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In a very dark cloud, a golden lining
Concerning the disaster of the Israeli-Hezbollah confrontation, Hugh Fitzgerald, in a blog comment at The New English Review, offers this heartening observation:
I wanted, in the atmosphere of bewailment and gnashing of teeth, to make one main point: that the failure of Israel to win easily, to obtain all of its objectives, has had an important and salutary effect. Imagine, for a minute, that the Israelis had managed to destroy all the Hezbollah forces and weaponry within a week or two. What would have been the result? More complacency by the Israelis, more of that silly belief that they can always handle everything and the Arabs and Muslims will never be a real threat. And then what? Then Olmert would have been able to continue his suicidal policy of giving up the “West Bank”…Of course. Think of our friend Mimi of Galilee, the self-described reformed peacenik who, despite the lessons she said she had learned about the follies of the “peace” process, nevertheless made it clear she was ready to recommence handing land away to the Arabs again the instant the fighting came to a satisfactory conclusion and the immediate threat had waned. But now, as a result of the Olmert/Livni/Peretz disaster, Mimi and the millions of Israeli leftists like her don’t have that “out.” Israel is wounded, the wolves are gathering, and the Israelis, if they want to live, have no choice but to change themselves back from a bunch of post-national liberal hedonists into a warrior nation.
In short, the unprincipled exception (meaning liberals recognizing the existence of enemies and supporting the use of force only under the pressure of a grave temporary emergency) is going to have to become the rule. And that’s good news, making the long-term survival of Israel more likely. Email entry |