Blair made a very unfortunate speech in Los Angeles, showing how out of sync he is with what is going on world-wide. UN told him to take a back seat from now on, as it prefers France to take a lead in the potential resolution of the crisis in the Middle East.
Blair will then also get to see at home that his own country is now pretty terminally fed up with him after almost ten years of his smooth operations. Even some of his own ministers are starting to question him over his foreign affairs policies.
The Guardian: UN tells Blair to take a back seat over Lebanon
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/foreignaffairs/story/0,,1835538,00.html
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Meanwhile the UN is realizing how impossible a situation it finds itself in. UN says it wants a multinational peace keeper force in Lebanon, repeating the mantra of Bush and Rice; but it knows it needs official Lebanon to want this also and to agree to it. UN knows that no such force can be sent in or even assembled in theory unless first there is a cease-fire in place as the French and Finnish diplomats have advised. But no cease-fire is in place because of you know who... catch 22.
Here for those who read French is a back ground article with the UN peace keeping operation chief.
French link:
http://www.lemonde.fr/web/article/0,1-0@2-734511,36-800353@51-759824,0.html
Jean-Marie Guéhenno, UN chief of peace keeping missions says they would need 10-20,000 people, and this he estimates would take several months to put together.
He knows that all this depends on what type of operation this force would have to be, and what political and ground-related goals it would have to accomplish. He also is wise enough to know that Nasrallah is very unlikely to surrender his militias weapons, which is what UN would have to achieve if anything is to make sense. He says one has to LISTEN TO LEBANON.
How do you -- as an unwanted outside peace-keeper -- disarm a population that defends itself against an aggressor? Only with an overall political agreement in place. Which requires "time" and mediators at work.
So the question soon is -- what would the job of a peace keeping force be about in Lebanon? Occupy the South of Lebanon? Disarm Nasrallahs militia? Just carry on the IDF job? Or make sure the IDF stops its offensives? Or all of this?
Either way, its a mission impossible on all fronts, in my opinion. (And also in the opinion of the UN expert who has enough experience in this, if you read between the lines of what he says in above linked French interview.)
UN asked several nations to contribute people to this multinational force. Yet, France says it will not participate in it without BOTH first a cease-fire in place without conditions, and a political overall agreement on how-what this peace force will operate, which is a view shared by more and more nations as France is leading this effort now from behind the scenes.
France says: We are not going to Lebanon to carry on the dirty job of Israel.
Foreign minister Philippe Douste-Blazy in Paris: "La France ne souhaite pas entrer dans un engrenage qui conduirait à l'existence d'une force sans un accord politique préalable."
(France does NOT wish to enter into a maelstoem dynamic which would lead to the existence of a force without preliminary overall political agreement in place.)
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Here Blair urges a "ReThink" - The Telegraph:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/08/02/wblair02.xml
(This is an important read as it shows other voices)
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Meanwhile as counter-point here in Tehran some rhetoric from the otherwise rather quiet Ayatollah Khamenei:
"Iran's supreme leader has urged the Muslim world to stand up to Israel and the US, criticising them for their role in the conflict in Lebanon. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said the US must expect a "destructive punch by Islamic nations" for its role in the crisis.
He also re-iterated Iran's support for militant group Hezbollah, but appeared to stress that the organisation operated independently from Tehran. The remarks, carried on state TV, were his first since early in the crisis.
'Devoted resistance'
More at BBC - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/5238162.stm
(The above BBC article states among other things that Iran and Syria are excluded from diplomatic efforts, but this is wrong. France is talking to Iran. You have to read many sources to see clearer.)
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Meanwhile the militia ramped up its daily rocket ratio flying South to almost 200 today, largest daily mission so far, and the range is getting longer and more far-reaching, while IDF battles its way through the guerilla positions...
Israeli troops are operating in their thousands along the Israel-Lebanon border, and additional soldiers crossed into Lebanon yesterday. They entered through four different points along the border and advanced at least four miles inside Lebanon. Israeli officials said their soldiers were to go as far as the Litani river, around 18 miles from the border, and hold the ground until an international peacekeeping force came ashore.
Guardian: 190 Hizbullah rockets hit Israel
http://www.guardian.co.uk/syria/story/0,,1835529,00.html
BBC says it is over 220 rockets...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/5239568.stm
Well, either way, the militia is alive and well, so it seems.
Rocket ranges on a map by BBC: (speculative ok)
- http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/5187974.stm
Guardian: "We Are Winning This War"
http://www.guardian.co.uk/syria/story/0,,1835299,00.html
(Report detailing now how the militia works in some places)
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So, now who exactly wants to send in its own people into that peace keeping force? Not France, and not Germany. Anyone else volonteering to go to Lebanon? Italy and Spain are takers. Anyone else?
Did you know that Hamas in Palestine and certain intellectuals in Israel had worked out a sustainable peace deal together just a day or so before the IDF began its operation in mid July? A fact lost in the shuffle of Mercury retrograde, but it helps explain why IDF went into overdrive arresting certain elected Hamas officials before entering Lebanon.
Meanwhile the beaches of Lebanon are covered in oil over a stretch of 50 miles or more. This is maybe the largest ecological disaster ever.
Peace -
St.Clair
“Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
there is a field. I will meet you there.” - Rumi (Sufi poet)
More links - sources, comments, background here:
