"It's a matter of results"

"Hezbollah is nothing but yet another Islamic death cult, dedicated to death and darkness for all of humanity," writes Dr. Sanity, quoting Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah's condemnation of the infidel's love of life, as contrasted with jihadis' "willingness to sacrifice their blood, souls, children, fathers, and families for the sake of the nation's honor, life, and happiness [which] has always been one of our nation's strengths." No wonder they never accomplish anything worthwhile. Above -- speakiing of worthwhile accomplishments -- Discovery shuttle returns safely to earth this morning.

"There's been a lot of discussion on the blogosphere about this war, of course. It's the most important thing going on in the world today, and I'm going to begin with the two principal arguments against Israel," says Pajamas Media CEO Roger L. Simon in the scoop of the 'sphere, an exclusive PoliticsCentral podcast interview with Ambassador of Israel to the US, Daniel Ayalon:

Roger Simon: One is that it is not acting proportionately, and the second -- which is probably partly the same question -- what about the argument that you are making enemies with the Lebanese people?

Daniel Ayalon: First of all, about the issue of proportionality, let me tell you that Israel is being very, very careful, and we are not targeting the buildings in the country. The problem is that there are no [indistinct] camps in Lebanon because precisely what they are doing is hiding all their equipment, their missiles, in residential areas. This is part of their strategy. And secondly, we have been quite restrained in the past six years. We are the ones who evacuated Lebanon altogether. We pulled out of Lebanon -- every inch of it -- in May of 2000. The other side of it was for the Lebanese to assume control all the way to their border and to disarm the terror organization of the Hezbollah, which didn't happen.

That's the dilemma of asymmetric warfare, where the enemy doesn't play by the rules of war but knows you will, while the world is watching your every move. Like many others on the right side of the blogosphere, we weren't buying the "disproportionate" argument, no way. Theorists and lawyers may debate the finer points of "Just War" theory," but as commenter george at Stuck in Beirut  -- blogged here -- said sensibly yesterday, "Disproportionate force is what enables a military force to win. It's necessary, and nothing to be ashamed of." Ambassador Ayalon told Roger very much the same thing:

This is an existential issue for all of us, and we have the right to defend ourselves.

An astronaut's-eye-view from the Discovery's cockpit on approach to the landing strip (top center) at the Kennedy Space Center this morning.

Likewise Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who declared today, "There are moments in the life of a nation, when it is compelled to look directly into the face of reality and say: no more!" A few more words of wisdom from Ambassador Ayalon before you go over and listen to the whole thing:

There is here a very dangerous strategic equation, whereby Iran and Syria are trying to promote their interests in the Middle East, which are very radical in nature. They want to turn the entire Middle East into a very extreme Islamist Republic, which will continue to promote terror, as they do, which will have weapons of mass destruction, you know -- nuclear weapons, that they are working on -- which is to destabilize the entire region and the country. And this is what's at stake, not just the abductions and soldiers. This is just the first manifestation, or one of the manifestations of their very dangerous policy. Now they are the ones that pushed us over the brink which we are all finding ourselves in. The only way to extricate ourselves and to get out of it is to make sure Hezbollah will not be able to do it anymore in the future and hold hostage the entire region. Certainly the poor Lebanese people, the government of Lebanon, we have nothing against them. So it's not a matter of tit for tat, its not a matter of proportionality. It's a matter of results. And the results can be done only with decisive action, and this is what we are doing, and we are targeting Hezbollah and their infrastructure and nothing else.

We especially liked Ayalon's reponse to the question "Do you follow the blogosphere?":

Well, absolutely . . . I believe more and more Americans and people around the world will get their information from blogs, and the of course great advantage of blogs is that they are interactive and they can also participate in making the news and also offering their opinion . . . and I see in the blogs and also when I hear Americans all across this great land of yours, they are very supportive of Israel . . . understanding that we are at the forefront of the war, the global war on terror.

We are all Israelis now.

Comments

[goomp]

Succesful results. Something lacking in the methods of the secular West. Time for the Western World to wake up to the mortal dangers to themseles from those inspired by Islam to destroy the infidels.

[pb]

We are watching Israel, hoping they will simply wipe out their enemies, summarily ending the Islamicists' dreams of eventually cowing the Western world. Israeli soldiers are traditionally among the best in the world; they are faithful, well-trained, and know exactly why they are fighting. It is for nothing less than the survival of their people.

When we recognize that we are fighting for nothing less than our survival, then we will support Israel wholeheartedly and with all our powers.

[Francis W. Porretto]

The open alliance of Syria and, at a very slight remove, Iran with Hezbollah is transforming terrorist-style asymmetric warfare into a good old contest between nation-states. The Israelis are braced for it; indeed, they're already conducting it as it must be conducted. If they don't contrive somehow to rein Hezbollah in within two or three days, Iran and Syria will soon be at war with Israel with more than words. They will discover that the Israelis don't pull their punches. They will discover, furthermore, that the United States really will back Israel all the way to victory, no matter who's on the other side.