is touring Britain and America at the moment, and is saying an immediate ceasefire is needed, rather than the 'durable' ceasefire tweedledum and tweedledee seem to be wanting. Tony Blair had an interesting press conference earlier in the week, where not wishing an immediate ceasefire was, by common sense I would think, equated with allowing more civilians to come under fire and probably die.
That microphone conversation that Blair and Bush had at the G-8, probably turned on and then leaked to the media by their host, Vladimir Putin, Blair was doing his earnest trying to help thing, and got slapped down by Bush saying Condi will get there, eventually, while taking bites of a bread roll. And Tony spluttering for about a minute after that - very funny, if it wasn't so tragically pathetic.
And one of the Democrat senators in Washington, Schumer I think, is saying why are we allowing the Iraqi PM to address Congress when he isn't trashing Hizbullah. Yes, you can have democracy, but only if you are lapdog-like to the power of Washington - regime change in Baghdad again perhaps?
Oh, and with 100 people a day dying in Iraq the last month, and more casualties there than in the Hizbullah war since that started, Bush and the Pentagon are reallocating troops from the provinces to Baghdad, civil war central. That will puncture the Administration a bit more before the mid-terms.
Part of the reason I have been a bit slack in my blogging lately, is reading reports from Iraq and Lebanon, and, to be honest, the way some of those reports are written, it is a bit intimidating to even think of ever writing again. Especially the report from the roadside on the weekend (NYT and Guardian), and a Washington Post series on the screw ups in Iraq in 2003/04.
I could only dream of writing as well. But, getting back on the horse of regular writing, I will just slog away in my little corner of internetland and try, try, try.
Paul
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