Bloody Sunday: Carnage at Qana

They were hiding for their lives from the bombs. In a basement of a multistory house, several displaced families were asleep in the desperately naive believe that they were save there. But they were not. During the early hours of this Sunday an Israeli bunker buster bomb destroyed the house on top of these poor souls. Their shelter were shattered with their bodies and their lives.

According to ABC (US) and BBC reports, at least 54 civilians died - of which 37 were children. The outrage that is unfolding in Lebanon is a travesty, destroying in two weeks what has been built painstakingly since 2002. It is not the vestibules of Hezbollah that are being destroyed. Rather it is the infrastructure, the nationhood, the very fabric of the Lebanese society that are being pummelled into submission. In one fell swoop, Israel has blown to shards the last remnants of goodwill and whatever respectable reputation might have remained amongst the Arab nations and many Western nations for itself.

For all the sweet talk over how civilians are warned of imminent attacks and how precision strikes are aimed at Hezbollah targets only, the carnage amongst the civilian Lebanese has reached over 400 dead and more than 600 000 displaced, refugees in their own country.

All the ostentatious harangue about eternal Jewish morals and humanism, the bombastic pounding of southern Lebanon turns into a cynical farce in the pantomime of Zionism. The outcry of an unjustly punished society is met by the tentative and bewildered indecision of the West.

Images of the broken Kosova of the 1990's jump to mind. Where is the international leadership to put an immediate end to this futile destruction? Once the emotions have settled for a brief moment before the next scene of devastation, one may contemplate just what the basis for such leadership might be.

Richard Calland of the Mail & Guardian argues that merely learning from examples of successful resolutions to deep-rooted conflict presents no evidence of any progress in those unresolved conflicts such as the Middle East. Rather, the pivotal question is whether the historic tide has changed against the status quo of injustice in the Israel-Palestine affair. More practical, moral weight should be gathered against the injustice and brought to bear upon the protagonists of injustice through sanctions and firm diplomatic pressure.

Tony Leon, leader of the Democratic Alliance of South Africa, is reported in a later addition of the Mail & Guardian, to have said that the best approach to the Israel-Lebanon conflict would be "rights-based". He warns against a simplistic, Manichean world view of good versus bad in which one is forced to align with one of the two poles - good or evil. The Middle Eastern conflict is complex far beyond such naive classification, according to Mr Leon. On that point, Mr Bush might take note. His axis of evil approach has not reaped him any good of lately and brought immense destruction to Iraq. One inevitably wonders who's next to go on his proclaimed axis.

The impunity with which Israel misbehaves in Lebanon is evidence of the lack of real influence that Europe, Russia and Asia have in one of the most acute ongoing international crises of all time. If the US is for us, who can be against us? That seems to be the mentality of the Israeli government and large sections of its political support base.

The lack of real influence also demonstrates how perilous the current international situation has become what with only one real superpower that can do as it pleases. What leadership exists at the head of this muscle-toned crusader leaves the world even more gasping with bated breath. But as history has shown us, the wheel always keeps turning.

As energy and commodities continue to increase in importance, the rise of new superpowers on the international block, such as China, Russia and India, are waiting in the wings. It is only a matter of time before the gauntlet is flaunted for a re-balancing of international power. The change of leadership will come with a change in the status quo at the UN Security Council.

Perhaps the massacre of 54 Lebanese civilians may still lead to more radical changes in the international power play. Perhaps the rest of the world can be shocked out of its indecision. Perhaps real leadership will arise to take us on a road of rights-based international justice. As Bloody Sunday of 30 January 1972 was in a sense a pivotal point for the Northern Ireland conflict, so the carnage in Qana may still prove similarly decisive.

"Jaw-jaw" is better than "war-war"

This posting is entirely inspired by and dedicated to Matt Frei of the BBC, author of Washington Diary. His latest posting on the recent G8 meeting is simply brilliant. No further musings from Anduril is required. Over to Matt... The Big Brother G8

"Stop this shit"

The casual tone of Bush caught by an open microphone at the G8 meeting belies the gravity of the unfolding tragedy in Lebanon [1]. His careless remark to Tony Blair smacks of his simplistic and superficial attitude towards sensitive and complex international conflicts. His high school-boyish attitude leaves one shuddering in dismay. This man is the leader of the primary superpower in the world. He displays all the flair of a rodeo horse in full rambunctious bucking.

While these leaders are relaxing over a sandwich, 230 Lebanese, of which 200 civilians, suffer death at the hands of brutal Israeli retaliation for a Hezbollah incursion into northern Israel to snatch two Israeli soldiers. Since Wednesday, Israel claims, 700 Hezbollah missiles have landed in Israel. This missile bombardment is given as further motivation for the ongoing destruction by Israeli forces of southern Lebanon. Yet, for all these missiles fired onto Israel, only 25 Israeli people have died - of which 13 are civilians. Such figures show that the missile attack is of low affectivity. By comparison, Israeli attacks are viciously effective, but seem to strike vastly more civilians than Hezbollah militants [2], the alleged target of these attacks.

Israel is flatly ignoring calls for proportionate and restrained response to the kidnapping of its soldiers and the threat from Hezbollah in southern Lebanon. Instead the Israeli government and its army are destructing southern Lebanon with impunity. All the while, the world stands by with barely a voice of opposition. Mild, half-hearted expressions of concern over the situation are issued where instead the world should be putting an ultimatum to both parties, Israel and Hezbollah: Stop this shit right here, right now, or the UN will send an international army to enforce a seize-fire at once. Only France and Russia have had the nerve thus far to express firm opposition to Israel’s reckless retaliation in southern Lebanon.

It would appear as if the misguided snatching of two Israeli soldiers by Hezbollah has been seized by Israel as a golden opportunity to provoke the direct involvement of Iran and Syria, long-time supporters of Hezbollah, thereby handing on a silver platter to the US the excuse militarily to engage both those countries. The escalating situation is super-nutritious fodder to the extremists in the Middle East.

The world has not been this close to World War III since the Cuban missile crisis of 1962. If anyone should stop this shit, to use Bush’s words, it is he, his megalomaniac clique and his cocky little brother-in-arms, Israel. Ghandi once said: "An eye for an eye will leave the whole world blind". We seem set to find out very soon just how blind.

Of the elite, for the elite

So direct democracy is a system of the people for the people. That is what we of the free world would like to believe. That is what we preach to the despots and the autocrats - and those whose resources we would like to control. Yet, closer to home, who really rules in this country of the brave and the free? Is it the people or the new elite - the wealthy and their lackeys, the lobbyists? Is it a democracy of the people for the people or is it a new system of elitism - of the elite for the elite?

Within a weekend, two major papers - The New York Times and the Boston Globe - have published columns on the nature of the ruling classes in the USA. The Sunday Globe ran a major piece, called 51 Angry Plebes, while the NY Times of today presented an article, called Lobbyist, Yes, the People, Maybe.

The Sunday Globe connected the influence of wealthy elites with the constitutional theories of Machiavelli, which set out to oppose such influences. It would seem, according to the Globe, that the Founding Fathers were more concerned about reigning in the masses and mobs than the wealthy. Today, the wealthy seem to rule the running of affairs in the USA. The NY Times reported that lobbyists are extending their activities even into local governments, collecting vast sums for earmarked projects that were successfully allotted to their masters. Notwithstanding ongoing criminal investigations into unlawful lobbying tactics, this form of graft seems to be rife in the US establishment.

Anduril is of the opinion that far from the wealthy having hijacked the US constitution, the Founding Fathers deliberately played into the hands of the wealthy. Powerful financial players existed in the forming days of the USA. It is not implausible that these players exerted their substantial influence upon the setting of the political foundations of the USA. The royal elite of Britain made way for the local establishment of wealth and power - even before the advent of the American Revolution.

Today, the American public may live the illusion of being in power, having full suffrage and democratic rule, but who are the demos that exert the real power? If middleclass America believes it is them who calls the tune, then they have to check again who pays the piper, for votes can be bought with glamour and glitter, the razzmatazz of political pageantry. And once voted into power, politicians dance obediently to the beat of good old graft.

While Mr and Mrs Smith celebrate their freedom, the wealthy individuals, corporations, industries pull the strings in Washington DC. You cannot vote them in or, more importantly, vote them out. And rather do not put your faith in your congressional representative and senator to stand in the cross-fire for you either. Meanwhile we all merrily tread the mill that line their pockets. Afterall, we need our defence, medicine, and let's not forget to fill that tank on the SUV.

However, while realising the dilemma is lofty, changing it is quite another matter. Those in power are not going to relinquish their grip to the plebes that churn their treadmills. Middleclass suburbia is too comfortable with their self-sufficient lifestyle to make the effort that will lift the wealthy from their plush cushions. These sorts of fundamental changes rarely happen without an endemic and enduring crisis, such as brought about the English revolution, the French Revolution, the South African revolution.

But the wheel goes round and round. Real political change starts in the minds of the middleclass. It is when they start writing about these ideas that the wheel gets rolling.

1st of July

On the 1st of July, Europe commemorated the 90’Th anniversary of the first day in hell: The battle of the Somme. Whole villages from Northern England lost bands of young men - the Pal Brigades, mates in life and death, who had conscripted from factory lines to stand and fall together. How did they not fell? On that fateful day, Britain alone suffered 19,240 killed, 2,152 missing and 36,058 injured men [1,2].

All sides lost a million soldiers over the four months of blood, gore and incomparable courage. For once mankind was shocked at its insatiable appetite to destroy and maim its own kind. What passion drives Man to such depths of destruction and despair?

Perhaps it is the same passion that is driving the World Cup this year, as every four years. Watch them as the ball enters play. See the complete and utter involvement, the fire that lights in a striker's eyes when his strike hits the goal, his posture one of defiance. Hear the battle cries in the chanting of the crowds. Feel the anguish of humiliation at defeat as much as the glowing glory over victory with team and supporters alike.

Ours is a species of war. Our history is painted in the blood of our heroes and our villains. Sometimes we are fortunate to choose the football field as our battleground. But in our core we are still at war and perhaps would be until the end.

And yet, all is not lost. On 1 July, during the aftermath of the England-Portugal game, while despair and despondency reigned amongst devastated English players, one player from Portugal walked over to console a rather broken-hearted English player. It was tender, touching and humane. It gave hope for Mankind as much as it restored hope to one man.

USS New York

In a shipyard in Louisiana, USA, an amphibious assault ship is being built. Its bow section will contain salvaged steel from the New York Twin Towers that were destroyed in the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001. The ship will be called the USS New York [1,2,3].

The wounds from treachery and deceit, callousness and savagery, have now given rise to a spirit of vengeance and war. In a culture of frequently over-hyped symbolic extravaganzas, simultaneously fed by and feeding the Hollywood industry, the advertising industry, the political stage dramas and the various lobbying enterprises, comes another symbolic gesture, laden with emotion that borders on the sentimental. In a time when the world could do with restraint and sobriety, the US authorities choose to fuel the flames of destruction. The spirit of the reborn Christian is glaringly absent in this symbolism.

Instead, the hurt and loss of many are being manipulated to feed a war mentality and, more importantly, lucrative defence industry. The very first and primitives reactions to hurt and loss are being nurtured to the peril of all, while the more mature response of stoic suffering and measured recovery are being cast out the window.

A more fitting symbol would have been to use the salvaged steel from the Twin Towers to contract another building on the original site. It would have sent the message that for the country once hurt, recovery will follow, externally as well as internally.

Yet, the opportunity has passed. The path has been chosen. The world is one step closer to meltdown.