Guilt in the Middle East?

Well, everyone who had been saying “Israel is doing the right thing!” are starting to change their tunes. It seems the thought of civilian casualties turns Israel from a righteous defender of their territory to a vicious oppressor of the masses. The sad ting I suppose is that it seems that Israel wanted to strike back at Hezbollah without invading Lebanon so they went with airpower. Unfortunately this kind of restraint has a serious downside. Namely, that airplanes are great for blowing up buildings but really lousy about knowing what is inside them. So, if some rockets are launched from the vicinity of a building the airplanes come and flatten the building without being able to see that there is a bomb shelter inside it. This is a serious downside to airpower. All of this should be clearly obvious to anyone who has observed the effects of America’s past efforts. Airpower is excellent for blowing up tanks that are on the move or are sitting in the dessert. It is much less effective when vehicles are hiding or small groups of people are hiding. Airplanes haven’t worked for hinting down and destroying Al Queda in
Afghanistan and it won’t work for killing Hezbollah in Lebanon. Israel has realized it now and the troops are moving in across the boarder which will simultaneously result in fewer civilian casualties and in increased condemnation from the international community. Unfortunately, the decrease in civilian casualties will be short lived because Hezbollah’s fighters will set up their defensive positions right in front of or even in the civilians of the area. Of course in that part of Lebanon Hezbollah really is the civilian population. They are the police, the teachers, the firefighters, the politicians, damn near everyone. So the folks who aren’t Hezbollah are thoroughly mixed with those who are, and when mixes like that happened people are just going to get killed. Who is in the wrong here? Everyone, no one, take your pick. They are all guilty. As George Carlin says, “Your birth certificate is proof of guilt.” In this part of the world I think that is a pretty accurate call.