I haven't written in a while, haven't really felt the urge. Perhaps its been the lack of things to talk about, perhaps just the fact that I don't think anyone reads this thing anyways. Maybe its better this way. I have to say I am frightened. I am frightened by the state of affairs going on in the world around us. The war in Iraq, the problems in Darfur, and now the Israeli Conflict. The war in Iraq has been beat up on enough so I will just let that one be. Darfur is reaching a new level of conflict even with a peace agreement in place because of Chad's involvement. It's amazing how long the world has turned a blind eye to this segment of the world as a whole population of civilians is killed. The current state of affairs begs for a International United Nations force, one which has been refused entry from the Sudanese government. It's baffling what we are going to do to bring this conflict to an end.
I want to dedicate a little more discussion to the Israeli conflict. I believe this problem is bigger then meets the eye of most citizens in the US. I am going to forego a discussion on the Palestinian front.(like the Iraq war I think that has been discussed quite a bit too) So lets talk about Lebanon. There are a number of issues that scare me but there are one or two that make me feel like this is like no other conflict that we have seen in the past.
Let's take a look at Hizbullah, its a terrorist organization. One that is amazingly organized. The problem is not in their organization but in how the world and more importantly the United States is supposed to deal with them. It's a group housed primarily in Lebanon but funded mostly by Iran and Syria. That sort of structure begs the question who is to blame. Hizbullah attacks Israel, Israel attacks Lebanon. A minority Shiite' organization in the Southern part of Lebanon attacks Israel and the disproportionate response sets a whole country back twenty years. Israel is defending itself but not by curtailing the current threat. They are ensuring that they do enough damage to Lebanon to prevent the revival of the threat for years to come. In some senses with the perdicament that Israel is in they are within their rights to do so. My problem is that setting back Lebanon will not solve the problem. It will merely result in the funding mechanisms targeting their money to different organizations.
Let's take a look at Hizbullah, its a social welfare organization. One that is also amazingly organized. Hizbullah runs a couple of hospitals, a few schools and a variety of other social service type orgs. In fact Hizbullah in South Lebanon does a better job of social service then the Lebanese government itself. By bombing Hizbullah the Israelis are destroying a social service organization that is close to the people and therefore providing another reason for the people to hate Israel if there weren't already enough. The Israelis are creating a recruiting haven for Hizbullah for years to come as the youth of those lost and slain will harbor hatred for those that are responsible.
There are definitely many other facets to this discussion that I am omitting but just the two highlighted above, in my mind, make this a very scary situation.