Cable news has been busy tonight. The better part of 40 minutes Shepherd Smith’s Fox News broadcast was devoted to live coverage of the Israeli strike against the Palestinian Foreign Ministry, a strike aimed at letting the Palestinians know this is personal now. Haaretz reports that 3 people were injured, however it looks as though the action taken by Hezbollah in Lebanon earlier in the day (the abduction of 2 Israeli soldiers) was intended to escalate the situation and get Israel out of Gaza - well, that didn’t work well, did it? Instead, Israel has responded with striking Hezbollah targets in Lebanon and more strikes and skirmishes in both Gaza and at the Lebanon/Israeli border. And heads up, it may not stop there.
Thus far, we have the following players in this budding Middle East war:
- Israel
- Palestine
- Hamas
- Hezbollah
- Lebanon
- Syria (in the background)
- Iran (in the background)
Note that Iran is also involved in UN security issue surrounding their development of nuclear weapons - makes one wonder if this is a race against time in the Middle East. As far as the Israelis are concerned, this is by no means the first such escalation of tensions they’ve experienced: such turmoil has reared its head with its neighbors after Israel’s establishment, such as 1948’s War of Independence, 1968’s War of Attrition, and Israeli’s 1982 attack against Lebanon for terrorist attacks against northernmost Israeli settlements. These conflicts are very, very deep in Middle East culture - most of the same countries or organizations are involved in the latest events.
Couple this with the upcoming G-8 summit this weekend, train bombings by terrorists in India, insurgents in Iraq, and last week’s North Korean missile tests...well, it’s an alarming picture.
Technorati Tags: Breaking News, Current Affairs, Israel, Gaza, Palestine, Lebanon, Middle East, Terrorism, Hezbollah
Yikes! Wow, it's hard to even pretend to know what will or should happen in this situation. I agree with you that there are too many mitigating and peripheral factors to not see all of this as somewhat coordinated.
My (and I assume the world's) patience for the "religion of peace" is completely worn out. Thanks to the radicals who have utterly hijacked Islam, there is a disgusting amount of death, pain, and suffering in store for the future of a large percentage of the world's population.
I expect Israel to be at all out war with two or three countries, not to mention the loonies living within their own border, within six months to a year. This is frightening, especially since the USA will back them, which they should.
By the way, does anyone else sense a Russian hand in all of this? It is well known that Syria, Iran, and Lebanon have received arms and various tech from the Russkies. The new Russia is playing a very calculated game of marrionette chess it seems to me. And it is a scary one, since we are still secretly their opponenets. - RD
Posted by: Realitydweller | July 13, 2006 at 07:27 AM