"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.