Why did Bush give Israel a week?

[americanstranger]

Because it's good for business at home.

In the course of a few different conversations with my co-blogger Invictus today, we talked about the reasons that Bush pretty much gave Israel a week to continue their attacks on Lebanon. The answer seems so simple to me, and it has very little to do with the situation in the Middle East.

In my opinion, everything that happens in the world is viewed by the White House through the prism of how it helps or hurts their political fortunes here in the US. They didn't move quickly on moving out the Americans in Lebanon, according to some reports, because the administration was afraid of the media getting a 'Fall Of Saigon' image that they could be beat about the head with. There have been reports today that Bush sees the current situation as an 'opportunity' to shore up flagging support for his foreign policy, such as it is.

And with that in mind, I submit that Bush is slow-walking any words or action against Israel because someone in the White House has taken notice of how badly the situation is polarizing liberals.

More at http://www.blah3.com/article.php?story=20060721193313427

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- as

[joemurphy]

1. If Bush thinks what's going on in Lebanon is going to

shore up support for his foreign policy, he's a total fool.

This is going to sink any Shia support we ever had in Iraq. This man is an immoral, dangerously stupid idiot.

[MADem]

2. Because it is good for business abroad, too.

This deal went down DURING the G8. Aside from a bit of tut-tutting, did you hear any world leader getting up there and DENOUNCING this quiet agreement to let ISRAEL, so easy to hate anyway, be the designated MEANIE in taking out these miitianuts??? Aside from the odd bone thrown to domestic audiences, the world leaders have been SILENT.

WHY??? Because they APPROVE.

And I disagree too about the FALL OF SAIGON business. I think the NEO plan that the embassy had did not count on three things:

--the number of dual nationals living in Lebanon (those numbers have soared in recent years);

--the airports, all of them, being unusable because the Israelis wanted to be sure they didn't take those captured soldiers to Iran via air, AND they wanted to stop missiles coming in the same way;

--the necessity to establish a harbor blockade and safe-passage route (all of which takes time and vessels to set up) to be sure no watercraft got blown up by some crazy and crafty HizbAllah bastards in an inflatable boat.

To suggest that the MONKEY did this shit more than a WEEK ago in hopes of "polarizing liberals" TODAY tells me that the writer thinks that Bush has power to see into the future. It's a nonsensical construct, that suggests not just precognition, but also that a lame duck preztledunce gives a flying fuck what "liberals" think and how they might react. He doesn't. He never has. He never will. He's content with conning the stupid, swaying the inattentive, and stealing what he can't get around the margins of error.

I don't think the Monkey has that crystal ball skill, or any other similar to it. He just is willing to be the head "asshole" who gives Israel the go-ahead to pound those terrorist militiashits into the ground, damn the casualties, and he is also giving cover, by being the frat boy shitheel tossing his weight about that he always is, to the other world leaders who are secretly agreeing with this position. Israel, for their part, is doing the ugly wet work, because they are the only ones with a defensible reason to so do.

And no one is speaking up, because they all are in accord with the ultimate aim of this exercise--to crush the military (not political, not charitable) wing of Hizb'Allah, and remove a Persian proxy military asset from the region.

Mark my words. They may not succeed, but that is the plan.

[americanstranger]

4. I mostly agree with you, except for this.

To suggest that the MONKEY did this shit more than a WEEK ago in hopes of "polarizing liberals" TODAY tells me that the writer thinks that Bush has power to see into the future. It's a nonsensical construct, that suggests not just precognition, but also that a lame duck preztledunce gives a flying fuck what "liberals" think and how they might react. He doesn't. He never has. He never will. He's content with conning the stupid, swaying the inattentive, and stealing what he can't get around the margins of error.

I don't for a minute think he 'did this' in hopes of polarizing liberals 'today.' You may have noticed that we've been badly polarized on this issue from Day One of the current crisis. But the initial idea was to strike against a known terrorist organization.

But after a day or two of seeing boards like this one erupt in battles royale over whether Israel was right or wrong, maybe they decided at that point to let the pot boil for a few days.

If you look back, the pronouncement that Bush/Condi were willing to let Israel conduct attacks for a week didn't even appear until a couple of days after they'd already been underway.

So no, they didn't plan this just to set Dem against Dem. I think they saw a couple of days into the situation that it was a nifty (for them, not so much for us) side-effect.

- as

[MADem]

5. Israel would not have ramped up without the go-ahead

It's not the easiest thing to swing your military into the acquire targets/load weapons/deploy aircraft mode. You've gotta launch drones, crack open armories, do all sorts of prep work. If they knew we were gonna say no, they'd have already sent a crew to slit Nasrallah's throat and poison the militia's high command, at great risk to their HUMINT assets.

But this Powell Doctrine response was ONGOING from the moment the rockets started coming over the border into Haifa. Just because there were no announcements did not mean the deal was not being sealed. All that "quiet time" was probably used to get every other country at the G8, and their factotums who weren't important enough to attend, all on the same page. The old "you can gripe this much at home, and this much abroad, but no further...when pressed, pull the HOPE FOR A UN AGREEMENT quote out of yer ass...and let Israel do the mopping up in the meantime."

The writer of that piece is suggesting that what liberals say MATTERS to Bush. He could care less. That he factors their opinion in, and he doesn't do that. That's the point I am making. It never has, it never will, matter to him. He's tone deaf on that "I'm a uniter" bullshit. He simply does not care. He puts his head down, and barrels forward, inattentive to any discussion from ANY faction, be it the right or the left, that deviates from his own opinions.

He will only need to care if we get the House and the Senate back. Right now, he's got it all. So fuck us, and while he is at it, fuck the classical conservatives too, and the horses we all rode in on...

[americanstranger]

7. No, I'm not saying that.

(I'm the writer.)

The writer of that piece is suggesting that what liberals say MATTERS to Bush. He could care less. That he factors their opinion in, and he doesn't do that. That's the point I am making. It never has, it never will, matter to him.

I'm afraid you're missing my point.

I'm not for a minute suggesting that Bush cares about what liberals say. What I am saying is that a side-benefit of his inaction in this crisis has the added side-benefit of pitting liberal against liberal, and the administration may have prolonged their inaction after they saw the shitstorms this crisis was generating out here on the liberal boards.

It has nothing to do whatsoever with Bush 'listening' to liberals or 'caring what we think.' That he doesn't has been a forgone conclusion with me since he took office.

- as

[MADem]

9. Here's my take on that "liberal pitting"

When it comes down to choices, there are people on the left who agree that Israel has a right to defend itself, and people who think they should shut up and allow ten thousand rockets to rain down on them without response. Somewhere between those extremes are people who wring their hands, call Israel "mean" but don't have any good solution to the fix the Israelis find themselves in. "Oh, they should TALK to the militia" they say. Yeah, the militia who has it in their charter that their aim is to destroy Israel, kill the Jews, and throw their bloated corpses into the sea! There's no talking to those muthas, none.

Personally, I find myself allied with the Jews on this issue, and though I disagree with their approach to Palestine, I don't confuse Lebanon and HizbAllah with Palestine and HAMAS. Plenty of people here, though, DO. You explain to them what HizbAllah is all about, and they come back with Rachel Corrie and bulldozers, like it is all of a piece. It isn't. But anyone who thinks it is has bought Nasrallah's propaganda hook, line, and STINKER.

They have similar gripes, but the issues are VERY different (Israel does not want to occupy Lebanon, after twenty years of hating that shit, they wanted OUT, and there is no substantial "disputed land" issues with Lebanon), and HAMAS serves the Filistines, who LIVE there, while HizbAllah's MILITIA serves Iran. People confuse the charity and political arms of HizbAllah with the militia--they aren't all of a piece. They are separate, with separate lines of communication.

I think the Kumbayah/Meanie Israel bunch are fucking nuts, a bunch of wishful PollyAnnas who fail to blame the people that are ultimately responsible for the carnage (the militias, who hide in civilian neighborhoods and launch from them) but I don't think they'll vote Green over this one issue, even if the bulk of the Democratic politicians side with Israel and not with the "poor Lebanese" (who ARE poor, and VICTIMIZED, but through the fault of the militia who deliberately, gleefully hide behind the skirts of the civilians and enthusiastically wave their dead at us, shouting "See??? SEEE???" when they HAD the POWER, and could have avoided the carnage by shooting from unpopulated areas).

And if the ultralefties who think Israel should just eat those rockets do desert the Democrats, good riddance to them. Who needs 'em? They're politically unreliable anyway. And they'll be doing their miserable part for BushCo with that sort of a flounce-off to enable the GOP to steal another election.

If they are THAT stupid, that childish, that much a "single issue voter," then we ARE getting 'the gubmint' we deserve....I refuse to fear them, to worry about how they will react, and I refuse to kowtow to them, either. Fuck 'em.

They can be adult, and pragmatic, and stand with sensible Democrats who see the world as it is and will move the progressive bar forward, albeit at a slower pace than they might prefer, or they can be steamrollered once again by a brutal Republican machine while waving their idiotic Nader signs.

It's their choice.

[americanstranger]

10. So you don't think Rove sees an upside to Dems arguing about this?

Just curious.

- as

[MADem]

15. Not that will last, honestly, or that will even stick, IMO.

These short-term brouhahas aren't worth worrying about, either way. By the time people go to the polls, the odds are quite good that there will be a multinational force on the border, and the militia will be either on the run, or sitting on their asses in Syria or Iran licking their wounds. Any that hang around Lebanon will be targets for special ops types. And funding will start to be organized to aid Lebanon not only in reconstruction, but some serious shaping up and reconstitution of their worthless fucking half-baked HizbAllah-infected army.

And it would not suprise me if for every far-leftist that stomps off to Nader (and ironically, provides support to the GOP) over the Democrats' refusal to abandon a traditional ally who has an enemy firing straight at them over their northern border, a recovering conservative who has looked askance at the Democrats in the past, but who is dismayed by the insanity of the BushCo regime, may just decide to get up off their ass on election day instead of staying home. That disaffected conservative may well vote for that Democratic ticket, due to a belief that, on matters of security, the Democrats pick sensible battles, see the issues involved in this matter clearly, and don't abandon their long-term allies.

[U4ikLefty]

12. Wow, nice post...not!!!

"When it comes down to choices, there are people on the left who agree that Israel has a right to defend itself, and people who think they should shut up and allow ten thousand rockets to rain down on them without response."

I like the false choice: either people on the left are in line with Israel's war crimes or they are in favor of "thousands" of rockets.

Another cutie is equating the Jews with Israel: "Personally, I find myself allied with the Jews on this issue, and though I disagree with their approach to Palestine, I don't confuse Lebanon and HizbAllah with Palestine and HAMAS."

...yet you confuse "Jews" with "Israel"...why???

And finally, let us not forget the elitist BS line: "And if the ultralefties who think Israel should just eat those rockets do desert the Democrats, good riddance to them. Who needs 'em?"

...you are indeed a great liberal :sarcasm:

[MADem]

13. Hey, there, rocket scientist....the JEWS run Israel, the Jews ARE Israel

I'm not supporting the MORMONS of Israel, I'm supporting the JEWS...and ya know why???

Because if Israel were populated with MUSLIMS, no one would be firing ROCKETS at the poor bastards and trying to push them into the sea!

But go ahead and deny the obvious, and best of all, do it SMUGLY! Israel is a JEWISH STATE.....LOOK IT UP. You can like that state of affairs, or you can NOT like that state of affairs, but that's the way it is.

I'm astounded at how you don't KNOW this simple fact, and with every lick of condescension you can muster, you give me a little lecture! I see you your :sarcasm: and raise you a :rofl:

It's pointless to engage you, you don't know your history. Here's some reading for you. Educate yourself: http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/decind.html

The Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel was approved at a festive session of the People’s Council, comprised of representatives of the yishuv (the Jewish community in Palestine) and the Zionist movement, on Friday, May 14, 1948, several hours before the British Mandate for Palestine came to an end.

The Declaration consists of seven sections, and stipulates six matters:

It asserts the natural right of the Jewish people to be like all other peoples, exercising self-determination in its sovereign state.

It proclaims the establishment of a Jewish state in Eretz Israel, named "the State of Israel."

It establishes provisional institutions of state governance: the Provisional Council of State and the Provisional Government.

It states that an elected constituent assembly will formulate a constitution within several months.

It sets forth the principles of the political rule of the newly formed state.

It calls for peace and cooperation with the Arabs of Israel, the neighboring countries and their peoples, the Jewish people throughout the Diaspora, and the United Nations Organization.

[DELUSIONAL]

3. That's how long it will take to secure the WATER source

in Lebanon.

Everyone is being duped -- the Neocons know the real reason ---

Thus, by targeting Israel's most vulnerable strategic asset, its dwindling water supplies, Syria has been able to position itself to profoundly influence Israel's bargaining posture over borders and security. This, more than any other factor, may be the reason why Israel has not committed itself to a written agreement regarding a redeployment to the June 4, 1967 line. To do so would be to signal an irrevocable surrender of both the Jordan River and the Kinneret. But renewed rhetoric in Israel seems to suggest that policy-makers are seriously considering just such a move. This would be a win-win situation for Syria. At best, Mr. Assad would not only score a major victory by gaining back the Golan, but also dramatically alter the water equation, and by extension the balance of power, between Israel and Syria. At the very least, the water issue could drive a wedge between Israel and Turkey.

As policy planners struggle to revive the Syrian-Israeli dialogue once again, resolving the topic of water remains the most difficult task for the two countries. It is also the most important. The way the water issue plays out will have major repercussions not only for Israel, but the region as a whole. The ensconcement of Syria on the Golan would allow Damascus not only to virtually dictate terms to Jerusalem, but exert influence over Amman and create a rift in the Israeli-Turkish military partnership as well. Given the signals made by Israel's continued efforts to reopen talks with Syria, Jerusalem has not yet understood the geopolitical significance of water to its relations with its neighbors. As a result, Mr. Assad has been given an incentive to continue to apply the appropriate pressure, diplomatic as well as military to achieve his goals.

http://www.iasps.org/nbn/nbn70a.htm

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/HG21Ak01.html

Lebanon left for dead
By Pepe Escobar

Lebanon is mired in a terrifying labyrinth of death and destruction. Beirut's airport is bombed. Israel has imposed a sea blockade. Other than privileged Westerners who are being evacuated by air or sea, people have overnight become refugees. They are plunged into an exodus of hundreds of thousands crammed on rickety rural trucks, overcrowded buses, Red Crescent convoys and even Mercedes with Saudi license plates on a mad dash through Lebanese back roads to Syria.

While everyone's attention is being diverted by the magician's magic dust (or BIG bombs) -- Israel will secure another country/people's water resource. Killing off a few people -- means more water for Israel.

The wars of this century will be about WATER!

[WinkyDink]

6. He can't count higher than 7?

[BringEmOn]

8. It's the same thing he says to Jeff Gannon....

Ooooooooohhhh, Jeffie, I'll give you a week to stop that!
He's having multiple wargasms.

[IChing]

11. Because he gave New Orleans a week too?

Did nothing for a week.

[DanCa]

14. He wants to divide on this. And it's working. (nt)