Speechless

This pretty much speaks for itself.

Thank you Mahatma

Like most of the world (or at least the the portion of it that really doesn’t give a rat’s arse that Brittany Spears is popping out another one), I’ve been watching the Lebanon-Israel escalation with a mixture of fascination, horror, and despair.  It’s one of those situations that no matter what each side says, we’ll never really know for sure exactly who started it and why.  Was Israel responding to the unprovoked kidnapping of its soldiers on Israeli soil or did Hizbollah capture them in Lebanon?  Who bombed who when?  The only things we know for certain are:
a) innocent people have and will die
b) this isn’t going to solve anything

Please understand, I’m not for or against either side.  I simply think that all parties involved need to be sent to their rooms until they can behave like adults.  I’ve never understood what nations hope to achieve by going to war (except in cases where human rights are being grossly violated and it’s the only way to rectify the situation, e.g. World War II).  This situation is even worse, more like junior high bullies giving each other purple nurples when the hall monitor isn’t looking than an actual armed conflict with priorities and agendas.

I keep going back to the oft-quoted (but no less relevant) words of Mahatama Mohandas Gandhi: “An eye for an eye makes the world go blind.”  It’s like the maternal mantra of “I don’t care who started it, be mature enough to finish it.”  Israel should not have to tolerate terrorist actions against its soldiers, Lebanese citizens should not suffer for the extremist actions of a faction, and no civilians should have their lives disrupted (or worse, taken) because their leaders can’t decide on who was first in the lunch line.  Thanks to retaliatory tactics, both sides are tumbling into a situation that will be increasingly hard to resolve.

For some wonderful coverage on the conflict, check out a bulletin board at Flyer Talk, where two posters are giving up close and personal coverage of the military actions as they occur.  Dovster is an Israeli living in a kibbutz a stone’s throw from Lebanon, and BEYFlyer is within sight of the Beirut airport.  Both are giving calm, factual, and largely unbiased accounts of their experiences, all while hoping for each other’s safety.  If only those making the decisions on each side of the front were that mature.