essential reading

By Aziz P. -
The Jerusalem Post looks at the war by the numbers, which paint an asymmetric picture indeed. Using their data, we see that it takes 10 sorties by the IAF to kill one Lebanese, and 24 rockets to kill one Israeli. Despite the vast disparity of tecchnologic force and weapon precision, the collateral damage/military kill ratio on both sides is 1:1 - the disparity only affects the magnitude of the kill rate (a factor of 10), not the accuracy. The IAF chiefs admit openly that air power alone won't suppress rocket fire, which is quite a rhetorical about-face from when the war began.

Hezbollah's roots in Lebanon run deep, as this fascinating article on its social service network demonstrates. Meanwhile, Syria's ambassador to the US argues in a lonely op-ed that in refusing to engage in any diplomacy with Syria, the US "continues to lose ability to influence a major player in the Middle East". His question - does isolating Syria really advance our stategic interests? - is moot I guess.

And this lengthy essay by Wesley Clark on the failure of the Administration to engage the root case of violence in the middle east, from back in May, strikes me as rather prescient given what has transpired since.

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