For some reason I continue to believe it’s possible to have civil discussion of the Mideast conflict — even in the blogosphere, which I’m beginning to think is an inherently poisonous medium. In the last couple of days I’ve been accused of ethnocentrism, support for ethnic cleansing, even tacit sympathy for Lebanese Maronite fascism. I’m not going to respond to scurrilous personal attacks, so I’d advise commenters not to waste their time or mine.
Israel’s killing of Lebanese civilians, its destruction of civilian neighborhoods and infrastructure, its attacks on the Lebanese military, are utterly indefensible. Dan Halutz the other day said “nothing is safe” in Lebanon, and the Israeli military has kept its word on that score. The Bush administration’s current tactic — do nothing, and allow this appalling escalation to take its course — is equally indefensible. Prominent Democrats, useless as usual, are lining up in uncritical support of Israel. (Once again, Marc Cooper has the story.) But the ultra-left is lining up in uncritical support of Hezbollah.
Kudos, however, to Juan Cole, one of Israel’s fiercest critics, who has no problem calling Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah “maniacal”:
Hizbullah’s attacks on Israeli civilians are war crimes. The killing of the civilians in Haifa at the train station was a war crime. And threatening to release chemicals from factories on civilian populations is probably a war crime in itself, much less the doing of it.
Obviously, I do not accept that Hizbullah’s actions justify the wholesale indiscriminate destruction and slaughter in which the Israelis have been engaged against the Lebanese in general. But they do have every right to defend themselves against Nasrallah and his mad bombers.
Again, that is not what Israel is doing at present. The fighting needs to stop.
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